KONIEC DEJÍN A POSLEDNÁ INSCENÁCIA?

Author(s): Michal Babiak / Language(s): Slovak Issue: 02/2015

The text ponders the possibilities of seeking new theatrical interpretations through the prism of the “end of history” thesis, which has been brought to social discourse by Francis Fukuyama. The text points to the direct link between Fukuyama’s thesis and the ideological and philosophical premises of postmodernism: both concepts suggest the end of the program of modernist search (both for a new political arrangement and cultural paradigm). However, they pose a serious problem for new theatre performances because the act of staging is based on discovering new interpretations. What is theatre going to speak about if we have – hypothetically – already discovered all possible interpretations (as Fukuyama and the philosophy of postmodernism suggest)? If theatre is supposed to be a mirror of its time (Shakespeare), is its role only to witness this end, the end of the program of modernist search?

ENGAGED NON-FICTION THEATRE AND A PLAYFUL FÉERIE IN TICHO A SPOL.

Author(s): Elena Knopová / Language(s): English Issue: Special/2015

The authoress maps out five years of the activity of Divadlo TICHO a spol. (Theatre Silence and Co.), which was started as an association of theatre practitioners. The paper describes a multi-level platform which includes a permanent theatre scene TICHO a spol., a platform of independent guest theatres, the theatre of handicapped creative professionals, songster and literary s cene and other visual and film activities, as well as organising public debates on important social issues. The paper also characterises the drama poetics of TICHO a spol., which its theatre professionals, under the guidance of the founder and dramaturge Viki Janoušková, refer to as “thinking theatre”. The paper contains analyses of five productions of TICHO a spol.

INDIVĪDA UN MASAS ATTIECĪBU TRAKTĒJUMS RAIŅA LUGU RADĀMAJĀS DOMĀS

Author(s): Zane Šiliņa / Language(s): Latvian Issue: 2/2015

Rainis’s world outlook has been strongly influenced by the Marxist philosophy, yet his attitude towards this doctrine is rather complicated. On the one hand, the poet was attracted by the idea of changing the world, voiced by Marxism, and he was fascinated by the personality of Karl Marx, in whom he saw a brave and talented reformer of the society; yet, on the other hand, Rainis has severely criticised a number of ideas propagated by Marxism which have been proposed as the foundation of socialism. Firstly, the distinctly materialistic orientation of the Marxist doctrine and the social and political movements associated with it is incompatible with Rainis’s artistic endeavours and his conviction that the decisive role in the development of the society is played by the enhancement of the man’s spiritual world rather than by the economic conditions and their transformation. Secondly, Marxism is unable to solve the contradiction that occurs between the necessity to act in the name of the interests of the overwhelming majority and, simultaneously, to guarantee a free development of every individual. One could even assert that Marxism tries to bypass the potential conflict between the individual freedom and mass interests. On the other hand, Rainis, who had a high regard for the individuality and wanted to harmonise the collective potential for the development of the society with the free development of the personality, is particularly sensitive to the contradictions existing between the individual and the society and strives to address them in his literary works. The issues outlined above in relation to the treatment of the individual and the mass specific of Rainis’s literary works have been analysed in this article in the context of the working notes of Rainis’s unfinished play “Īliņš (Kurbads)”.

Shakespeare Lives!: Anniversary Revivals and Exhumations of Shakespeare

Author(s): Edyta Lorek-Jezińska / Language(s): English Issue: 24/2019

The British Council Project Shakespeare Lives! launched as part of the events celebrating the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s death exemplifies the continuing investment in Shakespeare as a cultural brand and commodity. The project translates Shakespeare into contemporary culture, offering Instagram versions of his plays, “Mix the play” application in which users are invited to direct their own scenes from the original plays and short films, reinventing Shakespeare in a variety of forms and contexts. My major focus will be on these short video clips, each presenting a different perspective and investigating new thematic and formal possibilities inherent in Shakespeare’s drama, ranging between self-referential deconstruction of race and intertextuality in Othello, the celebration of the comic and carnivalesque potential of Hamlet, the exploration of alternative/disabled corporealities in A Midsummer Night's Dream, old age in King Lear or using the technique of the Manga cartoon to present Lady Macbeth’s transformation in Macbeth. Referring to the concepts of spreadable media and digimodernism, my aim is to investigate how the British Council makes Shakespeare a spreadable commodity, combining the technologically advanced popular cultural aesthetics with a degree of updated yet re-circulated controversy and subversion. Such strategies involve, for example, the use of computer-generated imagery or cartoon techniques, kitsch aesthetics, the grotesque humour, on the one hand, and the problems of race, gender, old age or disability, on the other.

