Elaine Aston

Pivotal to Caryl Churchill's What If If Only (2021) is the ghost of a democratic future that never happened. Framed by What If If Only, if-only yearnings for a democratic future are seminal to this Element with its primary attentions to the feminist, socialist and ecological values of Churchill's theatre. Arguing for the triangulation of the latter, the study elicits insights into: the feeling structures of Churchill's plays; reparative strategies for the renewal of an eco-feminist-socialist politics; the conceptualisation of the 'political is personal' to understand the negative emotional impact that an anti-egalitarian regime has on people's lives; and relations between dystopian criticality and utopian desire. Hannah Proctor's notion of 'anti-adaptive healing' is invoked to propose a summative understanding of Churchill's theatre as engaging audiences in anti-adaptive, resistant feelings towards a capitalist order and healing through a utopic sensing that an alternative future is desirable and still possible.

Pivotal to Caryl Churchill's What If If Only (2021) is the ghost of a democratic future that never happened. Framed by What If If Only, if-only yearnings for a democratic future are seminal to this Element with its primary attentions to the feminist, socialist and ecological values of Churchill's theatre. Arguing for the triangulation of the latter, the study elicits insights into: the feeling structures of Churchill's plays; reparative strategies for the renewal of an eco-feminist-socialist politics; the conceptualisation of the 'political is personal' to understand the negative emotional impact that an anti-egalitarian regime has on people's lives; and relations between dystopian criticality and utopian desire. Hannah Proctor's notion of 'anti-adaptive healing' is invoked to propose a summative understanding of Churchill's theatre as engaging audiences in anti-adaptive, resistant feelings towards a capitalist order and healing through a utopic sensing that an alternative future is desirable and still possible.

Restaging Feminisms offers a re-encounter with the tripartite modelling of liberal, radical, and socialist feminisms foundational to establishing feminist approaches to theatre. This lucid account of past-present connections to the staging of feminism assesses the legacies and renewals of all three feminist dynamics as they intersect with austerity Britain, the Weinstein watershed, and the #MeToo movement. Feminist politics, concepts, and the role of affect in the making of political attachments inform an approach that values understanding feminism’s past as critical to reanimating and restaging socially progressive, feminist futures. The volume includes case studies of productions staged between 2016 and 2019: Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone; David Greig’s version of The Suppliant Women; Morgan Lloyd Malcolm’s Emilia; Nina Raine’s Consent; Townsend Theatre’s We Are The Lions Mr Manager; and Laura Wade’s Home, I’m Darling. From an author with a pioneering and thirty-year-long commitment to the study of feminism and British theatre, Restaging Feminisms is for an intergenerational feminist-theatre readership: for those who are discovering relations between feminism and theatre for the first time and those re-encountering the feminist dynamics and their renewed resonance on the contemporary British stage.

Restaging Feminisms offers a re-encounter with the tripartite modelling of liberal, radical, and socialist feminisms foundational to establishing feminist approaches to theatre. This lucid account of past-present connections to the staging of feminism assesses the legacies and renewals of all three feminist dynamics as they intersect with austerity Britain, the Weinstein watershed, and the #MeToo movement. Feminist politics, concepts, and the role of affect in the making of political attachments inform an approach that values understanding feminism’s past as critical to reanimating and restaging socially progressive, feminist futures. The volume includes case studies of productions staged between 2016 and 2019: Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone; David Greig’s version of The Suppliant Women; Morgan Lloyd Malcolm’s Emilia; Nina Raine’s Consent; Townsend Theatre’s We Are The Lions Mr Manager; and Laura Wade’s Home, I’m Darling. From an author with a pioneering and thirty-year-long commitment to the study of feminism and British theatre, Restaging Feminisms is for an intergenerational feminist-theatre readership: for those who are discovering relations between feminism and theatre for the first time and those re-encountering the feminist dynamics and their renewed resonance on the contemporary British stage.

This invaluable student handbook is the first detailed guide to explain in detail the relationship between the drama text and the theory and practice of drama in performance. Beginning at the beginning, with accessible explanations of the meanings and methods of semiotics, Theatre as Sign System addresses key drama texts and offers new and detailed information about the theories of performance.

