Theatre and Ethics

NICHOLAS RIDOUT is Head of the Department of Drama in at Queen Mary University of London, UK. He is the author of Stage Fright, Animals and Other Theatrical Problems (2006) and the co-editor with Joe Kelleher of Contemporary Theatres in Europe: A Critical Companion (2006).

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'[a] brilliant series...these mini paperbacks each give an insightful, focused overview of a key topic...start collecting now.' - Whatsonstage.com '...Palgrave Macmillan's excellent new outward-looking, eclectic Theatre& ... series.These short books, written by leading theatre academics, do much to reintroduce some of the brightest names in theatre academia to the general reader. Plus, the matrix of references to bigger books soon builds quite a comprehensive catch-up reading list for those of us who graduated more than a decade ago and are interested in where contemporary thinking is at...' - Guardian Theatre Blog, September 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/theatreblog/2009/sep/10/theatre-critics-academics-artists 'The accomplishment of Theatre& Ethics is to develop a theory of ethics in performance that can be applied to such a broad range of plays, performances, and cultures. While there are a number of remarkable insights in Nicholas Ridout's book, the most significant is simply to have brought together these two terms - 'theatre' and 'ethics' - in an approachable, compelling volume.' - D.J.Hopkins, Head of Theatre Studies, San Diego State University 'Nicholas Ridout...neatly organises his argument around the philosophy and practices of the ancient, modern and postmodern periods. Beginning with Sophocles' Philoctetes, he deftly analyses how the question 'how shall I act?' has been proposed and problematized in a range of theatrical encounters. For Ridout, the question provides a seductive starting point as it bridges both theatrical and ethical concerns.' - Theatre Research International 'For those of us interested in the knotty paradoxes that sit at the core of theatre's meta-theatrical truth-effects - an ethics that is no longer ethics, a politics that is political for how it is yet to be imagined, an idea of the human that displaces itself the moment it is performed - these pithy glimpses at the enigma of what theatre might be doing when it does itself well are timely engagements with some of the twenty-first century's most pressing philosophical preoccupations.' - Review of Theatre & series, Performance Paradigm