Politische Valenzen in Friedrich Dürrenmatts Theaterschreiben und -praxis

Author(s): Dragoş Carasevici / Language(s): German Issue: 7/2018

Politics was more than once dealt with in the works of the Swiss playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt, as well as in his theatrical practice as a director. Two of the most interesting examples in this respect are Dürrenmatt’s last play, Achterloo (1983), and his staging of G. E. Lessing’s Emilia Galotti (Zürich, 1974). While the first one is a complex and encrypted politics collage, the second one reveals itself on the stage as a critique of a political system that surpasses the boundaries of time and becomes relevant also nowadays.

A Comparative Study of the Chinese and Russian Presentations of Shakespeare’s Macbeth in the Perspective of Intercultural Theatre

Author(s): Yu Sun,Longhai Zhang / Language(s): English Issue: 7/2018

In 2017, one of the most famous Shakespeare tragedies, Macbeth, directed respectively by China’s first-class director Chen Dalian and one of the leading European directors Luk Perceval, gained new forms in exotic countries and yet still displayed its eternal charisma and magnificent power. The two interpretations gave the Chinese audience an unprecedented experience due to their strong visual impact. The Chinese version marked a new level in the creation and performance of modern Chinese drama and was widely acclaimed. However, the Russian version seemed an “over-experimental” play to the Chinese audience, so it could not be fully understood and accepted. This paper compares the Chinese experimental interpretation of Macbeth with the Russian one from the perspective of intercultural theatre by using theories proposed by many international theatre critics, such as Antonin Artaud, Jerzy Grotowski, Peter Brook, Eugenio Barba and Richard Schechner, analyzing the stage design, directing concepts and performing skills. It then elaborates on the inner connections of the two adaptations by the two directors from China and Russia by analyzing the complexity of the relationship between audience and performance in intercultural theatre, and the transformation and reception of the cross-cultural adaptation of Shakespeare’s plays in China and Russia.

Voice Music in Răzvan Mazilu’s Production The Jungle Book

Author(s): Roxana-Sorana Ardeleanu (Tibil) / Language(s): English Issue: 7/2018

Maybe the most provocative personal experience regarding the musical training of the actors, certainly the most interesting, the composing of the "Jungle Book" show directed by Răzvan Mazilu, required the total involvement of the director and close collaboration with the musical producer concerning the instrumental part recorded on tape. The analysis of "The Song of the Eagles" reflects the personal contribution in the organic dramaturgy of the show.

Indian Philosophical Motifs in the Drama Shakuntala

Author(s): Luara Eliza Avarvari / Language(s): English Issue: 7/2018

This article aims at discovering and analyzing Indian philosophical motifs, poetically illustrated in Kalidasa’s drama, Shakuntala. The drama is the artistic expression of the longing for the absolute, as well as of the fascinating techniques of meditation and ecstasy practiced in the ancient civilization of India. The study attempts an essential interrogation about the relation between the earthly and the heavenly hermitage, about the relation between the earthly and the heavenly Ganges.

The Concept of Freedom in Jean-Paul Sartre’s Drama

Author(s): Laura-Lavinia Muzicaș / Language(s): English Issue: 7/2018

This study aims to analyze the concept of freedom, illustrated both in Jean Paul Sartre’s philosophy and in his drama. The study wishes to clarify Sartre’s view about the pre-existence of freedom, as a metaphysical, a priori given, as well as the association of identity with the concepts of existence and freedom. The singularity and irepeatablity of the Being is linked by Sartre with placing the existence within the situational and with its ability to choose among the countless existing options. The study contributes to the understanding of Sartre’s drama starting from his philosophical concepts.

Play vs. Screen

Author(s): Alexandra Ștefania Țiulescu / Language(s): English Issue: 18/2019

This present paper argues the use of visual language as improvement to cover open areas of discussion which go to the very core of Shakespeare’s legacy in modern age. The purpose of this paper is to invite the reader of Shakespeare’s dramatic texts to analyse his language from the “camera” perspective and to cover a complex picture of the role of the director for the screen adaptation. Casting new light on established forms of media transmission, this paper presents an analysis of different techniques in which Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” is transmitted by Franco Zeffirelli on the screen, looking through various cuts from Act 1, Scene 3 in accordance with the play story.

