Theory for Theatre Studies: Sound

Susan Bennett is University Professor in the Department of English at the University of Calgary, Canada.

• AcknowledgementsSeries PrefaceSOUND: An IntroductionSECTION ONE: Classical SoundTheatres in Ancient Greece and Aristotle’s PoeticsThe vocal map of ancient Greek dramaCase study: Aristophanes’s The FrogsVitruvius on acoustics: De ArchitecturaShakespeare’s Globe and Francis Bacon’s Sylva SylvarumAcoustic world-making on the early modern stageCase study: Shakespeare’s The TempestA sonic imagination of early modern LondonSECTION TWO: Avant-garde SoundNew technologies for sound performanceCase study: Luigi Russolo’s intonamuri and ‘The Art of Noise’Hanging on the telephone: Sigmund Freud and Roland BarthesCase study: Jean Cocteau’s The Human VoiceThe sounds of silence: John Cage’s future of musicAcousmatics and radiophonics: Pierre Schaffer and the BBCAura and archive: making sound memories Case study: Samuel Beckett’s Krapp’s Last TapeSECTION THREE: Experiential SoundProsthetic performance and deterritorialised listeningCase study: Janet Cardiff’s sound walksListening to women: Andrea Hornick and Luce IrigarayAffective theatres of embodied sound Case study: Shannon Yee’s Reassembled, Slightly AskewCase study: Rimini Protokoll’s Situation RoomsCoda: sound across the worldReferencesFurther ReadingIndex

This book presents an important analysis of the fundamental function of sound in theatre, from the acoustic expanses of Ancient Greek architecture, to the personal-political spaces of contemporary Headphone theatre. The breadth of knowledge and new insights afforded by the book are a breath of fresh air for researchers and students alike in a field which is often treated as a sub-category of other disciplines. Bennett draws on a wide range of theory and philosophy to demonstrate how sound has played a much more significant role in playtexts, production and perception than traditional theatre studies scholarship has hitherto considered, and puts forward a politics of theatre sound and its potential to perform difference through acoustic experience and ethical listening.