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Edward Bond Directs ‘Summer’ at the Cottesloe, 1982

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2009

Pete Mathers
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Abstract

The early issues of the original Theatre Quarterly carried extensive coverage of the work of Edward Bond – a conscious editorial emphasis, which it became less important to maintain as Bond's work acquired its present international recognition and a corresponding share of critical attention. Yet the very distinctiveness of Bond's dramaturgy demands a no less distinctive approach from its critics – notably, a recognition and evaluation of the many non-literary strands of the ‘text’ as performed, especially when under the author's own direction. Pete Mathers, who teaches in the Film and Drama Division of Bulmershe College, here attempts to assess one of Bond's most recent plays, Summer, in close relationship to its original production by Bond himself, at the National's Cottesloe Theatre in 1982, examining every element through which its audiences experienced that production – including the poster and programme, as well as the more clearly crucial ingredients of design, performance, and the ‘gests’ through which they interconnect.

Type
Research Article
Information
New Theatre Quarterly , Volume 2 , Issue 6 , May 1986 , pp. 136 - 153
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986

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References

Notes and References

1. Interview with Gordon, Giles, Transatlantic Review, No. 22 (Autumn 1966), p. 15Google Scholar.

2. Griffiths, Trevor, adapter, The Cherry Orchard by Chekhov, Anton, trans. Rappaport, Helen (London, 1978), p. 53Google Scholar.

3. Ibid., p. 42.4. All references to Summer are from the Methuen ‘Theatre‐script’ text of the play (1982), and are given (as here) in the form ‘Scene no: page no’.

5. See Franca Rame's essay which precedes the play text in , Dario Fo, We Can't Pay? We Won't Pay!;, trans. Pertile, Lino (London, 1978)Google Scholar.

6. The book of that title is by Raymond Williams (London, 1968).

7. A line from the fourth stanza of ‘What Sort of Morality is That’, a poem by Bond, printed in the Summer programme.

8. Hughes, Robert, The Shock of the New (London, 1980), p. 285Google Scholar.

9. Brecht, Bertolt, The Messingkauf Dialogues, trans. Willett, John (London, 1977), p. 36Google Scholar.

10. Edward Bond, quoted by Roberts, Philip in ‘The Search for Epic Drama: Edward Bond's Recent Work’, Modern Drama, XXIV, No. 4 (12. 1981), p. 477Google Scholar.

11. In the second version of ‘What is Epic Theatre’, published in Benjamin, Walter, Understanding Brecht, trans. Bostock, Anna (London, 1973), p. 18–19Google Scholar (my emphasis).

12. Edward Bond in a workshop at the Olivier Theatre, 24 April 1982.

13. Ibid.

14. Ibid.

15. Barthes, Roland, Camera Lucida, trans. Howard, Richard (London, 1982), p. 90Google Scholar.