A Short History of Western Performance Space

In recent years, the discourse surrounding concepts of space has emerged as a defining feature of theatre studies. Drawing inspiration and methodological resources from such disciplines as philosophy, human geography, and urban studies, scholars of theatre and performance have come to rely on theories of space to describe and define performances and theatrical events in the context of their cultural and physical surroundings. Henri Lefebvre's book The Production of Space (1974) and Michel Foucault's brief essay "Of Other Spaces" (1967) have made defining contributions to this broad interdisciplinary field, particularly because of the ways these works think together the discourses of space and history.

Space and history may be the most important dimensions of theatre, and David Wiles's new book provides a valuable, sustained inquiry into both. Though circumscribed by the "Western" of its title, Wiles's work has broad applications for scholars of the history of space and theatre forms around the globe.

Wiles begins his epoch-spanning survey not with epic examples but with intimate, personal anecdotes about teaching and theatregoing. He quickly presents the reader with a claim that will be the basic assumption of the entire study: "The play-as-text can be performed in a space, but the play-as-event belongs to the space and makes the space perform as much as it makes actors perform" (1, italics in original). This position, offered as a foundational principle, is developed throughout the book, as later when Wiles argues, after Lefebvre, that "space is social, and the architectural object is conjoined inseparably to the audience as subject" (205). Wiles's study is innovative in its insistence that the production of (theatrical) space be regarded as essential to any history of the theatre.

A notable refrain in Wiles's book is his discontent with contemporary theatre: theatre as it is staged and as it is organized as history. "Theatre-as-institution is a concept that serves the needs of the professional theatre historian, and [Oscar] Brockett adds his name to the distinguished list of those who have constructed such histories. The institution is thereby revalidated, with 'theatre' again cleanly separated from the theatrical" (2). By invoking the name of a historian who is himself an institution, Wiles sets out to differentiate his project from established historical narratives. And in this differentiation Wiles is largely successful. By foregrounding space rather than dramatic literature, Wiles provides a survey of theatre history that emphasizes the physical as well as cultural contexts for past performances. This emphasis makes his book a salutary critique of conventional, text-based histories, and an often exciting source of insight and information.

Wiles divides his study among seven kinds of space: Sacred, Processional, Public, and Sympotic (see below), followed by chapters on "The cosmic circle," "The cave," and the concluding chapter on twentieth-century spaces, "The Empty Space." As most readers of Theatre Journal will guess, this last chapter is partially indebted to (though still a critique of) the ideas of Peter Brook. The handful of historian-practitioners quoted periodically throughout the Short History—including Peter Brook, Thomas Heywood, and Luigi Riccoboni—reflect Wiles's own impulse to write with an agenda. For all his scholarly acumen, Wiles is not shy about adding a dash of polemic to his otherwise reliably rigorous history.

Wiles makes an interesting decision when he includes the reconstructed Shakespeare's Globe on London's Bankside in the chapter on sacred theatre spaces. The new Globe is not a theatre that announces itself as conventionally religious, though as Wiles notes, the "faith that Shakespeare was the genius of the second millennium" is built into the ideology that informs this space (60). In a revealing passage, Wiles dismisses the criticisms of the new Globe by Shakespearean scholar John Drakakis. Many contemporary scholars are suspicious of the theme park-like aspects of the reconstructed theatre, alleging that the structure attempts to project an historical "authenticity" that is more fabrication than fact. Drakakis...