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Sustainable Canons: Gadamer's Hermeneutics and Theatre

Sustainable Canons: Gadamer's Hermeneutics and Theatre

Authors :
Charles Gillespie
Source :
Labyrinth: An International Journal for Philosophy, Value Theory and Sociocultural Hermeneutics, Vol 24, Iss 2 (2022)
Publication Year :
2022
Publisher :
Axia Academic Publishers, 2022.

Abstract

This essay investigates Gadamer's hermeneutic theory and its application to theatre. Attention to Gadamer's views of theatre and performative interpretation provides a foundation to theorize a more sustainable canon. Classics that constitute a sustainable canon operate within a tradition through a community of interpretation that continually returns to interpret them anew. This structure also describes the theatrical repertoire. Several of Gadamer's central themes find easy analogues on stage: play, the history of effect (Wirkungsgeschichte), the participation of an audience in the fusion of horizons, and art's making present continuity the past. Gadamer provides a framework for understanding the work of interpretation of a dramatic text as a shared participatory event. In particular, Gadamer's hermeneutic theory can make sense of the how performance history makes discoveries that "sticks" to a script, particularly as when and how it enters and influences the canon. Gadamer's hermeneutics help to interpret how innovative performance choices and stage spectacle are part of a play's meaning; these interpretive interventions in drama's reception history are significant and not simply ornamentation to some "truth of the play" accessed only via the reenactment of the original compositional context. Occasional reparative interpretations of the canon, in turn, help to sustain the community.

Details

Language :
German, English, French
ISSN :
24104817 and 15618927
Volume :
24
Issue :
2
Database :
Directory of Open Access Journals
Journal :
Labyrinth: An International Journal for Philosophy, Value Theory and Sociocultural Hermeneutics
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
edsdoj.6246af67f50d452d86567f52bd22bc2d
Document Type :
article
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.25180/lj.v24i2.311