A matter of fundamentals : sound and silence in the radio drama of Samuel Beckett

Samuel Beckett was arguably one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. Known for his stage plays, including the renowned En attendant Godot (1948), Beckett’s contribution to the field of radio drama is often overlooked. His corpus of radio dramas included some of the most innovativeradio works of the post-World War II period. For Beckett, radio drama was not exclusively verbocentric, for he always maintained that his work was “a matter of fundamental sounds (no joke intended) made as fully as possible” (Frost 362). His (radio) drama aesthetics defined a strict hierarchy of sound whereby the dramatist balances sound effects, music and the characters’ dialogue – and the use of silence. In this essay, I examine the juxtaposition of sound and silence in Samuel Beckett’s most influential radio dramas: All That Fall, Embers, Words and Music and Cascando. In the end, this essay will show that the sounds and silence employed in Beckett’s radio dramatic works were inextricably linked, which added to the overall meaning of his dramas.

Watching the words: drama and poems

Some poems are inherently dramatic due to their narrative content or the events, characters, places and emotions that are their subject. Others have the potential for dramatisation because of some aural or visual quality of their poetic form. However, if dramatising poems is to be meaningful and effective children need to be taught something about the art form of drama rather than just being left to their own devices. This chapter explores the learning potential of considering the printed text of a poem as a notation of sound, movement, gesture and use of space. The chapter recognises a progression from simple nursery rhymes to the sophisticated use of poetic language in different types of literature that is mirrored in the journey from infants’ clapping games to the dramatic juxtaposition of aural and visual images in theatre and the performing arts.

The long and the short of it: negotiating the right space for Asian theatre in the university drama curriculum

This article compares two approaches to teaching Asian theatre at undergraduate level in the United Kingdom. One approach samples a variety of different traditions as a means to challenge students to produce performance for a combined audience of hearing and deaf, whereas the other focuses on the effect of exploring one geographical area intensively over the course of one academic year. The article seeks to highlight the merits and pitfalls of both approaches, and questions whether student work that actively questions ethnicity and identity, as well as the tension between innovation and tradition, might be considered diasporic in character.

Lost Youth : successfully introduced by Jennie Goldstein in Max Gabel's comedy drama "Ferlorene Yugend" at Gabel's Theatre New York City

words and music by David Meyerowitz. [Arr. by Jack Kammen]

The eternal drama; a comprehensive treatise on the syngenetic history of humanity, dramatics, and theatre.

Bibliography: p. 293-295.

In the mouth of the imagination : positioning children as co-researchers and co-artists to create a professional children's theatre production

In recent decades a number of Australian artists and teacher/artists have given serious attention to the creation of performance forms and performance engagement models that respect children’s intelligence, engage with themes of relevance, avoid the cliche´s of children’s theatre whilst connecting both sincerely and playfully with current understandings of the way in which young children develop and engage with the world. Historically a majority of performing arts companies touring Australian schools or companies seeking schools to view a performance in a dedicated performance venue engage with their audiences in what can be called a ‘drop-in drop-out’ model. A six-month practice-led research project (The Tashi Project) which challenged the tenets of the ‘drop-in drop-out’ model has been recently undertaken by Sandra Gattenhof and Mark Radvan in conjunction with early childhood students from three Brisbane primary school classrooms who were positioned as co-researchers and co-artists. The children, researchers and performers worked in a complimentary relationship in both the artistic process and the development of product.

Duplicity/complicity : misperforming the social drama of disability

In this paper, I investigate the (mis)performance of ‘passing’ in the context of bodies with disabilities. The desire to conceal, control or contain a body’s idiosyncrasies can be a deceitful act, complicit with dominant cultural assumptions about the benefits of fitting in. Passing, and the performative tricks, techniques and prostheses that support the ‘lie’ of passing, upholding a social contract in which a closeting-as-cure approach accommodates discomfort with difference. In this paper, I consider moments of non-passing, where people are caught out by mistakes or deliberate misperformances of the daily social drama of ability and disability. I reference the work of disabled artists Bill Shannon, Aaron Williamson and Katherine Araniello, who re-perform their daily personal interactions in the public sphere as a sort of guerilla theatre. Their work brings hidden assumptions about how disabled people should act and interact to the brink of visibility. It challenges passers-by to confront their complicity in these discourses by pressing them to re-perform their own spontaneous reactions to bodies that misperform the ‘lie’ of normalcy.

The new wave : a Brisbane perspective : La Boite Theatre Company's distinctive contribution

In 1967 Brisbane Repertory Theatre made a decision that was to change the city's cultural landscape in a significant and lasting way. Faced with crippling theatre rental costs, Brisbane Rep. found a realistic solution by converting one of its properties - an old Queenslander - into a unique theatre space. The theatre-in-the box that emerged, aptly called La Boite, opened on 23 June 1967 with a production of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger. This experimental space excited the imagination of a new, younger audience not previously interested in Brisbane Rep's essentially conservative fare. It attracted a new group of directors and actors keen to be part of a changing repertoire that embraced more radical, non-mainstream productions, some of which were of Australian plays. The decade after 1967 was a period of change and development unprecedented in La Boite's history. Since then the company has sustained and grown its commitment to Australian plays and the commissioning of new works. To what extent was this most significance moment in La Boite's transformational journey influenced by southern 'new waves' of change? With the benefit of hindsight, it is now time for a re-consideration of Brisbane's distinctive contribution to the New Wave.

Applied theatre and organisational transformation

Applied Theatre is an umbrella term for a range of drama-based techniques, all of which align with a lineage of pedagogical theory and practice: (e.g.) Freire, Moreno, Heathcote. It encompasses methods and forms including Drama Education (O’Neill); Forum Theatre (Boal); and Process Drama (Haseman, O’Toole). Applied theatre often occurs in non-theatrical settings (schools, hospitals, prisons) with the aim of helping participants address issues of local concern. Increasingly, Applied Theatre practices are utilised in the corporate environment. Appied Theatre adopts artistic principles in production, but posits a practical utility beyond simple entertainment.

Industrial Relations: Proceedings from the 1999 Australasian Drama Studies Association Conference

These papers were presented at “Industrial Relations”, the Australasian Drama Studies Association conference hosted by Theatre & Teaching Studies in the Academy of the Arts, Queensland University of Technology, from the 5th to the 9th of July, 1999. Conference delegates included scholars and artists from across the tertiary education and professional theatre sectors, including, of course, many individuals who work across and between both those worlds. More than a hundred delegates from Australia, New Zealand, England, Belgium and Canada attended the week’s events, which included: • Over sixty conference papers covering a variety of topics from project reports to academy/industry partnerships, theatre history, audience reception studies, health & safety, cultural policy, performance theory, theatre technology and more; • Performances ranging from drama to dance, music and cabaret; • Workshops, panel discussions, forums and interviews; • Keynote addresses from Wesley Enoch, Josette Feral and Keith Johnstone; and • A special “Links with Industry” day, which included the launch of ADSA’s “Links with Industry” brochure, an interview between Mark Radvan and David Williamson, and a panel session featuring Jules Holledge, Zane Trow, Katharine Brisbane, John Kotzas, Gay McAuley and David Watt.

Practising inspired leadership : the use of applied theatre 'prophetical' in the Executive Leadership Development Program for Queensland Health

The Executive Leadership Development Program embarked upon by Queensland Health as a part of the major reform program is discussed. The second stage of the program has begun and the main aim is to ensure leadership development across the organization.