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This thesis deals with the representation of the body and space in the theatre of Bernard-Marie Koltes and Helene Cixous. From the theoretical point of view, it looks at transition in French theatre from a modern to a postmodern predicament, from a discursive to a corporeal theatre. It then looks at the ways postmodern culture maps, configures, disciplines, and violates the body, particularly through the relationship of the new textuality to its stage manifestations. Textually, it analizes three plays by each playwright. The juxtaposition of the works of Koltes and Cixous allows for an in depth look at the theatre of the 1970's and 80's in France, a period marked by theatrical decentralisation and experimentation. Both favoured a strong tie to theatre practice while developing a close relationship with a theatre director: Patrice Chereau, in the case of Koltes, and Ariane Mnouchkine, in the case of Cixous. Aside from looking at the relationship with theatre practitioners, this thesis examines a number of aesthetic and political affinities which bring Koltes and Cixous together, such as redefining a postmodern mythology and a political role for theatre. Unlike many postmodernist theatre practices that try to evade political commitment, both Cixous and Koltes are preoccupied with the resistance to a nihilistic discourse, and propose an evolving and corporeal stage presence inscribed in a pluralistic space of representation. For Koltes, the body on the stage resists symbolic categorization in Combat de negre et de chiens (1979), it then becomes related to spatial reality outside language in Quai ouest (1985), and finally the corporeal body is culturally and ideologically mapped in Le Retour au desert (1988). This triple dimension is also reflected in the work of Cixous, for whom the theatre is a space of feminist praxis. First, the space of representation, through the subversive performativity of the body, questions the premises of the psychoanalytic gaze in Portrait de Dora (1976), then classical mythology is rewritten to disrupt patriarcal discourse in Le Nom d'Oedipe: chant du corps interdit (1978), and a post-colonial role for theatre is redefined in order to question the historical subject in L'Indiade ou l'lnde de leurs reves (1987). Finally, this thesis looks at the ways both Koltes and Cixous join in with postmodernism in declaring the impossibility of grand-narrative, while trying to show how identity cannot be based on essentialist categories of race, gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, but on the performance of all these various categories as they intersect in the performing body.

Taking as a case study the Theatre-Italien, here considered both as a particular theatrical practice and as a specific stage in Paris---one of the most popular at the time---this dissertation asks what role this theatre played in the novel competition of discourses which characterized political culture in the era of Revolutions. All too often, historians have overestimated print culture as the main medium through which discourses were produced in the eighteenth century, and this despite the fact that theatre played a fundamental role in the public life of this period. Furthermore, when theatre is studied, historians emphasize too often the written form of the plays. / The dissertation's structure seeks to underline the specificity of the cultural practice represented by the theatre. The discrepancies between the meaning of a play written by a particular author and the same play as it is performed on stage are emphasized. Political messages emerge out of the language of the actors and actresses without any possibility to control them, so that the players become, in effect, co-authors of the play. Similarly, the variety of the nature of the audience and the way in which it becomes at once judge, co-author and co-actor make the public, neither intangible nor invisible, but simply gathered, a crucial feature of this cultural practice which allows us to argue that theatre was actually a very bad instrument of propaganda. Instead, theatre can be seen at the time to be a public scene of immediate political debate. The conflicting opinions expressed there turn theatre not into the minor of political reality intended by various regimes confronted to the diversity of the polity---what some people have called "a school for the people"---but rather as the mirror of the reality experienced by a large number of Parisians at the time. It is in this sense that we relate the theatrical practices studied with the concept of public spirit, expressing the people's understanding of the general interest, instead of that of public opinion, expressing the unified message imposed by a dominant political group.