Стари Дубровник осветљен новим историзмом

Author(s): Nevena Varnica / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 14/2016

Review of: Topličanin, Tamara (2016), Dubrovnik Marina Držića, Beograd: Zadužbina Vladete Jerotića – Ars Libri.

Теорія індійського санскритського походження китайської драми Чжуцзюйшо у контексті студій історії культури Сходу

Author(s): Yaroslav Igorovich Shcherbakov / Language(s): Ukrainian Issue: 2/2019

The purpose of the article is to illuminate the influence of Sanskrit drama on the process of traditional Chinese drama genesis, to introduce into a Ukrainian- language scientific turn of a series of information on the history of Chinese culture that is only available in modern and ancient Chinese. The research methodology is to use a combination of historical, structural, typological-comparative research methods. This methodological approach allows us to reveal and analyze the influence of the Indian Sanskrit drama on the formation of Chinese drama. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the comprehensive coverage of the problems of the genesis of the Chinese traditional drama in the context of the Indian influence on the formation of the genre paradigm of Chinese traditional drama, as well as the systematization of material provided by Chinese researchers in Chinese, which has not yet been translated into the Ukrainian language and, in most cases, not entered into a scientific rush within the framework of the English literary criticism and cultural discourse. Conclusions. The idea of a dramatic action originated in India, and later, during the first millennium AD, the Indian Sanskrit drama was exported to the territory of East Turkestan and to the territory of Southeast Asia. Subsequently, the Uighur theater had a direct influence on the formation of the Chinese civilizational and cultural environment, which can be considered proven in the context of the actual material presented in the works of Chinese researchers, systematized and presented above. In the process of forming a genre paradigm of Chinese drama, in particular, the structure of the system of the role of Indian drama had a direct influence, as well as Indian influence was the structure of drama, there is a significant number of Chinese dramas, which present the motives of Chinese Buddhism.

Bestia et Amor: Equine Erotology in Shakespeare’s “Venus and Adonis”

Author(s): Jonathan W. Thurston / Language(s): English Issue: 12/2015

In his narrative poem Venus and Adonis (1593), Shakespeare advances two horses, a “jennet” and a “courser,” as a means of commenting on human sexuality. The poem’s equine terminology also gestures to commonplaces of sixteenth-century horsemanship. Shakespeare appropriates the literary symbol of the horse as representative of human sexuality in order to comment on contemporary political/national relations. Gender and animality in Venus and Adonis prove entirely congruent with the poem’s classical republicanism. Examining Venus’s almost-Spanish imperialism reveals that, more than just being aware of hippological discourse in the classical tradition, Shakespeare was incisively cognisant of the equestrian rule that the best manège was not at all about dominance. This paper traces the etymology of Shakespeare’s equine terminology within the context of English-Spanish relations in the late sixteenthcentury.

Џојсово промишљање о љубави без слободе и слободи без љубави у драми „Изгнаници“

Author(s): Biljana R. Vlašković Ilić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 12/2015

Joyce’s play Exiles (1918) is considered his least successful work, especially in comparison to the complexity of symbolism and the stream-of-consciousness technique skilfully employed by Joyce in his later novels – A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses, and Finnegans Wake. Exiles, however, documents two significant things: the autobiographical elements incorporated into its plot provide insight into Joyce’s complicated relationship with Nora Barnacle, whereas the play as a whole reveals the influence that Henrik Ibsen exerted over Joyce’s art. Drawing on these two aspects of the play, the paper examines the way in which James Joyce analysed the problematic relation between freedom and marriage, freedom and exile, freedom and dignity, freedom and the beauty of living. The paper favours the thesis that despite the inconsistencies of Exiles and Joyce’s inability to resolve the plot of the play, this early dramatic experiment should be regarded as the artistic work that paved the way not only towards the stream-of-consciousness technique which Joyce perfected in his subsequent works, but also towards the specific, primarily artistic perception of freedom, which is the basis for the understanding of Joyce’s celebrated novels.

