Irony and the Modern Theatre

Covering major playwrights including Ibsen, Brecht and Chekhov, William Storm presents a comprehensive investigation of irony's significance in the modern theatre.

William Storm (Author)

9781107007925, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 5 May 2011

266 pages
23.6 x 16.1 x 2 cm, 0.57 kg

'… a discerning commentary … William Storm's Irony and the Modern Theatre revisits some well-mapped territory, surveying as it does the nature and purpose of irony in selected dramatic texts from Ibsen to Tony Kushner.' Modern Philology

Irony and theatre share intimate kinships, not only regarding dramatic conflict, dialectic or wittiness, but also scenic structure and the verbal or situational ironies that typically mark theatrical speech and action. Yet irony today, in aesthetic, literary and philosophical contexts especially, is often regarded with skepticism - as ungraspable, or elusive to the point of confounding. Countering this tendency, William Storm advocates a wide-angle view of this master trope, exploring the ironic in major works by playwrights including Chekhov, Pirandello and Brecht, and in notable relation to well-known representative characters in drama from Ibsen's Halvard Solness to Stoppard's Septimus Hodge and Wasserstein's Heidi Holland. To the degree that irony is existential, its presence in the theatre relates directly to the circumstances and the expressiveness of the characters on stage. This study investigates how these key figures enact, embody, represent and personify the ironic in myriad situations in the modern and contemporary theatre.

Introduction
1. Irony personified: Ibsen and The Master Builder
2. The character of irony in Chekhov
3. Irony and dialectic: Shaw's Candida
4. Pirandello's 'father' - and Brecht's 'mother'
5. Absurdist irony: Ionesco's 'anti-play'
6. 'Ironist first-class': Stoppard's Arcadia
7. American ironies: Wasserstein and Kushner
8. Irony's theatre
Works cited.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: plays & playwrights [DSG], Literary studies: general [DSB], Plays, playscripts [DD], Theatre studies [AN]