Postdramatic Tendencies in Czech Avant-Garde Theatre: Reconsidering the Case of Director Emil František Burian and His Production of "May" (1935)
Abstract
This article analyses the production May (1935) by the Czech avant-garde director Emil František Burian, based on the famous Romantic poem by Karel Hynek Macha. The production combined voice-band recitation, music, dance and life action with the projection of photographs and film footage. The paper offers a new interpretation and contextualisation of the work in the context of avant-garde theatre, suggesting an alternative perspective and arguing that the production should be reconsidered as a post-dramatic phenomenon of the Czech theatre avant-garde.
Disclosure Statement
Keywords:
avant-garde theatre, postdramatic theatre, multimedia in theatre, Emil František Burian, Karel Hynek Mácha, authorial subjectReferences
Bernátek, Martin. “New Book on the Czech Avant-Garde Theatre.” Theatralia 26, no. 2 (2023): 239–247. https://doi.org/10.5817/TY2023-2-18.
Google Scholar
Bernátek, Martin. “Theatrical Apparatus and Social Change: The Divadlo Práce Project.” In Reclaimed Avant-garde: Spaces and Stages of Avant-garde Theatre in Central-Eastern Europe, edited by Zoltán Imre and Dariusz Kosiński. Warszawa: Instytut Teatralny im. Zbigniewa Raszewskiego, 2018.
Google Scholar
Bílek, Petr A., Josef Vojvodík, and Jan Wiendl, eds. A Glossary of Catchwords of the Czech Avant-Garde: Conceptions of Aesthetics and the Changing Faces of Art. 1908–1958. Praha: Togga, 2011.
Google Scholar
Burian, Emil František. Emil František Burian a jeho program poetického divadla, edited by Bořivoj Srba. Praha: Divadelní ústav, 1981.
Google Scholar
Burian, Emil František. “The Stage Metaphor.” In Theatre Theory Reader: Prague School Writings, edited by David Drozd, Tomáš Kačer, and Don Sparling, 499–500. Praha: Karolinum Press, 2016.
Google Scholar
Burian, Jarka M. Leading Creators of Twentieth-Century Czech Theater. London: Routledge, 2002.
Google Scholar
Česálková, Lucie, and Kateřina Svatoňová. The Dictator of Time: (De)contextualizing the Phenomenon of Laterna Magika+. Praha: National Film Archive, 2019.
Google Scholar
Hansen-Löve, Aage A. “Jan Mukařovský v kontextu ‘syntetické avantgardy’ a ‘formálně filozofické školy’ v Rusku.” Česká literatura 42, no. 5 (1994): 451–495.
Google Scholar
Jochmanová, Andrea. “Voice-band.” In A Glossary of Catchwords of the Czech Avant-Garde. Praha: Togga, 2011.
Google Scholar
Kosiński, Dariusz. “Central-European Theatre Avant-garde: Reclamation or Reimagination”. Theatralia 25, no. 1 (2022): 149–162. https://doi.org/10.5817/TY2022-1-9.
Google Scholar
Kosiński, Dariusz, ed. A Lexicon of the Central-Eastern European Interwar Theatre Avant-garde. Warszawa: Instytut Teatralny im. Zbigniewa Raszewskiego, 2023.
Google Scholar
Lehmann, Hans-Thies. Postdramatic Theatre. Translated by Karen Jurs-Munby. London: Routledge, 2006.
Google Scholar
Macha, Karel Hynek. May. Translated by James Naughton. https://czech.mml.ox.ac.uk/karel-hynek-macha-maj-1836.
Google Scholar
Mukařovsky, Jan. “D34–D48 ve vyvoji českeho divadla.” In Studie z estetiky. Praha: Odeon, 1966.
Google Scholar
Mukařovsky, Jan. Structure, Sign, and Function: Selected Essays by Jan Mukařovský. Edited and translated by John Burbank and Peter Steiner. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1978.
Google Scholar
Shevtsova, Maria, and Innes Christopher. Cambridge Introduction to Theatre Directing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139016391.
Google Scholar
Skrbkova, Lola. E. F. Burianova voicebandová kompozice Máchova “Máje”. Brno: Městske kulturni středisko S.K. Neumanna, 1977.
Google Scholar
Součkova, Milada. The Czech Romantics. Berlin: Mouton, 1958.
Google Scholar
Srba, Bořivoj. Poetické divadlo E.F. Buriana. Brno: Statni pedagogicke nakladatelstvi, 1971.
Google Scholar
Srba, Bořivoj. Řečí světla: princip světelného divadla v inscenační tvorbě Emila Františka Buriana. Brno: Janačkova akademie muzickych uměni, 2004.
Google Scholar
Trager, Josef. “Machův Máj na jevišti.” Listy pro umění a kritiku 3 (1935): 250–251.
Google Scholar
Authors
David Drozddrozd@phil.muni.cz
Masaryk University Czechia
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3351-8511
David Drozd – PhD., head of the Department of Theatre Studies, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic. He is a dramaturge, translator, and theatre theoretician. His main research fields are performance analysis (with a focus on modern and postmodern Czech theatre culture, especially directing) and structural and semiotic theatre theory (with a special focus on the Prague Linguistic Circle and the history of Czech theatre theory).
Statistics
Abstract views: 6PDF downloads: 1
License
Copyright (c) 2026 David Drozd
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The author grants a royalty-free nonexclusive license (CC BY 4.0) to use the article in Pamiętnik Teatralny, retains full copyright, and agrees to identify the work as first having been published in Pamiętnik Teatralny should it be published or used again (download licence agreement). By submitting an article the author agrees to make it available under CC BY 4.0 license.
From issue 1/2018 to 3/2022 all articles were published under a Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. During this period the authors granted a royalty-free nonexclusive license (CC BY-ND 4.0) to use their article in Pamiętnik Teatralny, retained full copyright, and agreed to identify the work as first having been published in our journal should it be published or used again.