The volume traces the scope and development of Caryl Churchill’s theatre from her early writing for radio and television, through her stage career of the 1970s and 1980s to her recent major success Far Away (2000). Making use of contemporary critical and feminist theory, the study offers close dramatic and theatrical readings of the plays highlighting Churchill’s concerns with feminism, socialism and theatrical style. A key chapter on ‘The Woman Writer’ examines those plays, including Cloud Nine and Top Girls, which brought Churchill to the attention of the international feminist theatre academy, and links Churchill’s emergent feminism to her personal struggle to combine a career in the theatre with motherhood. Detailing the international success of play such as Serious Money and Mad Forest, alongside some of the lesser known and lesser studied earlier work, this accessible account illustrates how Churchill has come to be recognised as one of the leading playwrights of our contemporary theatre.

Feminist Views on the English Stage, first published in 2003, is an exciting and insightful study on drama from a feminist perspective, one that challenges an idea of the 1990s as a 'post-feminist' decade and pays attention to women's playwriting marginalized by a 'renaissance' of angry young men. Working through a generational mix of writers, from Sarah Kane, the iconoclastic 'bad girl' of the stage, to the 'canonical' Caryl Churchill, Elaine Aston charts the significant political and aesthetic changes in women's playwriting at the century's end. Aston also explores writing for the 1990s in theatre by Sarah Daniels, Bryony Lavery, Phyllis Nagy, Winsome Pinnock, Rebecca Prichard, Judy Upton and Timberlake Wertenbaker.

Drawing on hands-on experience from workshops and interviews, this innovative book explores the work of eight gender aware theatre and performance artists and companies. The authors offer rare insights into the processes as well as the practice of these artists and employ an 'inside', practical approach to understanding their ground-breaking work

Drawing on hands-on experience from workshops and interviews, this innovative book explores the work of eight gender aware theatre and performance artists and companies. The authors offer rare insights into the processes as well as the practice of these artists and employ an 'inside', practical approach to understanding their ground-breaking work

Feminist Views on the English Stage, first published in 2003, is an exciting and insightful study on drama from a feminist perspective, one that challenges an idea of the 1990s as a 'post-feminist' decade and pays attention to women's playwriting marginalized by a 'renaissance' of angry young men. Working through a generational mix of writers, from Sarah Kane, the iconoclastic 'bad girl' of the stage, to the 'canonical' Caryl Churchill, Elaine Aston charts the significant political and aesthetic changes in women's playwriting at the century's end. Aston also explores writing for the 1990s in theatre by Sarah Daniels, Bryony Lavery, Phyllis Nagy, Winsome Pinnock, Rebecca Prichard, Judy Upton and Timberlake Wertenbaker.

Feminist Theatre Practice: A Handbook is a helpful, practical guide to theatre-making which explores the different ways of representing gender. Best-selling author, Elaine Aston, takes the reader through the various stages of making feminist theatre- from warming up, through workshopped exploration, to performance - this volume is organised into three clear and instructive parts: * Women in the Workshop * Dramatic Texts, Feminist Contexts * Gender and Devising Projects. Orientated around the classroom/workshop, Handbook of Feminist Theatre Practice encompasses the main elements of feminist theatre, both practical or theoretical.

Feminist Theatre Practice: A Handbook is a helpful, practical guide to theatre-making which explores the different ways of representing gender. Best-selling author, Elaine Aston, takes the reader through the various stages of making feminist theatre- from warming up, through workshopped exploration, to performance - this volume is organised into three clear and instructive parts: * Women in the Workshop * Dramatic Texts, Feminist Contexts * Gender and Devising Projects. Orientated around the classroom/workshop, Handbook of Feminist Theatre Practice encompasses the main elements of feminist theatre, both practical or theoretical.

At last an accessible and intelligent introduction to the energising and challenging relationship between feminism and theatre. In this clear and enlightening book, Aston discusses wide-ranging theoretical topics and provides case studies including: * Feminism and theatre history * `M/Othering the self': French feminist theory and theatre * Black women: shaping feminist theatre * Performing gender: a materialist practice * Colonial landscapes Feminist thought is changing the way theatre is taught and practised. An Introduction to Feminism and Theatre is compulsory reading for anyone who requires a precise, insightful and up-to-date guide to this dynamic field of study.

This invaluable student handbook is the first detailed guide to explain in detail the relationship between the drama text and the theory and practice of drama in performance. Beginning at the beginning, with accessible explanations of the meanings and methods of semiotics, Theatre as Sign System addresses key drama texts and offers new and detailed information about the theories of performance.