The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre Studies

Citation

Balme, C. B. (2008). The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre Studies. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge Introductions to Literature.

Chapter Summary

The book has an introduction, twelve chapters in three parts, a preface, notes, a bibliography with other resources, and an index, in roughly 230 numbered pages. Cambridge University Press describes it as a guide to the methods and tools of studying historical and contemporary theatre, from a cross-cultural perspective, with a central focus on methodology. Text boxes give background on key topics, and each chapter ends with suggestions for further reading.

Introduction: Theatre and Theatre Studies

The introduction sets out the discipline. Its sections are "Integrated theatre studies," "From theatre studies to performance studies" and an outline of the book. It presents theatre studies as an integrated field and places it in relation to performance studies.

Part I, Elements of Theatre: Chapters 1–3

Three chapters take the basic components of theatre in turn. "Performers and actors" covers theory and analysis, the pedagogy of acting and cross-cultural perspectives. "Spectators and audiences" covers spectator response, reception and response, and audiences. "Spaces and places" covers theatrical space, stage space and the place of theatre. Together they give the vocabulary for the later methodological chapters.

Chapters 4–5: Theories of Theatre 1 and 2

The first chapter treats historical paradigms under the headings mimesis, poiesis and catharsis. The second turns to systematic and critical approaches: semiotics, poststructuralism and psychoanalysis, phenomenology, cultural materialism, and theatricality and performance theory.

Chapter 6: Theatre Historiography

The chapter is about how theatre history is written, not a history of theatre. It covers sources and reconstruction, theatre iconography, periodization and contemporary approaches, and closes with a summary and outlook.

Chapters 7–8: Text and Performance; Performance Analysis

"Text and performance" examines the status of the text, the move from drama to theatrical text, and the distinctions between play, production and performance. "Performance analysis" deals with notation and documentation, tools of analysis, the goal of analysis, and methods and models.

Chapters 9–10: Music Theatre; Dance Theatre

Each chapter lists the elements of its genre and then moves to analysis. The music theatre chapter has sections on music dramaturgy and on text and staging, with analysis of La Bohème and Ariodante. The dance theatre chapter covers movement analysis (notation, semiotics and ideology) and analysis of Petrushka and Enter Achilles.

Part III, Theatre Studies Between Disciplines: Chapters 11–12

"Applied theatre" covers examples, historical trajectories, theoretical paradigms and research methods. "Theatre and media" treats theatre as a medium, its relation to other media, and intermediality.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1–3: Performers, Spectators, Space

• Spectator response and reception: sections of the spectators chapter, set beside a separate section on audiences.
• Theatrical space, stage space and the place of theatre: the three sections of the spaces chapter.

Chapters 4–6: Theory and Historiography

• Mimesis, poiesis, catharsis: the historical paradigms through which the book introduces theories of theatre.
• Semiotics, phenomenology, cultural materialism: among the systematic and critical approaches named in Chapter 5.
• Periodization and theatre iconography: methodological issues in writing theatre history from sources and images.

Chapters 7–12: Analysis and Interdisciplinary Fields

• Text, play, production, performance: the distinctions that underlie performance analysis.
• Notation and documentation: how performances are recorded for analysis.
• Applied theatre and intermediality: the two interdisciplinary fields with which the book ends.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• Method comes first. The publisher states that the focus is methodology, and the contents confirm it: Part II, the longest part, is about how to study theatre (theory, historiography, text and performance analysis), not about plays or periods.
• Genres beyond spoken drama. Separate chapters on music theatre and dance theatre, each with named case analyses, give opera and dance equal status with drama.
• Cross-cultural framing. The publisher describes the approach as cross-cultural, and the contents show it in the acting chapter, which has a section on cross-cultural perspectives.
• Compact and usable. At about 230 pages with a bibliography section and further-reading suggestions after each chapter, it can be read in a few weeks.

Limitations

• Short treatment of each topic. Chapters are mostly 13 to 22 pages, so the theory chapters are surveys, and each approach (semiotics, phenomenology, cultural materialism) gets only a section.
• Not a theatre history or an anthology. The historiography chapter explains how to write history and does not narrate it, and the book contains no plays, so it needs a history and a set of play texts alongside it.
• Dates from 2008. Developments since then lie outside the book; its media chapter ends with intermediality.

Where It Fits in the Course

Within the drama course the book is the methods companion. Studying Plays by Wallis and Shepherd teaches how to analyse play texts for performance and is the gentler starting point for readers new to the subject; Balme's text widens the question to theory, history and different performance genres. Theatre Histories: An Introduction supplies the narrative of theatre across cultures that Balme's historiography chapter does not attempt, and The Norton Anthology of Drama and Hamlet supply the plays to analyse. Marvin Carlson's Theories of the Theatre is a full survey of the Western theory that Balme covers in two chapters, so it is the natural follow-up for the theory chapters.

How to Use This Book

The book suits undergraduates beginning theatre studies and readers who want an overview of the discipline's methods. The publisher presents it as a guide for a wide variety of theatre studies courses; familiarity with a few plays and some experience of live performance will make the analysis chapters easier to apply.

A practical plan: read the introduction and Part I first, since they set the vocabulary of performer, spectator and space. Then read Chapters 7 and 8 (text, performance and analysis) alongside a play from the Norton anthology or Hamlet, applying the tools of analysis to a production, recorded or live. Read Chapters 4 to 6 when a course turns to theory or history, and use the bibliography section for deeper reading. Chapters 9 and 10 are worth reading in full only if the course covers opera or dance, though their analysis sections show methods that carry over. Chapters 11 and 12 suit courses on applied theatre or on theatre and media.