Theatre History Research Articles

Honour, Harmony and the King of Outspokenness. The Use of Stage Plays and Festive Culture in Fifteenth-Century Flemish Coastal Communities

ABSTRACT The history of fifteenth-century theatre in the Low Countries has long been studied primarily as the history of culture, literature and theatre. It has now attracted the attention of social historians and anthropologists and is being studied as an urban history of corporations, fraternities and chambers of rhetoric. That creative and art-loving activities in the Low Countries also frequently occurred in the fifteenth-century coastal communities, which largely comprised fishermen and sailors,, usually escapes the attention of historians. I argue these communities integrated drama into a survival strategy motivated by the spatial, economic and sociocultural context in which they were living.

The Case(s) of Thomasine Ostler: Gender, Fiction, and Theatre History in Common Law Court Records

Abstract This article asks what theatre historians can (and can’t) learn from the records of Thomasine Ostler in the court of King’s Bench between 1615 and 1619, during which period Ostler filed suit not only against her father, the actor John Heminges, but also the son of Walter Raleigh. Ostler’s name is not unfamiliar to scholars, but neither she nor the enrolments of her suits have been examined in detail, and both have been misunderstood or simply overlooked. The article hinges on a new way of working with the plea rolls of England’s common law courts, whose Latin entries have long been seen as limited repositories of ‘essential facts’ to be extracted from ‘smokescreens of formalism and legal fiction’. This article argues instead that plea rolls should be understood as sites of fiction-making, and uses Ostler’s suits to show why their constitution of character and plot should matter to theatre historians. The article thereby casts light on not just the ownership of playhouse shares contested by Ostler and Heminges, but the actions, motivations, and interpersonal relationships of all three parties in Ostler’s suits. It also challenges scholars to re-think the value of plea rolls as sources for women’s lives and stories.

KUNQU MUSIC THEATRE IN YANGZHOU IN THE 18TH CENTURY

This study focuses on the development characteristics of the traditional Kunqu opera in the Yangzhou theatre in the 18th century, particularly in the context of the emergence of the owery genre (huabu). The author identi es parallels in the historical cycles of the development of the owery genres and contemporary Chinese opera and suggests several recommendations for incorporating traditional techniques into modern productions to popularise Kunqu music theatre. The aim of this study is to deeply explore the history, culture, and art of the Yangzhou theatre and its in uence on Chinese theatrical art, as well as its value and inspiration in contemporary theatrical art. Furthermore, the study provides practical recommendations for presenting and developing the Yangzhou theatre.

From Anatomical Theatres to the Stage: Ferdinand and Dissection in the Duchess of Malfi

Unlike our 21st-century approaches to the disciplines, science and art were inextricably intertwined during the Early Modern Period. Innovations in scientific knowledge were both propagated and critiqued through various literary forms. Operating within the intersection of science and literature, this essay examines John Webster’s 17th-century play, The Duchess of Malfi, as a vehicle for critiquing contemporary anatomical dissections. Building upon Daisy Murray’s Twins in Early Modern English Drama and Shakespeare, and Albert H. Tricomi’s “The Severed Hand in Webster’s Duchess of Malfi,” this essay highlights the ways in which Webster engages with the anatomical dissections of his time. “From Anatomical Theatres to the Stage” begins with an overview of the history of European anatomical theatres and moves into an analysis of twinship as a dissection at birth and its implications for the early modern reader. Then, it considers Ferdinand’s association to witchcraft and his embodiment of the early modern surgeon as a means to showcase the immoral nature of the performance of human dissection. Beyond its demonstration of Webster’s engagement with his contemporary science, this essay ultimately illustrates the inseparability of art and science.

Vater – Land – Liebe

Abstract The article discusses in which ways Catherine Bernard reflects in her tragedy Brutus the aporias of the Roman-Republican usus as well as its habitus by staging the famous episode of the roman history in which Brutus sacrifices his two sons – Titus and Tibérinus – for the sake of the Roman Republic. Bernard introduces in her play the character of Valérie, the sister of the consul Valérius, in order to present a moral counterpart to the masculine Roman ethics. By doing this, Bernard’s tragedy constitutes a turning part in the history of the French classicist theatre: her Brutus sets an end to a specific classicist poetics that focusses on state affairs and introduces at the same time a new poetical concept: a civil classicism.

