The Theatre of Form and the Production of Meaning: Contemporary Canadian Dramaturgies

by Ric Knowles

How do dramatic forms shape social formations? This study of Canadian dramatic structures asks this question of an extraordinarily wide range of contemporary plays. Knowles begins with a look at inherited naturalistic and modernist forms based, respectively, on time and space. He then uses this division to extend his inquiry first into post-naturalist forms of collective and collaborative creations, community plays, and historical metadramas, and then into postmodernist structures of environmental theatre and “dialogic monologue.” The book ends with a brief epilogue on the structures of “spacetime,” as Canadian theatre moves “towards a quantum dramaturgy.” From Michael Cook and David French through George F. Walker, Judith Thompson, and Sally Clark, to Monique Mojica, John Mighton, and feminist performance art, this book revolutionizes the study of contemporary Canadian drama. It’s a thoughtful and timely advance in our ways of thinking about dramaturgical form and meaning in Canadian theatrical production, and in Canadian society.

250 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1999