Theatre and Performance

The first two sections of this review consider two anthologies on source study, specifically Shakespeare’s and Beckett’s Italian sources. These works bring together ideas of filiation and affiliation, a useful distinction made by Edward Said in The World, the Text, and the Critic (1983). By filiation is meant a biological or natural connection, while affiliation describes the conscious, chosen connections that are formed through shared ideas. These anthologies offer new kinds of affiliation, which are complex, overdetermined, and break with the ideas both of source study and of traditional dramaturgy. Ideas of origins and inheritance, both in the study of source materials and in the idea of performance, are at stake in these texts. The next two sections are concerned with two books on performance studies that offer new ways of thinking about theatre, in relation to environment and gender. In a break from traditional dramaturgy, these texts argue for the transformative power of theatre. Following an introductory overview, the essay is divided into five sections: 1. Shakespeare and His Italian Sources; 2. Samuel Beckett and His Italian Sources; 3. Performing the Nonhuman; 4. Performance, Resistance, Tragedy; Conclusion.