Francisco Nieva and Postmodernist Theatre

Author(s) Komla Aggor

Language: English

Genre(s): Film, Media and Culture, Literary Studies

  • February 2006 · 192 pages ·216x138mm

  • · Hardback - 9780708319611

"Francisco Nieva and Postmodernist Theatre" should engage with and advance the debate on the viability of postmodernist theatre in general by presenting the works of Francisco Nieva as a bona-fide postmodernist theatre formulated on avant-garde foundations.

In this excellent study we find a long-awaited discussion of postmodernism in modern Spanish theatre. Because of his provocative and pleasant style, Aggor's book will be useful both to the specialist who is already familiar with Nieva's plays and the discerning reader with an interest in the evolution of Spanish theatre as a whole.,Aggor provides smooth English translations for all of his critical citations and quotations from plays, thus making this book totally accessible to theatre specialists and other readers who may not have a command of Spanish. It is a near-definitive study of Francisco Nieva's theatre and one that must be considered essential bibliography for any meaningful course in which his plays are considered.,This is an original and challenging contribution to the literature on ideology with rich insights into the way cultural forms such as film mediate ideological positions and it is also a well-informed introduction to the complex ideas of Habermas, Ziek, Deleuze and Guattari.

Introduction: The Debate on Postmodernist Theatre. Chapter I - Postismo, Postmodernism, Theatre; From Postismo to Postmodernism; The Problematics of Spanish Theatre; Toward a Dramatic Theory. Chapter II - Cruelty and Paradox; Nieva and Artaud; The Paradox of Evil; The Paradox of Self-Transcendence; Aesthetic Composition and Doubling in Speech; A Celebration of Open Theatre. Chapter III - Metatheatricality; Metadrama as Dramatic Method; The Play within the Play; Ceremony within the Play. Chapter IV - Sexual Politics, Gender Politics and the Popular; Nieva and the Popular; The Politics of Sex; Denaturalizing Time; The Politics of Gender. Chapter V - Performance; A Sisyphean Trajectory; Performance and the Dramatic Text; Corazon de arpia on Stage; Las aventuras de Tirante el Blanco on Stage; Spectatorship.

Author(s): Komla Aggor

Komla Aggor is Associate Professor in the Department of Classical and Modern Languages at John Carroll University, Cleveland, Ohio. He has published widely in the field of Hispanic Studies, particularly on Francisco Nieva.

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