Always already almost here: Levinas, Derrida, and an ethico-political theatre.

摘要

This work begins and ends with the problem of the theatre's political efficacy and the bringing about of a just spectatorial response. Various scholars have utilized the tools of "post-" theories, and especially the work of Jacques Derrida, as a means to assess the political value of contemporary performance. Extraordinarily few, however, make reference to a notion of ethics. My project takes into account the ethical philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas as, arguably, the most important intertext for Derridean deconstruction, thus introducing an explicit notion of ethics—a radical transcendence that is wholly incommensurable with the political realm—into this existing body of work. In doing so, it is possible to question this work, to assess its victories and reveal its blind spots toward a revisioning of the possibility of a just, or what I term an "ethico-political," theatre.;It is not, however, just the context that must be specifically established, but also the text. Toward this end, DNA Theatre's production of Paula and Karl will be subjected to detailed analysis—this time through the lens of Derrida's reading of "hospitality" in the work of Levinas—in order to interrogate the strategic mechanisms by which an ethico-political theatre might operate.;This work concludes by radically destabilizing the very notion of an ethico-political theatre. In a sense, every theatre is an ethico-political theatre, while in another sense this theatre cannot be properly actualized. It is precisely this lack of stability that keeps strategy from slipping into dogma, and is the ephemeral source of this theatre's potentially just impact upon those who witness it.;But can deconstruction operate as intended in the context of the theatre? Derrida envisioned and practised deconstruction in the context of philosophy, which possesses an aura of seriousness (Reality) unlike the context of performance, which is saturated with playfulness (Illusion). As such, it is essential to explore the strategic contextual deployment of reality and illusion within the theatre, such that this formative contextual element is foregrounded. Of particular interest here are forms that subvert conventional contexts, such as various movements within the twentieth century avant-garde performance tradition, which are discussed through this lens.