The Fault of Epimetheus? Theater in the Network of Techniques and Technologies
Abstract
This article presents William B. Worthen’s latest book: Shakespeare, Theatre, Technicity (Cambridge, 2020), which offers a reflection on staging Shakespeare in the age of digital media domination. This publication by the renowned Shakespeare scholar is an important voice in the discussion of theatre as a hypermedium, that is, a medium that reaches for other media in order to establish its historical version in a particular period. Worthen’s concept is anchored not only in media theories, but above all in the philosophy of Bernard Stiegler, who regards the human being is a technical being, using material and technical prostheses to transcend his/her being-towards-death and to be able to exist beyond purely biological conditions. One of Worthen’s crucial arguments for considering theatre as a hypermedium is his extensive analysis of the practices, myths and dilemmas concerning the reconstruction of traditional Elizabethan theater; he defines them as remediation practices.
Keywords:
Elizabethan theater, theater as medium, original practicies (OP), performance studies, media studies, Bernard StieglerReferences
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Authors
Artur DudaNicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2522-6888
Artur Duda - associate professor of Theater and Performance Studies at Nicholas Copernicus University, Toruń, Poland. He is a member of The Polish Society for Theatre Research, Gesellschaft für Theaterwissenschaft (working group Theatergeschichte/Historiographie) and IFTR. Sincce 2018 he collaborates with Shanghai Theatre Acadamy His research interests include diverse aspects of drama and theater theory, the relationship between the text of a drama and its staging, the aesthetics of contemporary theater, especially Polish (history of the theater in Toruń), Lithuanian and German, and performance studies. He published Teatr realności (2006), Performans na żywo jako medium i obiekt mediatyzacji (2011), Reżyserskie strategie inscenizacji dzieła literackiego (2017), Teatr w Toruniu 1904-1944. Opowieść performatyczna (2020).
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