Eugene O’Neill and the Unity of Addiction

ABSTRACT Eugene O’Neill has cast a long shadow over the discourse on drug addiction in American theater. Yet, his conception of addiction is unique in theater history. This article explores the ways he infuses his dramaturgy with the cycles and themes related to addiction. It also places O’Neill in a literary context by tracing some potential influences on his conception of addiction. With a primary focus on Long Day’s Journey Into Night and a secondary focus on A Moon for the Misbegotten and The Iceman Cometh, this article examines how the cyclical nature of habituation serves as a scaffolding for characterizations, dialogue, and dramatic structure. It reveals O’Neill’s activation of addiction as part of a grand ontological metaphor and a manifestation of an existential philosophy. This article parses these uses and how they relate to other authors, including Thomas De Quincey, Charles Baudelaire, the British Decadents, and philosophers Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.

Charles Fleetwood, the 1744 Drury Lane Riots, and Pricing Practices in Eighteenth‐Century British Theatre

AbstractIn November 1744, a series of riots broke out at Drury Lane theatre, forcing its proprietor, Charles Fleetwood, to sell his majority share of the theatrical patent. Theatre scholarship has long held that the riots were caused by Fleetwood's attempt to raise admission prices for old pantomimes, yet also, somewhat contradictorily, has maintained that admission prices definitively increased at London's patent theatres in the period around 1740. This article shows both points to be mistaken: prices did not rise in the period, and Fleetwood was forced out due to a range of grievances that had developed over the preceding decade. By revealing how pricing practices, Fleetwood's tenure, and the riots developed, this article provides new insights on a crucial period in London's theatre history (the 1730s–40s) and on the wider social and economic dynamics of Georgian theatregoing.

From the desk of the Editor-in-Chief: Introduction to the Black Theatre Review, <em>Nurturing</em>

In this issue, Vol. 3.1., we invite readers to explore the collective body of Black and African Diasporic theatre history, dramatic literature, performance and production, multimedia media, artistic leadership, pedagogy, and praxis for elements of nurturing that center Black female and femme experiences. For this issue, nurturing is defined as the acts, rituals, and strategies of care that enhance one’s inner power and enable them to flow toward joy and vitality. Black women scholars, artists, and administrators often teach, conduct research and creative scholarship, govern, build, and nurture within institutional systems in the face of lack and their peril. Collectively, the entries featured in this issue attempt to move Black women—protagonists, playwrights, contemporary icons—from the margins to the center. Black Feminist and Afro-indigenous acts, rituals, and strategies of care are explicit and remind readers that love can be found everywhere. In all circumstances, a real revolution occurs within.

Reading Stanislavsky from a Stage Lighting Designer’s Point of View: Stanislavsky’s Notes on the Dramaturgy of Light

ABSTRACT Stage lighting design is, mostly, referenced and researched in correlation to the scenographic history of theatre, often leaving in shadow the organic impact it has on the human beings involved in the theatre process, both in front and behind the footlights. Light, though, is not just a visual scenographic element; it is living, an orchestrator of the human vision; we still say, “I‘m going to see a play” and not hear a text spoken on stage. The beginning of the twentieth century was a turning point for theatre making, with Stanislavsky being one reference point for future developments. He made valuable remarks about lighting, proving that concentrating attention is an active process that does not happen by accident and that there are tools, like lighting, to facilitate that process. Key to my discussion here will be Stanislavsky’s notion of a light-initiated compartmentalisation and manipulation of stage space, i.e. the identification of specific sections on the stage the limits of which are set by light: circles of attention. Stanislavsky’s circles of attention support the statement that lighting serves as a “magnifying lens” that draws the viewer’s focus to particular areas or actions on stage. This article will elaborate on the potential of Stanislavsky’s circles of attention to the dramaturgy of light, shedding light on various extracts of his writings where the dynamic functions of stage lighting are observed and described in an experiential way.

Renaissance Drama: Excluding Shakespeare

Abstract This chapter has three sections: 1. Editions and Textual Matters: this will be available as a double section in the next edition of YWES; 2. Theatre History: this will also be available as a double section in the next edition of YWES; 3. Criticism. Section 3(a) General is by Cristina Paravano; section 3(b) Marlowe is by Cristiano Ragni; section 3(c) Jonson is by Yuri Enjo.

Liver Graft Machine Perfusion: From History Perspective to Modern Approaches in Transplant Surgery.

