Theatrical Immanence: The Deus ex Machina after the Death of God

The appearance of supernatural creatures on the theatrical stage, like the deus ex machina, directly intervening in the flow of the events has not ceased with the “Death of God”. It can be viewed from two perspectives, first as a meta-theatrical device through which the theatrical medium self-reflexively, sometimes even playfully, examines its own conditions and limits, as an integral aspect of the theatrical apparatus, or its dispositive; and secondly from a philosophical or theological perspective, raising the question why it has continued to serve as a powerful metaphor not only for an open-ended futurity through which Utopian notions are critically reflected and refigured, but also for ideological, social and personal conflicts, frequently even involving strong components of excess, violence and cruelty. The article discusses these theoretical issues and exemplifies with The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Elisabeth Hauptmann

Le cadre. La scène d’ouverture d’une élégie vidéographique

Cet essai examine la première séquence de la vidéo de Wilson, de façon à montrer comment elle établit ses propres paramètres génériques fondamentaux, l’inscrivant expressément comme une élégie. Le sujet explicite de cette élégie est MoLièRe, mais son objet implicite est Heiner MüLleR, qui a écrit et colligé les textes de cette vidéo. L’article porte aussi sur la façon dont la vidéo utilise des images de cadres à des fins autoréférentielles, de façon à se présenter explicitement comme une élégie pour « M-L-R ».This article analyses the first sequence of the video film with the aim of showing that it sets up its basic genre parameters, literally framing it as a kind of elegy. The overt subject of this elegy is MoLieRe, but its implicit subject is Heiner MüLleR, who wrote and collected the texts for the video. The article also focuses on the ways in which the video uses images of frames as a selfreferential method to frame itself generically as an elegy for “M-L-R”

‘Suddenly a Stranger Appears’: Walter Benjamin’s Readings of Bertolt Brecht’s Epic Theatre

My contribution to the the NTS issue on Theatre and Continental Philosophy discusses a particular aspect of the complex intellectual and creative dialogue between the work and thinking of Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht, beginning in 1929, the year they became close friends. Benjamin is no doubt the first critic of Brecht’s epic theatre, even planning to write a book about his artistic contributions. By examining the notion of the “Interruption” (Die Unterbrechung) and the sudden appearance of a stranger in three of Benjamin’s texts about Brecht’s epic theatre, I want to draw attention to Benjamin’s philosophical understanding of this ‘critical’ figure’ (the interrupting stranger), as one of the central aspects of the epic theatre. The essay is a prolegomenon for a more comprehensive study of this topic

Theatralische Immanenz: Der deus ex machina nach dem Tod Gottes

Das Auftreten übernatürlicher Geschöpfe auf der Theaterbühne, die in den Verlauf der Handlung intervenieren – wie der deus ex machina – ist mit dem „Tod Gottes“ nicht zu einem Ende gekommen. Es kann von zwei Perspektiven betrachtet werden: zuerst als ein meta-theatralisches Instrument, durch welches das theatralische Medium selbstreflexiv, manchmal sogar spielerisch, seine eigenen Bedingungen und Grenzen erforscht, als integraler Aspekt des theatralischen Apparates, oder seines Dispositivs; und zweitens von einer philosophischen oder theologischen Perspektive, wobei es die Frage aufwirft, warum es weiterhin als eine machtvolle Metapher dient – nicht nur für eine offene Zukünftigkeit, durch die utopische Begriffe kritisch reflektiert und neu figuriert werden, sondern auch für ideologische, soziale und persönliche Konflikte, wobei es oftmals sogar starke Elemente von Exzess, Gewalt und Grausamkeit impliziert. Der Artikel diskutiert diese theoretischen Fragen und erläutert sie anhand von Beispielen aus der Dreigroschenoper von Bertolt Brecht und Elisabeth Hauptmann

Praxis: An Editorial Statement

Praxis: An Editorial Statemen

Życzenia, obietnice i groźby: Walter Benjamin jako storyteller

Życzenia, obietnice i groźby: Walter Benjamin jako storytelle

Apie būtinybę : mirusiųjų balsai ir „lapų šlamesys“

The author indicates how we relate to history when imagining and representing utopias in the theatre or on the stage as a form of listening to the dead, or the “rustle of the leaves”. As Didi and Gogo agree, to have lived is not enough for the dead: “They have to talk about it”. And the theatre remains a site where this can be done without the risks that Hamlet runs, having to feign madness, or perhaps even actually being insane or believing that he is. At the same time, relying on interpretations of Hamlet as a model, the utopias of the 20th century, including the Zionist utopia (as expressed allegorically in The Dybbuk), have been based on multileveled combinations and linkages between the past and the future through the reappearance of the dead. The hoped for utopian condition has, on the one hand, been perceived as a corrective or even a form of healing of the painful failures of the past. But at the same time it has also been viewed nostalgically, depicting the return to an idyllic past (in our Israeli case by returning to the “Biblical homeland”) with its obvious associations of retrieving or even, some claim, re-establishing a lost (national) paradise.Yra daugybė būdų, kaip scenoje gali būti rekonstruojama istorija, ir kai kuriuos iš jų esu ištyrinėjęs savo knygoje Istorijos rekonstrukcijos: sceninės praeities reprezentacijos šiuolaikiniame teatre (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2000), kuri neseniai buvo išversta į lenkų kalbą. Šiame straipsnyje paliečiama tema, apie kurią knygoje tik užsiminiau: kai istorija yra rekonstruojama teatre, mes paprastai matome ir girdime kažką, kas kalba iš praeities, kas gyveno ir dabar vėl pasirodo scenoje, pasakodamas apie gyvenimą, kurį jis ar ji nugyveno prieš mirtį. Straipsnyje bandau įrodyti, kad toks pakartotinis pasirodymas – kaip Hamleto tėvo dvasios – kyla iš tam tikro primygtinio dabarties poreikio suprasti tam tikrą praeities laikotarpį, sugrįžti prie jo. Straipsnyje pateikiu daugybę atvejų, kai skaitytojas ar žiūrovas primygtinai raginamas klausytis mirusiųjų balsų. Straipsnis pradedamas asmeniniu pasakojimu, susijusiu su šia tema: tai pasakojimas apie mano senelį, kuris prieš bolševikų revoliuciją „vaidindavo“ mirusius personažus Sankt Peterburgo operose