Performing European Memories: Trauma, Ethics, Politics (Studies in International Performance)

Asking whether a genuinely shared European memory is possible while addressing the dangers of a single, homogenized European memory, Gluhovic examines the contradictions, specificities, continuities and discontinuities in the European shared and unshared pasts as represented in the works of Pinter, Tadeusz Kantor, Heiner Muller and Artur Zmijewski. -- From publisher's website "Performing European Memories: Trauma, Ethics, Politics" explores the intersections between contemporary European theatre and performance, the interdisciplinary field of memory studies, and current preoccupations with the politics of memory in Europe. Asking whether a genuinely shared European memory is possible while addressing the dangers of a single homogenised European memory, this important book examines the contradictions, specificities, continuities and discontinuities in the European shared and unshared pasts as represented in the works of Harold Pinter, Tadeusz Kantor, and Heiner Muller, Andrzej Wajda, Artur Zmijewski and other European artists. Gluhovic shows different ways in which these artists engage with the traumatic experiences of the Holocaust, the Stalinist Gulags, colonialism, and imperialism, challenge their audiences' historical imagination, and renew their affective engagement with Europe's past Front Matter....Pages i-xii Introduction: Theorising Europe and Recollection....Pages 1-29 History, Memory, and Trauma in Heiner Müller’s Theatre....Pages 30-100 Contested Pasts and the Ethics of Remembrance in Tadeusz Kantor’s “Theatre of Death”....Pages 101-170 Postmemory, Testimony, Affect....Pages 171-247 Conclusion: European Memories and the Margins of Europe: Sarajevo Theatre Tragedy and Three Prayers for One Wish....Pages 248-268 Back Matter....Pages 269-322