The shortage of donor organs remains an unresolved issue in livertransplantation worldwide. Consequently, strategies for expanding the donor pool are currently being developed. Donors meeting extended criteria undergo thorough evaluation, as livers obtained from marginal donors yield poorer outcomes in recipients, including exacerbated reperfusion injury, acute kidney injury, early graft dysfunction, and primary nonfunctioning graft. However, the implementation of machine perfusion has shown excellent potential in preserving donor livers and improving their characteristics to achieve better outcomes for recipients. In this review, we analyzed the global experience of using machine perfusion in livertransplantation through the history ofthe development ofthis method to the latest trends and possibilities for increasing the number of liver transplants.

Cowhides and motorcars

The proposed development at Beaverbank Place, Canonmills, Edinburgh led to the excavation of theremains of the 19th-century Beaverbank Tannery. Accompanying historical research allowed the history ofthe ownership and tenancies of the buildings and various businesses to be traced from 1807 to 1959. Thisincluded the early 19th-century Clark’s Mill linen bleachers and the 1868 tannery built by the Johnstonfamily and later leased by family firms of the Pringles and Walkers. A period of abandonment between1913 and 1915 was followed by the repurposing of the building as a sawmill and cooperage. Part of thesite changed again to become a motor garage in 1928. The remains can be matched well with historic map evidence and appear to relate predominantly to thelate 19th-century tannery structures. Remains were found of approximately 100 tanning pits set out in a gridpattern, with further features related to drainage, paving and other structures. Very little environmental orartefactual evidence was recovered to shed light on specific practices, materials used or materials produced. There were also scant structural remains that could be related to the earlier linen bleachers and to thelater motor garage.

Художественное осмысление судеб людей искусства в драме Т. Миннуллина «Галиябану – ненаглядная моя»

The purpose of the study is to reveal the features of the plot interpretation by the playwright T. Minnullin of individual destinies of creative people in the drama "Galiyabanu – My Beloved". In the play, the author managed to show the "conflict of generations" not in the generally accepted everyday plan, but in the stage and professional one, namely in three planes of the fate of theater artists (the stage play of the younger generation of actors, theatrical history and the personal life of actors of the older generation). Special attention is paid to the role of the visual media used in revealing the world of art people and their images, as well as expressing the author's position. The scientific novelty consists in revealing the intertwining of the artist's personal fate with the life of society, the need to serve a great purpose and the emotional vulnerability of a man of art in T. Minnullin's play. Their personal life (unhappy love, loneliness) and the moral and philosophical problems of our time (contradictions between two generations, transformation of moral values, lack of public attention, etc.) are evaluated in this plane. As a result of the research, it was determined: firstly, for the comprehensive disclosure of the images of people of art, the playwright T. Minnullin refers to the widely known classic work "Galiyabanu" by M. Faizi. Secondly, such artistic means as techniques of psychologism and motifs of intertextuality and play contribute to the deep disclosure of the world of people of art, characters of heroes, and thirdly, the difference in world perception and worldview, manifested as usual in the conflict of generations, is represented by the author by the play of artists two generations in the play.

Debating Decolonization: The Use of Postcolonial Metatheatre in Murray Carlin’s Not Now, Sweet Desdemona

This article considers Not Now, Sweet Desdemona (1967) by the South African playwright Murray Carlin as an intervention in the critical and performance histories of Othello, situating Shakespeare’s tragedy within contemporary postcolonial and apartheid-era debates. Carlin’s play reveals multiple interlocking layers of meta-commentary to illustrate the ways in which Othello is haunted by postcolonialism. This reading builds on Marvin Carlson’s notion of the haunted stage as well as Joanne Tompkins’s account of postcolonial metatheatre, in which an embedded counter-discourse assists in the rereading, restructuring, and resituating of a “base” play. In the case of Not Now, Sweet Desdemona, Carlin engages metatheatrically with racist and misogynist discourses as well as with fields that are less often mentioned in discussions of postcolonial metatheatre, such as literary criticism and theatre history. Through these engagements, Carlin positions Othello as both a historical vector for racist ideologies and a more contemporary tool for challenging and dismantling systemic oppression.

Perspectives on the history and present of documentary theater

Perspectives on the history and present of documentary theater

Jane Plastow, A History of East African Theatre, I: Horn of Africa

Book review.

