“Violence and Performance on the Latin American Stage” investigates Latin American theatre of the 1960s. It focuses on violence as an inherently formal element that intersects multiple contexts. My purpose is to develop a reading that challenges traditional interpretations of Latin American avant-garde theatre. I argue that this theatre does not apply European forms to Latin American realities, but rather juxtaposes local with foreign elements in multiple domains. It connects aesthetic, philosophic, social, and political contexts through the use of violent theatrical forms. The playwrights José Triana, Virgilio Piñera, Griselda Gambaro, and Jorge Díaz develop an aesthetics of violence that examines the ontological effects of crisis and revolution. Their characters confront questions of agency, subjectivity, historical perception, and consciousness that speak to their audiences’ experience in the sixties –I focus specifically on the Cuban revolution, Argentina’s growing socio-political violence, and Chile’s changing social demographics. I aim to show that the plays demand a simultaneous textual and contextual reading that dialogues with the multiple contexts and domains the plays intersect. My analysis focuses on the concepts of violence and performance in order to emphasize the plays’ modernizing role within their national theatrical scenes. I examine the challenges of theatrical writing and practice in times of conflict and social transformation, commenting on the disparaged reception of the plays’ innovative forms. I contend that this problem of reception accounts for the plays’ highly sophisticated structures of violence, which, in most cases, confused and distanced their audiences. This dissertation ultimately seeks to reveal the power of this theatre’s violent aesthetics to synthesize and critically engage with its cultural and socio- political surroundings.

“Violence and Performance on the Latin American Stage” investigates Latin American theatre of the 1960s. It focuses on violence as an inherently formal element that intersects multiple contexts. My purpose is to develop a reading that challenges traditional interpretations of Latin American avant-garde theatre. I argue that this theatre does not apply European forms to Latin American realities, but rather juxtaposes local with foreign elements in multiple domains. It connects aesthetic, philosophic, social, and political contexts through the use of violent theatrical forms. The playwrights José Triana, Virgilio Piñera, Griselda Gambaro, and Jorge Díaz develop an aesthetics of violence that examines the ontological effects of crisis and revolution. Their characters confront questions of agency, subjectivity, historical perception, and consciousness that speak to their audiences’ experience in the sixties –I focus specifically on the Cuban revolution, Argentina’s growing socio-political violence, and Chile’s changing social demographics. I aim to show that the plays demand a simultaneous textual and contextual reading that dialogues with the multiple contexts and domains the plays intersect. My analysis focuses on the concepts of violence and performance in order to emphasize the plays’ modernizing role within their national theatrical scenes. I examine the challenges of theatrical writing and practice in times of conflict and social transformation, commenting on the disparaged reception of the plays’ innovative forms. I contend that this problem of reception accounts for the plays’ highly sophisticated structures of violence, which, in most cases, confused and distanced their audiences. This dissertation ultimately seeks to reveal the power of this theatre’s violent aesthetics to synthesize and critically engage with its cultural and socio- political surroundings.

