Theatre and Event ― Staging the European Century

Theatre and Event: Staging the European Century, examines how, in these first decades of the twenty-first century, contemporary European theatre-makers have sought to consider the disastrous events of the twentieth century as the 'unfinished business' of the contemporary. Kear argues that by thinking through the logic of the event, and the theatre event especially, contemporary performance practice enables an affective interrogation of 'the event' of the European century.

Examining the work of leading theatre companies, Theatre and Event: Staging the European Century offers detailed expositions and engaged analyses of key works by Needcompany (Belgium), Jaunais Rigas Teatris (Latvia), Societas Raffaello Sanzio (Italy), National Theatre Wales (UK), and Studios Kabako (France/Democratic Republic of the Congo). This book offers an original conception of the theatre event as an event which exists in relation to, and performatively historicises, other 'events', requiring a critical and creative practice of spectatorship to animate its political affects.

Adrian Kear is Professor of Theatre and Performance at Aberystwyth University, UK. His writing focuses on contemporary theatre, performance, politics and philosophy. Previous publications include International Politics and Performance (with Jenny Edkins), Psychoanalysis and Performance (with Patrick Campbell), and Mourning Diana: Nation, Culture and the Performance of Grief (with Deborah Lyn Steinberg).