Mondi, corpi, materie: Teatri del secondo Novecento [Worlds, Bodies, Matters: Theatres in the Second Part of the 20th Century] (review)

Mondi, corpi, materie: Teatri del secondo Novecento (Worlds, Bodies, Matters: Theatres in the Second Part of the 20th Century) by Valentina Valentini, represents a breakthrough in theatre studies and performance theory outside of the Anglo-Saxon world. Its publication in Italy can be compared to the innovative works of Patrice Pavis (Languages of the Stage, 1982), Marco de Marinis (Capire il teatro [To Understand Theatre], 1988), and Hans-Thies Lehmann (The Postdramatic Theatre, 1999), which each introduced a major change in European theatre studies. A renowned Italian theatre scholar and professor at La Sapienza University in Rome, Valentini modestly claims that her book is meant as a textbook for teachers and students of theatre and performance practice and theory. However, it is also accessible to nonspecialists, who might be unfamiliar with the "archaeology" of contemporary performing arts and their main aspects: its 200 pages are very well equipped with numerous footnotes, titles, and sources, and richly illustrated with photographs from various historical and contemporary performances. Some of these represent memorable moments in the history of theatre and performance, while others serve to illustrate the main hypothesis: the complex relations between different performance and artistic practices can only be examined and analyzed from a contemporary philosophical perspective which, in turn, can contribute to the development of the field of theatre studies.

The book is the fruit of systematic and passionate research into the complex phenomenology of contemporary performing arts, including the new media and their interaction with live theatre in the last 15 years. Being aware of the limitations of so-called "theatre theory," Valentini tries in this book to surpass it, searching for possible interdisciplinary modalities and perspectives, often coming close to a philosophical rather than aesthetical interpretation of theatre and performance.

Worlds, Bodies, Matters begins from the premise that a book on the theatre cannot be written without insight into other artistic practices and scientific disciplines with which theatre practice and theory constantly interact. For the purpose of this book, Valentini establishes two pragmatic criteria for theoretical analysis: it is first an analysis of live artistic performance, be it a theatre, performance, or a performance that has been videoed; second, it is a theoretical inquiry that does not merely describe general artistic trends, but advances new arguments and constitutes an original contribution to the theoretical discourse. Her intention is not to create an annotated catalogue of performances, nor to adopt a classical Hegelian view of "natural progress," but rather to introduce a paradigm of historical discontinuity as a method of inquiry, a method taken from Foucault's Archeology of Knowledge ([1969] 2009). This paradigm gives us the sense that the performing arts, as they are nowadays, are closest to post-structuralism, which is becoming almost their natural ally. Each of the three main chapters addresses fundamental questions in performing arts from a philosophical perspective and the guiding principle of this book is a "sustained engagement" with poststructuralist philosophy (Foucault, Deleuze), as well as with visual arts and performance theory (in spite of Valentini's repeated claim that performance studies does not have a clear methodology).

In the first chapter, "Contemporary Myths and World Theatres," she discusses the myths that persist in today's theatre, the images and archetypes it puts forward, and which, if any, general plots and different visions of the world recur. What kind of relationship, if any, still exists with ancient myths? Through a sample of works by different authors and companies who either deconstructed old or invented new rituals of death and resurrection (Heiner Müller, Peter Handke, Societas Raffaello Sanzio, Reza Abdoh), to those whose work engages the complete reversion of classical myths (Sarah Kane, Rodrigo Garcia, The Wooster Group), Valentini scrupulously scrutinizes a complex symbiosis between theatre and myth and the new symbols this association creates.

In the second chapter, "Visual, Performative, Mediatic...