University of Chicago Press: New Titles in Literature and Literary Criticism: Dramatic Works

Octave Mirbeau: Two Plays

Richard J. Hand — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Octave Mirbeau was one of the most prolific literary figures of France’s storied Belle Époque, and his innovative theatrical works are only recently being rediscovered and appreciated by modern audiences. Here for the first time in English-language translation are his two most celebrated and successful plays: Business is Business, a classical comedy of manners recalling Molière; and Charity, a satirical comedy centered around the exploitation of adolescents in a dubious charity home. In addition to the play texts, this volume also includes an introduction contextualizing the works and the translation and adaptation process.

Italian Women's Theatre, 1930-1960

Daniela Cavallaro — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 06:00:00 GMT

Between 1930 and 1960, popular female dramatists, including Paola Riccora, Anna Bonacci, Clotilde Masci, and Gici Ganzini Granata, set the stage for a new generation of feminist theatre and the development of contemporary Italian women’s theatre as a whole. Now largely forgotten, the lives and works of these dramatists are reintroduced into the scholarly conversation in Italian Women’s Theatre, 1930–1960. Following a general introduction, the book presents a selection of dramatic works, rounded out by commentary, performance histories, critical analyses, and biographical information.

Avant-Garde

Mike Sell — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 06:00:00 GMT

In The Avant-Garde, Mike Sell rejects the common idea that the avant-garde is only about art and insists that it is much more than a European phenomenon. In doing so, he redefines the historical, geographical, ideological, disciplinary, and theoretical boundaries of avant-garde studies and raises a number of difficult questions about the avant-garde— How have avant-gardes been shaped by racism and contributed to racist power and imperialism? How have the claims made by avant-garde political and artistic groups to liberate humanity been indebted to religious intolerance? And how has the vanguard commitment to radical cultural action contributed to war, terror, and destruction?

To answer these questions, Sell presents surprising and incisive juxtapositions of the familiar and the unfamiliar, including futurist manifestos and colonial medical practice in Algeria, expressionist theater and Islamic terrorism, and constructivist paintings and military counterinsurgency strategy. Combined, his analysis establishes a new theory of the avant-garde that helps us to better comprehend the history, power, and promise of cultural activism. The Avant-Garde will interest scholars in modernist and avant-garde studies, cultural studies, literary and art history, and theater and performance studies.