This thesis has two aims: to make an original contribution to knowledge by demonstrating the importance of theatrical rivalry to the development of drama in the Carolean period (the reign of Charles II), and to re-evaluate the managerial career of Thomas Killigrew (1612-1683). This is the first detailed survey of the circumstances in which the King's Company and the Duke's Company competed and an analysis of the troupes' devices of plotting and counter-plotting during their twenty-two years of stage rivalry from 1660 to 1682. As well as charting the stage rivalry between the two companies, my dissertation argues that Killigrew was a competent but unscrupulous and devious playhouse-manager. A close analysis of his managerial career will show how Thomas Killigrew was the central figure in the Carolean stage rivalry in London and how he helped to shape the future of English theatre. The survey starts from Killigrew's beginnings as the manager of the King's Company from 1660 and concludes in 1682 when the King's Company was effectively taken over by its rival, the Duke's Company, to make one United Company, thus ending the span of theatrical competition in the Carolean period. Each chapter is divided in accordance with the beginning and end of significant events of rivalry and are organised chronologically at different phases of the competition. The first chapter provides the historical background of the establishment of the patent grants and the gradual consolidation of the monopoly over dramatic entertainment in London. In charting the initial stages of the development of the King's Company and the Duke's Company from 1660 to 1663, this chapter argues that it was largely due to Thomas Killigrew's underhandedness that the King's Company began the competition in an advantageous position. The second chapter focuses on the theatrical competition from 1663 to 1668. Until 1663 both companies were busy consolidating their duopoly and the competition between the two managers ended abruptly with William Davenant's death in 1668. In the survey of the Killigrew-Davenant rivalry, this chapter's overall aim is to argue for narrowing of the wide chasm often described between the managerial skills of the two managers. Chapter three explores the period from when Mary Davenant, Thomas Betterton and Henry Harris took over the management of the Duke's Company to the burning of the King's Company's playhouse in 1672. It argues that the competition in this period was evenly matched. This chapter also revises the perceived style of management adopted by both Betterton and Killigrew. The chapter argues that Betterton was perhaps less involved in the most audacious project of the Duke's Company during these years: the building of three theatres including the Dorset Garden Theatre. In the case of the latter, this chapter argues that Killigrew continually took risks at other people's expense and was little concerned with the well being of his staff and shareholders as long as the company gained notoriety and retained its success. The penultimate chapter of the dissertation covers the time span from the Bridges Street Theatre's fire to the ousting of Killigrew as the manager by his own son, Charles Killigrew. It argues that this was the crucial period in which the Duke's Company began clearly to surpass its rival. This chapter qualifies the orthodox view that the King's Company simply lost its battle against the Duke's Company by demonstrating that the two companies also had to contend with a large number of foreign troupes and the rising popularity of music concerts. The final chapter explores the period from when Charles Killigrew took over the management of the King's Company to the amalgamation of the two acting troupes in 1682. It demonstrates the negative effects of the political turbulence of the Popish Plot and the Exclusion Crisis on both the troupes' plays and players. The chapter also argues that Charles Killigrew was not as charismatic or manipulative as his father, and that he greatly contributed to the demise of the King's Company. In conclusion, this is strictly a study of theatre history that looks at the importance of management and company rivalry to the development of Carolean drama. At its peak in the 1670s, the Carolean period produced on average twenty new plays per season. The highly competitive nature of the rivalry between the King's Company and the Duke's Company and how the respective managements responded to the success or the failure of the other theatre is the background against which one must read the plays of the Carolean period. Thomas Killigrew, whose managerial career spanned the longest in the Carolean years, was an influential figure in the period and whose innovations and difficulties as a manager had a direct effect not only on theatre history but also on the dramatic traditions of the seventeenth century.

The submitted work deals with the historical development of german Passion plays in Hořice na Šumavě (district of Český Krumlov) since their origination in 1816, over their temporary decline in 1936. The concept of this work leans on the defended bachelor's thesis Mysterium Hoericense Transformation of the place of memory in the 19th and 20th century. The main exploring attention is paid to the origin of Passion plays in Hořice about life and death of Jesus Christ, to the course of the plays, significant actors and visitors of the plays. Apart from the german written sources, the autor also used local literature published by Sudeten Germans as well as oral history techniques.

