The death of character: Reflections on theatre after modernism.
Item
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Title
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The death of character: Reflections on theatre after modernism.
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Identifier
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AAI9630457
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identifier
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9630457
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Creator
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Fuchs, Elinor.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Marvin Carlson
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Date
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1995
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Theater
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Abstract
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Aristotle's insistence that Character was secondary to Plot in the structure of tragedy was theoretically challenged by Hegel as the culmination of interest in feeling, spiritual development and interiority that had been growing in Western drama since the Renaissance. Yet later in the 19th century, Nietzsche's attack on bourgeois character in drama seemed to mark a decline of interest in character in general. Avant-garde theatre artists at the turn of the century turned against character in their theoretical writings, and playwrights creating new theatrical forms in the early 20th century used allegorical or theatricalist strategies to shift the dramaturgical center of plays away from character to idea or pattern. One strong modern genre to emerge from these experiments is the Mysterium, based on part on a conflation of medieval mystery and morality dramatic structural models.;In postmodern theatre, character has been levelled to one dramaturgical effect among many. This can be seen in the emergence of interest by directors and writers in bringing reading and writing directly onto the stage, thus diminishing the impression of autonomous character, and in the "landscape" staging of contemporary directors, which treats character as an element in a dispersed pattern. The postmodern spectator's ability to "read" such productions is contingent on his or her own dispersed or decentered sense of self. Some contemporary women directors and writers have used obscenity as a way to expose the split in the female subject formed by her division into "good" and "bad" sexual classes. These productions may stir conflict in the female spectator, while ultimately suggesting a potential for a new, more integrated postmodern female subject. The spectator as listening and seeing subject is also undergoing mutation in postmodern "shopping" theatre, as s/he enters the spectacle to become adjunct performer, and the boundary between performer and performance dissolves.;If theatre is losing traditional boundaries, Western culture generally has become highly theatricalized. An examination of the theatrical metaphor in contemporary theoretical discourse suggests that "theatre" has been identified as a crucial transitional space in culture, one that appears after old grounding principles collapse, or before new ones appear. In this light, postmodernism appears as a cultural transition that is inherently theatrical.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
