Beyond Lady Audley's Secret: Drama in the English Department

Abstract

The field of drama or theater suffers perhaps more than any other from the pigeonholing of educational institutions. Drama or theater? The question itself defines the problem. Is a course to concern itself with dramatic literature, the study of text, or is it to deal with the process of staging, the means by which the text becomes performance? In the normal course of events the English or Language departments claim the one and the Theatre Arts departments claim the other, so that the student-who is unlikely to be attached to both departmentshas little chance of coordinating with any strength literary knowledge and practical ability. The problem is understandable: if a member of an English department feels he or she would like to extend with practical work a course in dramatic literature, the facilities-let alone a theater-are seldom available; if a member of a Theatre Arts department feels a need for deeper textual analysis and understanding, he or she is liable to forego this under the pressure of producing practical results and coordinating all the various elements that become a part of that process. And so the field continues to lie uneasy in any teaching schedule because, from either end, one feels one is never communicating the whole. Poetry and the novel are self-contained literary forms whose richness is contained conveniently within the covers of a single book. Not so the play: the book is one half, the stage process the other; the two halves should not be separated, and the need for practical knowledge and involvement presents quite separate teaching problems. Under the strain of this situation, I have been attempting, as a member of an English department, to develop means whereby the theoretical and practical aspects of drama/theater can be brought closer together. The result is an approach to practical work that can be made a part of any regular course offering in draLmatic literature. This approach tries to show first, what can be practically achieved without technical facilities readily available to Theatre Arts programs; second, that textual and practical work can be combined and related within a single course, thus lessening the gap between the literary and the theatrical; and third, that there is a kind of practical work open to all students whether they have had previous experience or not. The emphasis rests on maximum physical involvement and minimal technical complication. Given an empty floor space and a group of people of varied experience and interest, I have concerned myself with