The new epic theatre in French :myth, history and contemporary news in the Theatre of Bernard-Marie Koltès, Hélène Cixous, Koffi Kwahulé and Wajdi Mouawad
附註:Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 75-03(E), Section: A.
Adviser: Judith G. Miller.
"UMI Number: 3602751"--T.p. verso.
103年科技部補助人文及社會科學研究圖書設備計畫規劃主題 : 藝術學 : 全球化與劇場跨界.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, 2013.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 277-287).
摘要:My dissertation articulates a unique trend in contemporary French-language theatre centered on a return to myth, literature and History as well as a strongly structured storyline. This 'New Epic Theatre,' as I have named it, is a theatre which, in a distinct way, tells the story of contemporary man caught in the contradictions and violence of the world around him. In my inquiry, the term 'Epic' refers to an identifying attribute of this theatre, which, through the activation of common mythicoliterary references and a return to lyricism as manifested in the story of one or more central characters, attempts to provide a context through which to grapple with the complex realities of the world. I present four exemplary plays and consider each play's unique variations on the New Epic: Roberto Zucco (1990) by Bernard-Marie Koltes, La Ville parjure (1994) by Helene Cixous, Bintou (1999) by Koffi Kwahule, and Incendies (2003) by Wajdi Mouawad. , Common to the works I examine is a confrontation with violent contemporary news stories which ground these plays in a recognizable reality. Whereas plays outside the New Epic present highly gratuitous violence without offering to the spectator any structuring mechanism, the authors of the New Epic Theatre seek precisely to guide the audience's reception. In response to the absence of universal organizing belief systems, Koltes, Cixous, Kwahule and Mouawad reconfigure and repurpose elements from the seminal stories of the Western tradition, at once acknowledging the untenable nature of these grand narratives and drawing on them. In so doing, they suggest the possibility of constructing identity and community based not on meta-narratives, but rather on shared narratives, as re-imagined in the theatre.