Црнохуморна представа деградираног друштва у комедији апсурда Душана Ковачевића

Author(s): Đorđe N. Kebara / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 20/2019

The intention of this paper is the semantic disfiguration of the cultural subtext of black-humorous elements in Dušan Kovačevićʼs comediography, and a method of research is to synthetically discover the meaning on a symbolic plane of the text. The comic elements of Kovačević‘s plays are presented based on the plays: The Marathon Family, Radovan III, Balkan Spy, Claustrophobic Comedy, The Professional, Roaring Tragedy, also, based on film adaptations of plays Balkan Spy and The Professional. The subject of this paper is to determine the genre charcteristics of Dušan Kovačevićʼs comedies, as well as a comparative analysis of parodic in the context of Serbian literature history. An analysis of comic elements is performed based on the theory of drama, comedy and absurdity. This paper discusses the concept of parody and grotesque. The second part of the paper refers to extratextual characterictics that are scenic type of nature and contribute to the atmosphere of black-humorous social regression. The goal of this paper is to relate the characterisation of Dušan Kovačevićʼs dramatic prosèdē as tragicomic. His comedies demonstrate internal aspects and characteristics of tragedy, but the actions of the characters from plays are comic in nature.

Crossing the Borders of the East: Petya Tsoneva Ivanova, Negotiating Borderlines in Four Contemporary Migrant Writers from the Middle East

Author(s): Ayham Abu Orouq / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

Le trauma, de l’écriture à la lecture: Radu Clit, Du trauma à l’écriture. Un point de vue sur la création littéraire de Herta Muller

Author(s): Radu Ciobotea / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2019

Sukob kritičkih interpretacija na primeru Šekspirovog Falstafa

Author(s): Milena Kostić / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 8/2013

Literary critics were mostly divided into two dominant, rather contrasting, interpretative fractions of Falstaff during the 20th century: on the one hand, there were critics (Bradley, Goddard) who agreed with Bloom in glorifying Falstaff as “the representative of imaginative freedom, of a liberty set against time, death, and the state, which is a condition that we crave for ourselves... the image of life itself” (Bloom 1998: 288). On the other hand, Wilson and Tillyard identified the structure of medieval morality plays in Shakespeare’s Henry IV; in the same vein, in the character of Falstaff they perceived the author’s moral condemnation of the careless life attitudes that corrupted the youth. Recent interpretations of Falstaff have not been as radical in their praise or disapproval as these two critical fractions, but are generally characterized by combining their various insights. Special attention in the paper is paid to Grenblatt’s new historicist interpretation of Falstaff as a potential subversive force in the Elizabethan system of values, as well as to the understanding of Falstaff from the point of view of the theory of carneval practiced by Bakhtin and his followers. In the light of diverse critical insights, the paper focuses on the conflict between the private and public manifested in Henry IV through prince Hal’s divided loyalty to his dominant, royal, biological father and his plebeian substitute.

Ликови историјских драма Матије Бана између националног, политичког и приватног живота и могућност за самообликовање

Author(s): Mirjana Bojanić Ćirković / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 8/2013

This paper, through Greenblatt’s theory of self-fashioning and correlated with Foucault’s understanding of power and discourse, determines the identity of the characters of the historical dramas Marojica Kaboga and Knez Nikola Zrinjski by Matija Ban, and the possibility of their “slipping out” of their assigned roles. The identity of the characters of Ban’s historical dramas symbolized several levels: national, cultural, political and private. The invention of intent-mentioned historical drama allowed for discourse on power, and found space for self-fashioning heroes and their personal choice. The final part of the paper answers the question whether historical drama with such certain tendency can examine or expound about personal identity.

Tea first. Then war! - Alan Ayckbourn‘s Neighbourhood Watch (2011): A reflection on Great Britain‘s 21st century internal security policy and its citizens‘ need for safety?

Author(s): Maria Wiegel / Language(s): English Issue: 7/2017

In a time when terrorism has become a regular topic in newspapers and on television, security appears as a recent and urgent issue. CCTV cameras and surveillance operate in a great part of western public space and life. This article focuses on the ways in which the radicalized internal security policy of the Bluebell Hill Development, in Alan Ayckbourn‘s play Neighbourhood Watch (2011), reflects on Great Britain‘s security policy and society’s need for safety and security throughout the early 21st century. Security policy is one of the main issues in the western countries of the late 20th and the early 21st century. The paradox of using surveillance - a restriction of freedom - for the protection of freedom can be seen in Neighbourhood Watch. The result of contradictory security measures, as argued in this article, leads to paranoia. Neighbourhood Watch functions as a mirror to present-day Great Britain‘s security measures, while using the microcosm of a small neighbourhood.