Introduction

Summary

THE TERM “GESTURE” IN THE TITLE OF THIS BOOK calls for some explanation. In some disciplines in which gesture is studied, such as anthropology, social psychology, and linguistics, the term is used with a more precise if also somewhat narrower meaning than in literary criticism and theater studies. A leading scholar in the burgeoning field of gesture studies, Adam Kendon, defines gesture as a “label for actions that have features of manifest deliberate expressiveness.” Gesture is seen as part of a system of signs that human beings consciously use to communicate, and this system is influenced by a number of factors, such as the cultural heritage, the environment, the situation, the degree of formality, and so on. In literature, and particularly in drama, gesture tends to have a rather broader meaning and embrace all visible bodily movements, whether they are conscious or unconscious. When used consciously, it generally lends emphasis to what a character says, extending or illustrating the meaning of what is being conveyed. Gesture as expounded by writers like Quintilian and Cicero, who wrote on the elements of the ancient art of rhetoric, overlaps with gesture as it is used in drama. Schiller makes frequent use of gesture in his plays: his stage directions indicate a variety of bodily movements, ranging from the gentle, such as taking another character by the hand, to the more violent, like stamping the feet or running around wildly.