This thesis deals with the representation of the body and space in the theatre of Bernard-Marie Koltes and Helene Cixous. From the theoretical point of view, it looks at transition in French theatre from a modern to a postmodern predicament, from a discursive to a corporeal theatre. It then looks at the ways postmodern culture maps, configures, disciplines, and violates the body, particularly through the relationship of the new textuality to its stage manifestations. Textually, it analizes three plays by each playwright. The juxtaposition of the works of Koltes and Cixous allows for an in depth look at the theatre of the 1970's and 80's in France, a period marked by theatrical decentralisation and experimentation. Both favoured a strong tie to theatre practice while developing a close relationship with a theatre director: Patrice Chereau, in the case of Koltes, and Ariane Mnouchkine, in the case of Cixous. Aside from looking at the relationship with theatre practitioners, this thesis examines a number of aesthetic and political affinities which bring Koltes and Cixous together, such as redefining a postmodern mythology and a political role for theatre. Unlike many postmodernist theatre practices that try to evade political commitment, both Cixous and Koltes are preoccupied with the resistance to a nihilistic discourse, and propose an evolving and corporeal stage presence inscribed in a pluralistic space of representation. For Koltes, the body on the stage resists symbolic categorization in Combat de negre et de chiens (1979), it then becomes related to spatial reality outside language in Quai ouest (1985), and finally the corporeal body is culturally and ideologically mapped in Le Retour au desert (1988). This triple dimension is also reflected in the work of Cixous, for whom the theatre is a space of feminist praxis. First, the space of representation, through the subversive performativity of the body, questions the premises of the psychoanalytic gaze in Portrait de Dora (1976), then classical mythology is rewritten to disrupt patriarcal discourse in Le Nom d'Oedipe: chant du corps interdit (1978), and a post-colonial role for theatre is redefined in order to question the historical subject in L'Indiade ou l'lnde de leurs reves (1987). Finally, this thesis looks at the ways both Koltes and Cixous join in with postmodernism in declaring the impossibility of grand-narrative, while trying to show how identity cannot be based on essentialist categories of race, gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, but on the performance of all these various categories as they intersect in the performing body. / Arts, Faculty of / French, Hispanic, and Italian Studies, Department of / Graduate

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The thesis will be divided into the following parts: the introduction will focus on the objectives of the research, review of literature, and the blueprint of methodology. Chapter One will define some basic concepts and introduce the historical background. Chapter Two will explore the relationship between modern city and the Avant-garde drama in terms of "modern city", thus leading to four relevant parts: new ways to understand space and time, cultural transformation, global spectacle and new media. Chapter Three will turn to the definition of the Avant-garde drama, discussing the relationship between the specific areas of drama (drama practitioners, motives of the drama, stage scenery, spectatorship, and body) and the modern city. Chapter Four will analyze in details the cases in two metropolis: Beijing and Shanghai, particularly comparing their cultural background, production situation, the type and quality of the production and the spectator groups. The variation of the urban culture influences the production choices of the Avant-garde drama; while the Avant-garde drama reflects the cultural transformation of different cities. In addition, this chapter will briefly analyze the drama as a carrier of cultural interaction of cities, and I will conduct a comparative study in this interchange and interaction. The results of the above research will be concluded in the final chapter. / The thesis will discourse on the context of contemporary mainland China, and analyze the inner tensions lying in a complex matrix of contending relationships between the modern city and the Avant-garde drama. I will try to explore the characteristics, situation, evolution and future possibilities of the dramas in the context of modern urban society, while probing into the situation and symptoms of modern Chinese cities in relation to the Avant-garde drama. I will find out the construction of the power relationships concomitant with the cultural transformation in mainland China from 1990s, and will explore the possibility of the Avant-garde theatre as a public space as well as the modern city's stimulation and facilitation of this possibility. / 李婭菲. / Advisers: Thomas Luk; Natalia Chan. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-06, Section: A, page: 1840. / Thesis (doctoral)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 214-230). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / School code: 1307. / Li Yafei.

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