The scientist on the stage: a survey

Abstract

Science and theatre seem to have almost always been regarded as fundamentally, and largely irreconcilably, disparate. Both have evolved over the centuries and millennia, and the exercise of each has varied greatly from culture to culture, but historically there has been little overlap. Only fairly recently has the scientist—and the practice of science—come to figure on the stage with any sort of regularity. Even now one can hardly speak of a conquest of the boards by science: a few plays garner much attention and count as successes—including Bertolt Brecht's 'Life of Galileo', Tom Stoppard's 'Arcadia', and Michael Frayn's 'Copenhagen'—but they are exceptions. A notion of incompatibility between science and theatre remains deeply ingrained.