Signs of Performance: An Introduction to Twentieth-Century Theatre

Signs of Performance: A Student's Guideprovides the beginning student with working examples of theatrical analysis. Its range covers the whole of twentieth-century theatre, from Stanislavski to Brecht and Samuel Beckett to Robert Wilson. Colin Counsell takes a historical look at theatre as a cultural practice, clearly tracing connections between key practitioners' own ideas about performance; the theatrical practices prompted by those ideas; the resulting signs which emerge in performance; the meanings and political consequences of those signs.Signs of Performanceis the first book to answer the question "How does theatre work?" It provides an understandable theoretical framework for the study of theatre as a signifying practice, and offers vivid explanations in clear, direct language. This is an"Everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about-performance" book, and opens up this fascinating field to a broad audience.

Colin Counsell is Lecturer in English Literature and Theatre Studies at the University of North London.