Skip to content
Licensed Unlicensed Requires Authentication Published by De Gruyter November 4, 2016

Caryl Churchill’s 21st Century Poetics: Theatre Form and Feminism from Far Away to Ding Dong the Wicked

  • Harry Derbyshire EMAIL logo

Abstract

This article considers the six plays written by Caryl Churchill between 2000 and 2012 (Far Away, A Number, Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, Seven Jewish Children, Love and Information and Ding Dong the Wicked) in relation to the vision of feminist theatre offered in Sue-Ellen Case’s “Towards a New Poetics,” the final chapter of her 1988 study Feminism and Theatre. It thereby offers an assessment of how far Churchill’s work in the ‘post-feminist’ period accords with or deviates from an earlier feminist agenda, one that proposed to decouple theatre form from patriarchy by re-making it from scratch. It is argued that Churchill’s work during this period, while no longer explicitly feminist in intent, nonetheless contains and expresses – both in its thematic concerns and its formal properties – the feminist “residue” that has been described by Janelle Reinelt. The body of the discussion offers a consideration of the plays in relation to the four main tenets of feminist theatre as envisaged by Case: breaking with realism; constructing woman as subject; deviating from linearity; and offering multiple and ambiguous meanings. The argument concludes by suggesting that Churchill’s widespread influence on contemporary British playwriting can be seen in part as the influence of the kind of feminist thinking exemplified by Case’s “new poetics.”

Works Cited

Aston, Elaine. “But not that: Caryl Churchill’s Political Shape-Shifting at the Turn of the Millennium.” Modern Drama 56.2 (2013): 145–164. Print.10.3138/md.0521Search in Google Scholar

Aston, Elaine. Feminist Views on the English Stage: Women Playwrights, 1990–2000. Cambridge Studies in Modern Theatre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Print.10.1017/CBO9780511486005Search in Google Scholar

Aston, Elaine. Foreword. Feminism and Theatre, ed. Sue-Ellen Case. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. ix-xxiii. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations. Ed. Hannah Arendt. Trans. Harry Zohn. New York: Schocken, 1969. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Brecht, Bertolt. Brecht on Theatre. Eds. Marc Silberman, Steve Giles and Tom Kuhn. Trans. Jack Davis, Romy Fursland, Steve Giles, Victoria Hill, Kristopher Imbrigotta, Marc Silberman and John Willett. 3rd ed. London: Methuen, 2015. Print.10.5040/9781472558640Search in Google Scholar

Buse, Peter. Drama + Theory: Critical Approaches to Modern British Drama. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Case, Sue-Ellen. Feminism and Theatre. 1988. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. Print.10.1007/978-1-349-19114-7_5Search in Google Scholar

Churchill, Caryl. Ding Dong the Wicked. London: Nick Hern, 2012. Print.10.5040/9781784602499.40000002Search in Google Scholar

Churchill, Caryl. Love and Information. London: Nick Hern, 2012. Print.10.5040/9781784602482.00000002Search in Google Scholar

Churchill, Caryl. Plays: Four. London: Nick Hern, 2008. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Churchill, Caryl. Seven Jewish Children. London: Nick Hern, 2009. Print.10.5040/9781784602475.00000002Search in Google Scholar

Churchill, Caryl. Top Girls. Methuen Student Edition. Ed. Bill Naismith. London: Methuen, 1991. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Diamond, Elin. Unmaking Mimesis: Essays on Feminism and Theater. London: Routledge, 1997. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Eagleton, Terry. After Theory. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 2004. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Gobert, R. Darren. The Theatre of Caryl Churchill. Methuen Drama Critical Companions. London: Methuen, 2014. Print.10.5040/9781408166390Search in Google Scholar

Harris, Geraldine. “Post-postfeminism? Amelia Bullmore’s Di and Viv and Rose, April de Angelis’s Jumpy and Karin Young’s The Awkward Squad.” Contemporary Theatre Review 24.2 (2014): 177–91. Print.10.1080/10486801.2014.885898Search in Google Scholar

Moran, Caitlin. How to be a Woman. London: Ebury Press, 2011. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Pinter, Harold. Various Voices: Sixty Years of Prose, Poetry, Politics 1948–2008. London: Faber, 2009. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Rebellato, Dan. “Exit the Author.” Contemporary British Theatre: Breaking New Ground. Ed. Vicky Angelaki. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. 9–31. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Rebellato, Dan. “On Churchill’s Influences.” The Cambridge Companion to Caryl Churchill. Eds. Elaine Aston and Elin Diamond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 163–79. Print.10.1017/CCOL9780521493222.010Search in Google Scholar

Reinelt, Janelle. After Brecht: British Epic Theater. Ann Arbor: University of Michegan Press, 1994. Print.10.3998/mpub.13741Search in Google Scholar

Reinelt, Janelle. “On Feminist and Sexual Politics.” The Cambridge Companion to Caryl Churchill. Eds. Elaine Aston and Elin Diamond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 18–35. Print.10.1017/CCOL9780521493222.002Search in Google Scholar

Roberts, Philip. About Churchill: The Playwright and the Work. London: Faber, 2008. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Sierz, Aleks. In-yer-face Theatre: British Drama Today. London: Faber, 2000. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Zola, Émile. “From Naturalism in the Theatre.” Trans. Albert Bermel. The Theory of the Modern Stage. Ed. Eric Bentley. 3rd ed. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1992. 351–72. Print.Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2016-11-4
Published in Print: 2016-11-1

© 2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 29.3.2024 from https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/jcde-2016-0021/html
Scroll to top button