Posthumanistliku teatriteksti võimalikkusest
What is a Posthuman Theatre Text?

Summary/Abstract: In this article, I read a selection of 21st century Estonian plays through the lenses of posthumanism. I examine the matters of subjectivity, corporeality, consciousness and relation to technology of the characters based on Katherine N. Hayles’ pioneering How We Became Posthuman (1999) and Rosi Braidotti’s The Posthuman (2013); some relevant ideas of transhumanism exceeding the biological limits of the human organism (Nick Bostrom) are also considered. The first selected play is uus elysium. une luup (new elysium. dream loupe, 2001) by Andreas W and Jaak Tomberg. The play is a textual experiment of the technological theatre, the action takes place in virtual reality. go neo und romantix (2013) by Kadri Noormets is postdramatic and highly poetical. Otsuse anatoomia (Anatomy of Decision/Otsus, 2015) is a scenario of interactive theatre in Cabaret Rhizome, consisting of 64 possible plot developments. The audience are invited to influence the events in a family called Otsus (‘Decision’). Siret Campbell’s drama Beatrice (2017) is a science fiction romance depicting an attempt of prolonging the human life after the death of the physical body. This analysis is supported with two examples, Girl in the Machine (2017) by Scottish author Stef Smith, and The End (2010), a group work of Von Krahl Theatre performers. Although the form of drama appears to be productive representing the ethical conflicts of a possible transhumanist future, the posthuman ideas appear in a more intriguing way in experimental texts. The ideas of posthuman subjectivity appear in the ways the concepts of body and consciousness are entangled in each text. Posthuman subjects can be amalgams (Hayles), socially and digitally programmed (Edward Scheer), but they are always dynamic and exist in an in-between zone of different concepts of the human and poetics of dramaturgy. The relation to technology is dominantly conflicted or dystopic, but might also form a challenging continuum of the human, technology and nature.

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