Book contents
- A New History of Theatre in France
- A New History of Theatre in France
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on the Text
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 The Performing Arts in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century France
- Chapter 2 Drama during the Wars of Religion
- Chapter 3 Drama before Standardization
- Chapter 4 Neo-Classical Tragedy
- Chapter 5 Molière, a Man of the Stage?
- Chapter 6 Theatres as Economic Concerns
- Chapter 7 Seventeenth-Century Printed Theatre
- Chapter 8 Non-Official Eighteenth-Century Stages
- Chapter 9 The Expanded Theatre of the French Revolution
- Chapter 10 Nineteenth-Century Melodrama, Vaudeville and Entertainment
- Chapter 11 New Approaches to Women Actors and Celebrity in Nineteenth-Century France
- Chapter 12 Extended Romanticism in the Extended Nineteenth Century
- Chapter 13 Poetry in Action, 1945–1968
- Chapter 14 Performance and Installation Art
- Chapter 15 Twentieth- and Twenty-First-Century Theatre Directing
- Chapter 16 Political Theatre in France (1954–2020)
- Chapter 17 Liberating Third World Theatre
- Chapter 18 Francophone Theatre-Makers in France
- Chapter 19 Migration in Modern and Contemporary Playwriting
- Chapter 20 An Interview with Éric Ruf
- Chapter 21 An Interview with Magali Mougel
- Chapter 22 An Interview with Phia Ménard
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
Chapter 3 - Drama before Standardization
The Theatre of Blood
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 October 2024
- A New History of Theatre in France
- A New History of Theatre in France
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on the Text
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 The Performing Arts in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century France
- Chapter 2 Drama during the Wars of Religion
- Chapter 3 Drama before Standardization
- Chapter 4 Neo-Classical Tragedy
- Chapter 5 Molière, a Man of the Stage?
- Chapter 6 Theatres as Economic Concerns
- Chapter 7 Seventeenth-Century Printed Theatre
- Chapter 8 Non-Official Eighteenth-Century Stages
- Chapter 9 The Expanded Theatre of the French Revolution
- Chapter 10 Nineteenth-Century Melodrama, Vaudeville and Entertainment
- Chapter 11 New Approaches to Women Actors and Celebrity in Nineteenth-Century France
- Chapter 12 Extended Romanticism in the Extended Nineteenth Century
- Chapter 13 Poetry in Action, 1945–1968
- Chapter 14 Performance and Installation Art
- Chapter 15 Twentieth- and Twenty-First-Century Theatre Directing
- Chapter 16 Political Theatre in France (1954–2020)
- Chapter 17 Liberating Third World Theatre
- Chapter 18 Francophone Theatre-Makers in France
- Chapter 19 Migration in Modern and Contemporary Playwriting
- Chapter 20 An Interview with Éric Ruf
- Chapter 21 An Interview with Magali Mougel
- Chapter 22 An Interview with Phia Ménard
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
Summary
Christian Biet explains that ahead of the restrictions on theatrical representation imposed in the seventeenth century, sixteenth-century theatre was free to stage macabre spectacles of cruelty and bloody horror, convulsive emotions and transgressive acts. Like Bouteille and Karsenti in their chapter in the same book, Biet is careful to locate the theatre he examines during the catastrophically destructive Wars of Religion. While overt depictions of the war were banned in an attempt to avoid sectarianism, playwrights presented schism, chaos, politics of state and abuse perpetrated by the monarchy via the detours of allegory, classical myth or foreign context. In Nicolas Chrétien des Croix’s Les Portugais infortunés (The Unfortunate Portuguese, 1608), for example, the encounter between the Portuguese and the inhabitants of the land they colonize indirectly critiques France’s own colonial politics of expansion and the use of religion to justify terror and abuse overseas. Biet argues that, far from being primitive or archaic, theatre from this period has much to teach us today about the representation in the arts and media of violence and atrocity.
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- A New History of Theatre in France , pp. 72 - 87Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024