Books in the Dramaturgies series

In 1961, Martin Esslin named a body of plays that lacked plot, character depth, and details of time and space the "Theatre of the Absurd". Esslin explained that this type of theatre, minimalist in the extreme, constituted a response to the existential crisis of Europe, which was in the midst of recovering from World War II. But the fact that this body of theatre lacked details of time and space means that we may break the ties that anchor the Theatre of the Absurd irremediably to the historical context of post-World War II Europe. How can the Theatre of the Absurd speak meaningfully to us in the twenty-first century? This book explores this question by combining the avant-garde that Martin Esslin named in 1961 in his signature work The Theatre of the Absurd with gender studies, queer theory, and psychoanalysis, and avant-garde studies. The Theatre of the Absurd is capable of subverting post-millennial institutions and ideologies, including the Prison Industrial Complex and the West¿s domination of the Islamic world in a post-9/11 era.

This book brings together essays on the Stratford Festival, on Shakespeare in Quebec, and on Canadian dramatic adaptations of Hamlet and Othello by Ric Knowles, one of Canadäs leading drama and theatre scholars. The essays discuss such major figures as Robert Lepage, Ann Marie MacDonald, Djanet Sears, Michael O¿Brien, Ken Gass, Robin Phillips, Marco Micone, and Martine Beaulne. Taken together they explore both the role that Canada has played in contemporary understandings of Shakespeare, and the role that Shakespeare has played in the constitution of postcolonial Canadian subjectivity and nationhood.

This book examines the dramatic rewritings that emerged in the period 1970-2007, during which stage adaptations flourished in Ireland. The year 1970 marked the beginning of a significant theatrical renaissance in Ireland, recalling that which occurred in the early twentieth century. This renewal was characterized by the prominence of major playwrights such as Brian Friel, Tom Murphy and Thomas Kilroy. The essays collected in this volume seek to provide new perspectives on theatre adaptation in Ireland, while shedding light on the particular features of the contemporary Irish theatre landscape. Far from being an exhaustive history of theatre adaptation, these articles, using differing methodologies, investigate the many ways in which adaptation has left its imprint on Irish theatre since the 1970s. Appended to this book is a DVD that offers excerpts from a staged reading of Enda Walsh¿s Pondlife Angels. This DVD also includes the recording of a roundtable discussion, in which two Irish directors express their views on contemporary Irish theatre.