Abstract
David Edgar’s The Shape of the Table (1990) is a near-contemporaneous dramatization of the process of regime concession and opposition conquest of power that characterised the negotiated transitions in Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany. It is interesting in and of itself as an example of how one of the UK’s most notable socialist playwrights saw the varying elements of accommodation and confrontation in roundtable dialogues around 1989. However, it has further interest because in adopting an agent-centred, voluntaristic, and bargained conception of transition, Edgar reflected and anticipated the initial scholarly response to these processes. Similarly, Edgar anticipated problems of democratic disillusionment, economic liberalisation, and ethnonationalism as post-Communist Eastern Europe undertook the unprecedentedly complicated triple-track transition in economy and society as well as politics.
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© 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Frontmatter
- The Past as Prologue: Imagining a Brave New World in Philip Osment’s This Island’s Mine
- Alan Bennett’s Single Spies: Lifting the Veil of Personal and Institutional Secrecy
- “Pravda for Playboy”: David Edgar’s The Shape of the Table and the Eastern European Roundtables
- Rewriting Trauma: The Legacy of W.B. Yeats in Marina Carr’s By the Bog of Cats . . .
- A Fallen-Soufflé Crisis in Dinner with Friends
- Storytelling in Apocalyptic Times: Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play
- Posthuman Dystopia: Animal Surrealism and Permanent Crisis in Contemporary British Theatre
- Book Reviews
- Carl Lavery, ed. Performance and Ecology: What Can Theatre Do? Abingdon: Routledge, 2018, xiv + 118 pp., £115 (hardback).
- S.E. Wilmer. Performing Statelessness in Europe. London: Palgrave, 2018, ix + 245 pp., £79.99 (hardback), £79.99 (paperback), £79.99 (PDF ebook).
- Graham Saunders. Elizabethan and Jacobean Reappropriations in Contemporary British Drama: “Upstart Crows.” London: Palgrave, 2017, xii + 194 pp. €96.29 (hardback), €74.96 (PDF ebook).
- Marissia Fragkou. Ecologies of Precarity in Twenty-First Century Theatre: Politics, Affect, Responsibility. London: Bloomsbury, 2019, xi + 233 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook).
- Elin Diamond, Denise Varney, and Candice Amich, ed. Performance, Feminism and Affect in Neoliberal Times. London: Palgrave, 2017, xviii + 315 pp., £67.99 (hardback), £67.99 (paperback), £53.99 (PDF ebook).
- Nicola Shaughnessy and Philip Barnard, ed. Performing Psychologies: Imagination, Creativity and Dramas of the Mind. London: Bloomsbury, 2019, xiii + 246 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook).
- Ariane de Waal. Theatre on Terror: Subject Positions in British Drama. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017, viii + 297 pp., €99.95 (hardback), €99.95 (PDF ebook). Clare Finburgh. Watching War on the Twenty-First Century Stage: Spectacles of Conflict. London: Bloomsbury, 2017, xv + 355 pp., £75 (hardback), £28.99 (paperback), £29.99 (PDF ebook).
- Lisa Fitzpatrick. Rape on the Contemporary Stage. Cham: Palgrave, 2018, vii + 281 pp., €96.29 (hardback), €96.29 (paperback), €74.96 (PDF ebook). Nancy Taylor Porter. Violent Women in Contemporary Theatres: Staging Resistance. Cham: Palgrave, 2017, x + 410 pp., €139.09 (hardback), €139.09 (paperback), €107.09 (PDF ebook).
- Helen Nicholson, Nadine Holdsworth, and Jane Milling. The Ecologies of Amateur Theatre. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2018, ix + 343 pp., €29.11 (paperback), €23.79 (PDF ebook).
- Catherine Rees. Adaptation and Nation: Theatrical Contexts for Contemporary English and Irish Drama. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2017, ix + 185 pp., £79.99 (hardback), £63.99 (PDF ebook). Frances Babbage. Adaptation in Contemporary Theatre: Performing Literature. London: Bloomsbury, 2018, 280 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook). Kara Reilly, ed. Contemporary Approaches to Adaptation in Theatre. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2018, xxix + 357 pp., £80.00 (hardback), £63.99 (PDF ebook).
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Frontmatter
- The Past as Prologue: Imagining a Brave New World in Philip Osment’s This Island’s Mine
- Alan Bennett’s Single Spies: Lifting the Veil of Personal and Institutional Secrecy
- “Pravda for Playboy”: David Edgar’s The Shape of the Table and the Eastern European Roundtables
- Rewriting Trauma: The Legacy of W.B. Yeats in Marina Carr’s By the Bog of Cats . . .
- A Fallen-Soufflé Crisis in Dinner with Friends
- Storytelling in Apocalyptic Times: Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play
- Posthuman Dystopia: Animal Surrealism and Permanent Crisis in Contemporary British Theatre
- Book Reviews
- Carl Lavery, ed. Performance and Ecology: What Can Theatre Do? Abingdon: Routledge, 2018, xiv + 118 pp., £115 (hardback).
- S.E. Wilmer. Performing Statelessness in Europe. London: Palgrave, 2018, ix + 245 pp., £79.99 (hardback), £79.99 (paperback), £79.99 (PDF ebook).
- Graham Saunders. Elizabethan and Jacobean Reappropriations in Contemporary British Drama: “Upstart Crows.” London: Palgrave, 2017, xii + 194 pp. €96.29 (hardback), €74.96 (PDF ebook).
- Marissia Fragkou. Ecologies of Precarity in Twenty-First Century Theatre: Politics, Affect, Responsibility. London: Bloomsbury, 2019, xi + 233 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook).
- Elin Diamond, Denise Varney, and Candice Amich, ed. Performance, Feminism and Affect in Neoliberal Times. London: Palgrave, 2017, xviii + 315 pp., £67.99 (hardback), £67.99 (paperback), £53.99 (PDF ebook).
- Nicola Shaughnessy and Philip Barnard, ed. Performing Psychologies: Imagination, Creativity and Dramas of the Mind. London: Bloomsbury, 2019, xiii + 246 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook).
- Ariane de Waal. Theatre on Terror: Subject Positions in British Drama. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017, viii + 297 pp., €99.95 (hardback), €99.95 (PDF ebook). Clare Finburgh. Watching War on the Twenty-First Century Stage: Spectacles of Conflict. London: Bloomsbury, 2017, xv + 355 pp., £75 (hardback), £28.99 (paperback), £29.99 (PDF ebook).
- Lisa Fitzpatrick. Rape on the Contemporary Stage. Cham: Palgrave, 2018, vii + 281 pp., €96.29 (hardback), €96.29 (paperback), €74.96 (PDF ebook). Nancy Taylor Porter. Violent Women in Contemporary Theatres: Staging Resistance. Cham: Palgrave, 2017, x + 410 pp., €139.09 (hardback), €139.09 (paperback), €107.09 (PDF ebook).
- Helen Nicholson, Nadine Holdsworth, and Jane Milling. The Ecologies of Amateur Theatre. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2018, ix + 343 pp., €29.11 (paperback), €23.79 (PDF ebook).
- Catherine Rees. Adaptation and Nation: Theatrical Contexts for Contemporary English and Irish Drama. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2017, ix + 185 pp., £79.99 (hardback), £63.99 (PDF ebook). Frances Babbage. Adaptation in Contemporary Theatre: Performing Literature. London: Bloomsbury, 2018, 280 pp., £67.50 (hardback), £64.80 (PDF ebook). Kara Reilly, ed. Contemporary Approaches to Adaptation in Theatre. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2018, xxix + 357 pp., £80.00 (hardback), £63.99 (PDF ebook).