The Feminist Spectator as Critic

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments This book in some respects charts my own development as a feminist performance critic, and there are many people who in one way or another helped to shape my growth and its direction. The editorial board of Women & Performance Journal-which began meeting as an informal feminist support group in Performance Studies at New York University in Fall 198 I-provided me with a continual sounding board during my graduate work. The Women and Theatre Program of the defunct American Theatre Association, now reconstituted as American Theatre in Higher Education, has given me a supportive forum for my thinking since I began attending their conferences in 1983. My personal sense of growth is justly shared by the members of that organization, as we move together toward a sophisticated, but accessible, political and theoretical, practice-oriented consideration of feminism and theatre. Kate Davy's insight into body image and performance, and her comments on my work on Richard Foreman, were very helpful on initial drafts of chapters 2 and 3. Sue-Ellen Case and E. Beth Sullivan were instrumental in editing and refining an early version of chapter 4, which appeared in Theatre Journal (May 1987). Elin Diamond's brilliant insight into the possible connections between feminist poetics and Brecht was a primary inspiration for chapter 6. The continuing discussions among my feminist colleagues-at conferences, through their published work, and through our informal but crucial national network-and my first group of students in feminist theory and theatre at the University of Washington in Seattle in Fall 1987 provided me with the constant and final impetus to think and to write this book. I would also like to thank Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Susan Slyomovics, Brooks McNamara, and Michael Kirby for their comments on the manuscript. Two people warrant special thanks. Personally, professionally, and politically , Sue-Ellen Case has been a continual source of inspiration. With her energy, commitment, and sense of purpose, she serves as an invaluable role model, and has blazed the trail for feminist theatre critics in the academy and in the theatre profession. Finally, Peggy Phelan's work on this manuscript as xii Acknowledgments editor, advisor, and intellectual watchdog continually prompted me to challenge myself and to push further. I sincerely appreciate her dialogue with me around this work. ...