Signs of Performance: An Introduction to Twentieth-Century Theatre - Hardcover

Counsell, Colin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415106427 ISBN 13: 9780415106429

Publisher: Routledge, 1996

Synopsis

Signs of Performance provides the beginning student with working examples of theatrical analysis. Its range covers the whole of twentieth century theatre, from Stanislavski to Brecht and Samuel Beckett to Robert Wilson. Colin Counsell takes an historical look at theatre as a cultural practice, clearly tracing connections between:
* Key practitioners' ideas about performance
* The theatrical practices prompted by those ideas
* The resulting signs which emerge in performance
* The meanings and political consequences of those signs
It provides an understandable theoretical framework for the study of theatre as a an signifying practice, and offers vivid explanations in clear, direct language. It opens up this fascinating field to a broad audience.

About this title

About the Author

Colin Counsell is a lecturer in English Literature and Theatre Studies at the University of North London. He has worked in the theatre both as a performer and as a director.

From the Back Cover

Signs of Performance provides the student with working examples of theatrical analysis. It ranges across the spectrum of twentieth-century theatre, covering practitioners as diverse as Stanislavski and Brecht, Samuel Beckett and Robert Wilson. Colin Counsell takes a historical look at theatre as a cultural practice, clearly tracing connections between key practitioners' own ideas about performance; the theatrical practices prompted by those ideas; the resulting signs which emerge in performance; the meanings and political consequences of those signs. Signs of Performance is the first book to answer the question 'How does theatre work?'. It provides an understandable, theoretical framework for the study of theatre as a signifying practice and offers vivid explanations in clear, direct language. This book tells you everything you want to know about how performance works, and opens up this fascinating field to a broad audience.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 1996
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0415106427
• ISBN 13: 9780415106429
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 250