Historiography of the study of theatrical and decorative art in the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century

The purpose of the study is to review and systematise the source base of research on theatrical and decorative art, to consider the dynamics of the latter in the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the 20th and first quarter of the 21st century. The research methodology is based on the cultural-historical method. The article reveals for the first time the historiography of cultural studies of theatrical and decorative art, summarises, systematises and periodises sources that deepen the understanding of theatrical and decorative art of the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the period of the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century in the cultural dimension, outlines the state of scientific development of the topic; reviews publications on theatrical and decorative art, the work of scenography figures and their artistic achievements. The scientific works that study the theatrical culture of the region in the 20th and first quarter of the 21st century are analysed and its influence on the formation of the region’s scenic art is determined. The analysis of the historiography of theatrical and decorative art of the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century shows that the main problems faced by a modern researcher of this topic are the lack of a source base dedicated to the theatrical and decorative art of Transcarpathia of this period and the absence of its periodisation. Modern cultural studies and other researchers studying this issue can only rely on literary publications and other general sources, till april 2024 there is a lack of research on Transcarpathian theater and set design. The results of the study can be used in the preparation of generalised works on the history and theory of culture, the history of theater in Transcarpathia, as well as in the preparation of scientific seminars, lectures, advanced training courses

Historiography of the study of theatrical and decorative art in the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century

The purpose of the study is to review and systematise the source base of research on theatrical and decorative art, to consider the dynamics of the latter in the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the 20th and first quarter of the 21st century. The research methodology is based on the cultural-historical method. The article reveals for the first time the historiography of cultural studies of theatrical and decorative art, summarises, systematises and periodises sources that deepen the understanding of theatrical and decorative art of the theatrical culture of Transcarpathia in the period of the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century in the cultural dimension, outlines the state of scientific development of the topic; reviews publications on theatrical and decorative art, the work of scenography figures and their artistic achievements. The scientific works that study the theatrical culture of the region in the 20th and first quarter of the 21st century are analysed and its influence on the formation of the region’s scenic art is determined. The analysis of the historiography of theatrical and decorative art of the 20th – first quarter of the 21st century shows that the main problems faced by a modern researcher of this topic are the lack of a source base dedicated to the theatrical and decorative art of Transcarpathia of this period and the absence of its periodisation. Modern cultural studies and other researchers studying this issue can only rely on literary publications and other general sources, till april 2024 there is a lack of research on Transcarpathian theater and set design. The results of the study can be used in the preparation of generalised works on the history and theory of culture, the history of theater in Transcarpathia, as well as in the preparation of scientific seminars, lectures, advanced training courses

Theatre & Medicine By Stanton B. Garner Jr. Theatre &. London: Bloomsbury, 2023; pp. x + 94 pages. $12.95 paper; $11.65 e-book. - Symptoms of the Self: Tuberculosis and the Making of the Modern Stage By Roberta Barker. Studies in Theatre History and Culture. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2022; pp. x + 299, 16 illustrations. $90.00 paper; $90.00

Theatre & Medicine By Stanton B. Garner Jr. Theatre &. London: Bloomsbury, 2023; pp. x + 94 pages. $12.95 paper; $11.65 e-book. - Symptoms of the Self: Tuberculosis and the Making of the Modern Stage By Roberta Barker. Studies in Theatre History and Culture. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2022; pp. x + 299, 16 illustrations. $90.00 paper; $90.00

Women Playwrights at the Crossroads: A Comparative Study of Ireland and Korea in the Mid-Twentieth Century

This paper examines plays by Irish and Korean women playwrights whose work is often neglected in their national canons and in the male-dominated theatre scene of the mid-twentieth century. The cases of Ireland and Korea overlap in compelling ways with discussions of modernity that are being reconstructed from the perspectives of colonial subjugation (under Britain and Japan) and wartime experience (in the Irish Civil War of 1922-23 and Korean War of 1950-53). There is a close relationship between these women writers’ marginalised place in their respective countries’ literary and theatrical scene and the process of Irish and Korean modernisation. The paper conducts a comparative analysis of works by Teresa Deevy, Kim Ja-rim, Maura Laverty and Jeon Ok-joo, highlighting the various thematic, political and formal strategies that these playwrights adopted at a time when their nations were ‘at the crossroads’. Against the grand narratives of ‘the nation’, women playwrights focused on depicting the aesthetics of daily life, emphasising aspects that had been neglected or marginalised in the discourse of modernity/coloniality. They dismantled clichés of dutiful wives and pacifist mothers, choosing instead to create complex and authentic depictions of femininity, endowing their female characters with a potent political voice in the public sphere. By reassessing their plays from a transnational feminist perspective, the paper seeks to expand feminist discourses in both Irish and Korean theatre history.