Author: Edward Burns Publisher: Springer ISBN: 134909594X Category : Performing Arts Languages : en Pages : 247
Book Description
An analysis of acting and characterization on stage, covering theories of character from Aristotle to Brecht and approaches from formalism to post structuralism. The Early Theatre Group have, over the last 5 years, used an experimental approach to performing some of the plays written about here.
Author: R. Hillman Publisher: Springer ISBN: 0230372899 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 320
Book Description
This book documents the changing representation of subjectivity in Medieval and Early Modern English drama by intertextually exploring discourses of 'self-speaking', including soliloquy. Pre-modern ideas about language are combined with recent models of subject formation, especially Lacan's, to theorize and analyze the stage 'self' as a variable linguistic construct. Both the approach itself and the conclusions it generates significantly diverge from the standard New Historicist/Cultural Materialist narrative of subjectivity. Plays range from the Corpus Christi pageants to the Beaumont and Fletcher canon, with Shakespeare a recurrent focus and Hamlet, inevitably, the pivotal text.
Author: Edel Lamb Publisher: Springer ISBN: 0230594735 Category : Performing Arts Languages : en Pages : 202
Book Description
This book investigates how the Children of Paul's (1599-1606) and the Children of the Queen's Revels (1600-13) defined their players as children and, via an analysis of their plays and theatrical practices, it examines early modern theatre as a site in which children have the opportunity to articulate their emerging selfhoods.
Author: Vladimir Mirodan Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1317527941 Category : Performing Arts Languages : en Pages : 320
Book Description
Transformative acting remains the aspiration of many an emerging actor, and constitutes the achievement of some of the most acclaimed performances of our age: Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln, Meryl Streep as Mrs Thatcher, Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter – the list is extensive, and we all have our favourites. But what are the physical and psychological processes which enable actors to create characters so different from themselves? To understand this unique phenomenon, Vladimir Mirodan provides both a historical overview of the evolution of notions of 'character' in Western theatre and a stunning contemporary analysis of the theoretical implications of transformative acting. The Actor and the Character: Surveys the main debates surrounding the concept of dramatic character and – contrary to recent trends – explains why transformative actors conceive their characters as ‘independent’ of their own personalities. Describes some important techniques used by actors to construct their characters by physical means: work on objects, neutral and character masks, Laban movement analysis, Viewpoints, etc. Examines the psychology behind transformative acting from the perspectives of both psychoanalysis and scientific psychology and, based on recent developments in psychology, asks whether transformation is not just acting folklore but may actually entail temporary changes to the brain structures of the actors. The Actor and the Character speaks not only to academics and students studying actor training and acting theory, but contributes to current lively academic debates around character. This is a compelling and original exploration of the limits of acting theory and practice, psychology, and creative work, in which Mirodan boldly re-examines some of the fundamental assumptions of actor training and some basic tenets of theatre practice to ask: What happens when one of us ‘becomes somebody else’?
Author: P. Yachnin Publisher: Springer ISBN: 0230584152 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 266
Book Description
Shakespeare and Character brings together leading scholars in theory, literary criticism, and performance studies in order to redress a serious gap in Shakespeare studies and to put character back at the centre of our understanding of Shakespeare's achievement as an artist and thinker.
Author: N. Selleck Publisher: Springer ISBN: 0230582133 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 224
Book Description
The Interpersonal Idiom offers a timely reformulation of identity in the age of Shakespeare, recovering a rich and now obsolete language that casts selfhood not as subjective experience but as the experience of others.
Author: Michael W. Shurgot Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1317056027 Category : Drama Languages : en Pages : 281
Book Description
Making a unique intervention in an incipient but powerful resurgence of academic interest in character-based approaches to Shakespeare, this book brings scholars and theatre practitioners together to rethink why and how character continues to matter. Contributors seek in particular to expand our notions of what Shakespearean character is, and to extend the range of critical vocabularies in which character criticism can work. The return to character thus involves incorporating as well as contesting postmodern ideas that have radically revised our conceptions of subjectivity and selfhood. At the same time, by engaging theatre practitioners, this book promotes the kind of comprehensive dialogue that is necessary for the common endeavor of sustaining the vitality of Shakespeare's characters.
Author: Min Wild Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1317166426 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 240
Book Description
Christopher Smart and Satire explores the lively and idiosyncratic world of satire in the eighteenth-century periodical, focusing on the way that writers adopted personae to engage with debates taking place during the British Enlightenment. Taking Christopher Smart's audacious and hitherto underexplored Midwife, or Old Woman's Magazine (1750-1753) as her primary source, Min Wild provides a rich examination of the prizewinning Cambridge poet's adoption of the bizarre, sardonic 'Mary Midnight' as his alter-ego. Her analysis provides insights into the difficult position in which eighteenth-century writers were placed, as ideas regarding the nature and functions of authorship were gradually being transformed. At the same time, Wild also demonstrates that Smart's use of 'Mary Midnight' is part of a tradition of learned wit, having an established history and characterized by identifiable satirical and rhetorical techniques. Wild's engagement with her exuberant source materials establishes the skill and ingenuity of Smart's often undervalued, multilayered prose satire. As she explores Smart's use of a peculiarly female voice, Wild offers us a picture of an ingenious and ribald wit whose satirical overview of society explores, overturns, and anatomises questions of gender, politics, and scientific and literary endeavors.
Author: A. Streete Publisher: Springer ISBN: 0230358667 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 275
Book Description
Early modern drama is steeped in biblical language, imagery and stories. This collection examines the pervasive presence of scripture on the early modern stage. Exploring plays by writers such as Shakespeare, Marlowe, Middleton, and Webster, the contributors show how theatre offers a site of public and communal engagement with the Bible.
Author: Edward Burns
Author: R. Hillman
Author: Edel Lamb
Author: Vladimir Mirodan
Author: P. Yachnin
Author: N. Selleck
Author: Michael W. Shurgot
Author: Min Wild
Author: A. Streete
Author: Matthew James Smith