Horses, Horses, Horses: On Equus and Unbridled : An Interview with William Robert

In this interview, William Robert and Ecumenica’s editor, Hank Willenbrink, discuss Robert’s award-winning book Unbridled: Studying Religion in Performance and his pedagogical approach to teaching religion through theater. Robert’s scholarship derives from his classroom practice, where students use plays to develop, revise, and redevelop interpretations with Robert acting as a “producer” to empower their progression. In the conversation, Robert discusses Unbridled’s experimental structure—written as a play with acts and scenes, relegating traditional academic apparatus to endnotes—and Robert’s decision to embrace vulnerability by removing scholarly “safety nets.” Through his work, Robert embraces performance as a method in scholarship and teaching. He explains how plays, with their resistance to singular interpretations, provide ideal texts for studying religion while also revealing how a book about Equus took on unique dimensions driven by his fidelity to the classroom experience.