History of Theater I
F06
Kathleen Dimmick
This course examines the history and aesthetics of theater, along with the development of staging, production, and acting methods and styles. We read representative plays from the major periods of dramatic literature, from Ancient Greece to the 20th century, with particular reference to historical context and dramatic convention. Along with the plays, we look at critical and theoretical essays that elucidate these social and aesthetic conditions. Part I covers the period of Ancient Greece through 17th-century Europe, including the classical theater of Japan; Part II covers the beginning of modernism in 19th-century European drama, examines the formal experiments of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and concludes with postwar European and American drama.