Space and Reference in Drama

Abstract

If, following Beckett's example, one can banish from a play various elements, such as movement, or even dialogue, the element that must remain constant and be retained in any text written for theatrical performance is, of course, space. A play when enacted must take place somewhere. Its performance must occur in some real, visible space, on a stage or in an area fulfilling that purpose. That much is obvious. But what is perhaps less obvious is how complex space in drama is, once it is subjected to analysis. In the case of narrative, when we talk of space, we are normally referring to one of two kinds of space the space of language (the text itself considered spatially) (Genette, 1969:43-48), or the language of space, namely the words cueing the reader and enabling him to participate in the illusion of the verbal creation of geographic space (cf. Issacharoff, 1976:10-19, 1978:1-5). In narrative, however, since there can be only one channel transmitting space verbal language its mode of existence is relatively simple. Space in narrative, then, is mediated by language, and its perception by the reader can only occur through the verbal medium. In the theater, on the other hand, space is a much more complicated phenomenon, embracing several conceivable theatrical areas. A fundamental distinction must be drawn, first of all, between the two entities: space on stage and space off stage, between what is shown to an audience and what is not. That problem alone is the epitome of controversies and aesthetic theory spanning some three hundred years of French theater! Moreover, dramatic tension is often contingent on the antinomy between visible space represented and invisible space described. I shall return to this distinction later. The main point to bear in mind for the moment is that unlike space in narrative, space in drama is not one-dimensional and it is best classified in accordance with its mode of transmission by the encoder and perception by the decoder.