Theatremachine: Tadeusz Kantor in Context ed. by Magda Romanska and Kathleen Cioffi

Abstract

Reviewed by: Theatremachine: Tadeusz Kantor in Context ed. by Magda Romanska and Kathleen Cioffi Mischa Twitchin THEATREMACHINE: TADEUSZ KANTOR IN CONTEXT. Edited by Magda Romanska and Kathleen Cioffi. Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 2020; pp. 342. After more than thirty years now since his death, the ambition of this collection of essays (in the words of one its coeditors) is "to reframe and reexamine Kantor's work in the critical context of contemporary theory and aesthetics, while reclaiming the critical and formal opportunities it offers" (xvi). One might pause to reflect on this "while," as it suggests an interesting caveat concerning the relation between the two aims—not least, with respect to a "critical" understanding of "context" in the book itself. What kinds of questions, after all, might the singularity of Kantor's work still provoke, not least as concerns the context of theatre studies? Although the tension between the critical and the aesthetic is perhaps endemic in theatre research, it becomes especially noticeable in light not only of Kantor's lifelong polemics but, more crucially, of the artistic and conceptual commitments that underlie them. Distinct from exploring Kantor's own sense of "context" (such as he attempted to define it himself in his manifestos and in his archive project, the Cricoteka), many of the essays here seem to want, rather, to apply some moral to Kantor's work—or draw one from it—whether this concerns, for example, art "after Auschwitz," ideas of the post-human, post-memory, or the Anthropocene. In this respect, the collection interestingly invites reflection on aspects of Kantor's reception today, of which it offers an important example of its own. The scope of the "contexts" in which Kantor's work is read here is indicated by the three editorial headings under which the essays are grouped: "in theory," "locally" (that is, in relation to Poland specifically, including its Jewish cultural legacies), and "globally." Besides new essays from scholars such as Hans-Thies Lehmann (addressing Kantor in respect of "post-dramatic tragedy") and Michal Kobialka (exploring the reality of "objects" in Kantor's theatre, distinct from the conventions of "props"), as well as valuable essays by each of the editors themselves, the collection includes translations of essays by many Polish researchers, which makes for a particular recommendation of the editors' work. Among these, Grzegorz Niziolek, for instance, evokes a sense of the "obscene" (48) in the relation (the "scandalous collision" [45]) between Kantor's theatre and history, specifically the Holocaust, within the postwar Polish context. Another key to the collection is the editors' invitation to their contributors to put Kantor into relation with other theatre artists, including (among others) Bausch, Tanguy, Perceval, and the Wooster Group, to propose international connections through which to consider his work anew. Insights are derived from attention to cultural contexts here, with Izumi Ashizawa's essay on "Kantor and Japan," for example, reflecting on the difference between the onstage role of the assistant in Noh theatre (koken), as distinct from the supporting character (waki) that Georges Banu famously suggested as a point of comparison for Kantor (233); and from Kris Salata's examination of the key notion of a "poor theatre" in an essay reviewing what is lost in the English translation of a distinction in Polish between biedny (in Kantor's use) and ubogi (in Grotowski's) (157). With respect to the context of theatre studies itself, however, it is interesting how rare are the moments where different essays offer, precisely, different (still less contradictory) refractions of the very question of "Kantor in context"—where the use of the singular in the book's subtitle (rather than "contexts") is perhaps already indicative. The sense that, as Katarzyna Fazan notes, "Kantor's actions provoke ambiguous interpretations" (190) is barely explored, and only the essay by Anna Burzynska offers the explicit caveat "that there is actually no such thing as one 'theatre of Tadeusz Kantor,' an easily defined, unchanging monolith" (255). While, no doubt, all of the contributors would agree with this, such awareness is belied by the recurring assertion of themes, often caught up in a critical will to identify "influences," whether that of Kantor on others or, more...