James MacDonald, Roberta Mock (EDT) Carnival Texts

Annotation

Carnival Texts comprises three related dramatic works, all of which have as their point of departure Russian theorist Mikhail Bakhtin's concept of carnival, a literary style designed to subvert dominant assumptions through chaos and humour. Making creative use of post-Brechtian performance theory, these texts blur the distinction between spectator and performer in a fascinating exploration of physical, moral and cultural upheaval in a postmodern age. Performance theory is crucial to understanding how performance affects collective understanding, and this book will be of interest to a broad range of students of drama and theatre.