Theater and Dance 372: Theater: Modern Europe

This course is a survey of the literature and history of the theater of Modern Europe. Students primarily examine plays through the lens of the following movements: Naturalism, Realism, the Historical Avant-Garde, Modernism, and Postmodernism. Students will become aware of changes in social, political, and religious attitudes and the influence of these changes on the form and content of plays. Students will become aware of technological advances and their effects on theater design and technical practice. We will consider trends in acting, directing, audiences, and theory. We will seek to identify the influence of these movements and developments on contemporary theater practice. Dramatists and theorists to be studied may include Büchner, Zola, Ibsen, Jarry, Strindberg, Chekhov, Stanislavsky, Pirandello, Brecht, Genet, Artaud, Beckett, Esslin, Pinter, Müller, Churchill, Jameson, and Lehmann.