TY - JOUR
T1 - Failure, Trauma, and the Theatre of Negativity
T2 - The New Tragic in Contemporary Theatre and Performance
AU - Mangold, Alex
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Cambridge University Press.
PY - 2019/2/1
Y1 - 2019/2/1
N2 - In this article, Alex Mangold identifies failure as a defining element of tragedy and argues that traditional understandings of the genre have been too narrow. Here, he asserts that tragic failure contributes to a tragic ‘mode’ that transcends genre definitions and, instead, extends to all kinds of contemporary theatre and performance. Examining a wide range of performance examples, including work from Sophocles to Sarah Kane, Forced Entertainment, Sasha Waltz, and Orlan, he argues that tragic failure, as it has come to be realized in examples of postdramatic writing and in site-specific or dance-based performance, is presented as an option, a dramatic choice, an outcome or part of an overall denial of dramatic form. The true power of the new tragic consequently lies in its ability to foster social change and a more ethical stance toward social dystopias.
AB - In this article, Alex Mangold identifies failure as a defining element of tragedy and argues that traditional understandings of the genre have been too narrow. Here, he asserts that tragic failure contributes to a tragic ‘mode’ that transcends genre definitions and, instead, extends to all kinds of contemporary theatre and performance. Examining a wide range of performance examples, including work from Sophocles to Sarah Kane, Forced Entertainment, Sasha Waltz, and Orlan, he argues that tragic failure, as it has come to be realized in examples of postdramatic writing and in site-specific or dance-based performance, is presented as an option, a dramatic choice, an outcome or part of an overall denial of dramatic form. The true power of the new tragic consequently lies in its ability to foster social change and a more ethical stance toward social dystopias.
KW - Sophocles
KW - Sarah Kane
KW - forced entertainment
KW - postdramatic theatre
KW - dystopias
KW - new tragic
KW - neoliberal society
KW - reciprocity
KW - Forced Entertainment
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85060135385&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1017/S0266464X18000593
DO - 10.1017/S0266464X18000593
M3 - Article
SN - 0266-464X
VL - 35
SP - 33
EP - 43
JO - New Theatre Quarterly
JF - New Theatre Quarterly
IS - 1
ER -