Que peut-il y avoir à penser entre jeu et politique ? A priori, peu de chose. Cette thèse questionne pourtant l’écart apparent entre le mode ludique et la perspective politique à l’heure où cette dernière est sommée de renouveler ses formes et ses moyens au théâtre dans le cadre d’un désaveu de l’activité politique plus général depuis la fin des années quatre-vingt. Dans un dialogue ouvert entre l’expérience latino-américaine et le reste de la scène internationale, il s’agit d’observer en quoi le modèle du jeu participe au travail de redéfinition d’un théâtre qui se voudrait politique aujourd’hui. D’une part, il permet d’appréhender les transformations du contexte théâtral latino-américain à la fin du XX° siècle qui voit son modèle de théâtre politique engagé remis en question. D’autre part, il devient un outil pour étudier les textes de Fabio Rubiano (Colombie, 1963) Rafael Spregelburd (Argentine, 1970) et Gabriel Calderón (Uruguay, 1982), dans leur articulation spécifique au politique. Se dessine alors une politique du jeu, dans les pas de Jacques Rancière et de sa « politique de l’esthétique », qui dispose la perspective politique, en tant que critique du présent et désir de transformation, depuis un rapport au réel, une production de sens et une conception du spectateur qui lui sont propres. Entre jeu et politique, deux dynamiques majeures s’établissent au sein du corpus. Le jeu s’offre d’abord comme un moyen paradoxal de critique. Il dispose des hétérotopies ludiques qui mettent à distance le présent pour mieux faire la peinture dystopique de ses failles et ses manquements. Dans un second temps ou simultanément, il brouille cette première interprétation critique par des expérimentations formelles et fictionnelles qui mettent l’accent sur la créativité elle-même. Si la portée utopique de ces expérimentations varie selon les textes et les auteurs, toutes participent à formuler les prémices de transfigurations à venir. / At first glance, there is not much to be said about the relation between play and politics. And yet, this thesis questions the gap between playful mode and political perspective at a time when the latter is being asked to renew its theatrical forms and means in a more general context of disavowal of the political practice since the end of the 1980s. As part of an open dialogue between the Latin-American experience and the rest of the international scene, this work focuses on the ways in which the play model participates in a redefinition of a theatre striving to be political. First, it allows for the apprehension of transformations within the Latin-American theatrical context of the end of the 20th Century when its model of a politically engaged theatre was being questioned. Furthermore, it becomes a tool to study texts by Fabio Rubiano (b. 1963, Colombia) Rafael Spregelburd (b. 1970, Argentina) and Gabriel Calderón (b. 1982, Uruguay), and their specific articulation to the political. A politics of play, following Jacques Rancière’s “politics of aesthetics”, is being charted here, and it allows for the political perspective to exist as a critique of the present and as a desire for transformation, based on its own relation to the real, production of meaning and idea of the viewer. Between politics and play, two main directions can be drawn out within this corpus. Play first functions as a paradoxical means for a critique. It creates playful heteropias which distance themselves from the present to better outline the dystopic map of its flaws and failures. Subsequently or simultaneously, it complicates this first critical interpretation with formal and fictional experimentations which put forth creativity itself. Although the utopic impact of these experimentations varies according to the text and its author, they still participate in formulating the premise of a transformation to come. / ¿Qué relaciones podemos establecer entre juego y política? Supuestamente, muy pocas. Esta tesis quiere sin embargo cuestionar la aparente divergencia entre el modo lúdico y la perspectiva política cuando ella se encuentra con la obligación de repensar sus formas dentro de un contexto de sospecha general hacia la actividad política desde el final de los años ochenta. A través de un dialogo abierto entre la experiencia latinoamericana y los escenarios teatrales internacionales, este estudio observa como el modelo del juego participa en redefinir un teatro político para hoy en día. Por una parte, el juego permite entender las transformaciones experimentadas por el contexto teatral latinoamericano al final del siglo XX frente a las alteraciones de su modelo dominante de teatro político comprometido. Por otra parte, permite estudiar los textos de Fabio Rubiano (Colombia, 1963) Rafael Spregelburd (Argentina, 1970) y Gabriel Calderón (Uruguay, 1982), en su articulación especifica con lo político. Allí surge una política del juego, en los pasos de la reflexión sobre la “política de la estética” por Jacques Rancière, que dispone la perspectiva política, como crítica hacia el presente y deseos de transformación, desde una relación con lo real, una producción de sentido y una concepción del espectador que le son propios. Entre juego y política, dos dinámicas principales se desarrollan en los textos. Primero, el juego se presenta como una medio paradoxal para la crítica. Dispone heteropías lúdicas que se distinguen de la realidad para poder pintar de manera distópica las fallas y los mancamientos del presente. Después o simultáneamente, el juego desordena la interpretación critica inicial a través de exploraciones ficcionales y formales que subrayan la creatividad en sí misma. La dimensión utópica de estas experimentaciones va cambiando según los textos y los autores pero todas obran a constituir las premisas de unas transfiguraciones por venir.