Don’t tell Robert Skloot the arts aren’t important.

“I’m a firm believer in bringing the arts into the discussion of important human issues,” he says.

The Professor Emeritus of Theatre from the University of Wisconsin is in town to star in his own play, “If the Whole Body Dies: Raphael Lemkin and the Treaty against Genocide”, opening Thursday in the Inge Theatre at KU.

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Lemkin, who first coined the term, “genocide,” is one of history’s more important but lesser known figures. Born in Poland in 1900, Lemkin grew up to earn two Ph.D’s – one in Linguistics and the other in Law. He taught at Uppsala University in Sweden in the 1930’s, and immigrated to the U.S. in 1941.

Lemkin was Jewish, and, while he personally escaped the Holocaust, 49 members of his family died in Nazi concentration camps. He went to work for the U.S. War Department, and, in 1944, wrote a definitive treatise on Nazi Law. It was in this document he first used the word, “genocide.”

After the war, he wrote the Treatise on Genocide, which became the basis for the U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Lemkin then spent the rest of his life advocating U.N. member-nations to adopt it.

“He had no official position,” Skloot says, “only his own brilliance and persistence.”

And persistent he was. Lemkin traveled the globe meeting with leader after leader to get the treaty signed. In 1951, 20 nations had agreed – enough for formal U.N. ratification.

“He spoke nine languages and knew 11,” Skloot says. “He was truly a world citizen.”

Skloot first became interested in Lemkin back in 2006.

“My research interests ran to the Holocaust and Theatre,” Skloot says. “In the late ’90’s, Holocaust Studies expanded to become Genocide Studies. Lemkin was virtually unknown when he died in 1959. More attention was given to him in Samantha Power’s book, ‘A Problem from Hell: American and the Age of Genocide’ in 2003. The first 80 or so pages of the book are about Lemkin.”

Skloot wrote “If the Whole Body Dies” to bring more attention to the anti-genocide crusader.

“Towards the end of my career, I wanted to write a play,” he says. “I hadn’t written one, but I’d doctored many.”

That’s where that passion for the arts tackling the human issues moved him.

“These big questions can be investigated, not better, but differently by the arts,” he says. “Theatre brings a whole new perspective to an issue.

“And,” he admits, grinning roguishly, “I’m egged on by people who are opposed to this idea. There are some social scientists who have little patience for how the arts can voice these discussions. They think it should only be analyzed in papers and articles.”

“If the Whole Body Dies” has enjoyed wide consideration. It’s been translated into several languages, among them Hebrew, Spanish, and Polish. It’s been read or performed all over the world, including productions in Peru and Cuba. A staged reading of it at KU last year prompted University Theatre to bring it back for a fuller production under the direction of KU Theatre Professor John Gronbeck-Tedesco.

“I’m fascinated to see what John thinks of it,” Skloot says, noting that, as a playwright, it’s interesting to see what a director finds in his work.

But if the show is based on the heavy material of genocide and the struggle of one man to eradicate it through international law, Skloot is mainly interested in telling a very human story.

“I want the audience to know how Lemkin lived his life and what he wanted to do,” he says. “The message has to do with the struggles to carry out a decent life – what we can learn from Lemkin’s life about living forthrightly.”

“If the Whole Body Dies” plays November 29, 30, December 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. Performances are at 7:30pm every night except Sunday, the 2nd, when curtain is 2:30pm. Audience talkbacks follow the November 29 and December 2 performances. Tickets are available by calling the box office at 785-864-3982 and online at www.kutheatre.com.