Overview

"Since the moment after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the most important German theater artists have created plays and productions about unification. Some have challenged how German history is written, while others opposed the very act of storytelling. Performing Unification examines how German directors, playwrights, and theater groups including Heiner Müller, Frank Castorf, and Rimini Protokoll have represented and misrepresented the past, confronting their nation's history and collective identity. While scholars and critics have scrutinized unification in cinema and literature, this is the first book to focus on theater and performance. Author Matt Cornish surveys German-language history plays from the Baroque period through Friedrich Schiller, Heinrich von Kleist, Brecht, and up to the documentary theater movement of the 1960s to show how German identity has always been contested, even well before Germany became a nation. Then turning to performances of unification after 1989, Cornish argues that theater, in its structures and its live gestures, on pages, stages, and streets, helps us to understand the past and its effect on us, our relationships with others in our communities, and our futures. Engaging with theater theory from Aristotle through Bertolt Brecht and Hans-Thies Lehmann's ""postdramatic"" theater, and also with theories of history from Hegel to Walter Benjamin and Hayden White, Performing Unification demonstrates that historiography and dramaturgy are intertwined."

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9780472037568

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Reviews

Matt Cornish has written a very good investigation into history and nation on the German stage after 1989 ... He arrives at some fascinating conclusions. --The German Quarterly-- (10/05/2018) Performing Unification is written clearly, is attentive to its reader...and avoids obscuring its findings in jargon. It provides a stimulating and accessible way into an otherwise dense and difficult topic and will reward the reader wishing to extend Cornish's findings. This study will be useful not just for researchers with an interest in theatre's relationship to history and memory but also for those looking for perspectives on aesthetic developments in German theatre in the last thirty years. --Modern Drama-- (10/05/2018) Cornish offers exemplary readings of important, recent productions. The book makes a significant contribution to German studies, where theater tends to get short shrift; and to theater studies, where scholars have been both intrigued and baffled by German directors' irreverent approach to classical texts and nationalist myth-making. --German Studies Review-- (06/12/2018) Cornish skillfully examines the neo-documentary style of groups like Rimini Protokoll and the hybridized post-migrant theater. More than 60 pages of notes, bibliography, and index lend the book authority...Highly recommended. --Choice Reviews-- (02/20/2018) This important study not only sheds significant new light on the modern German stage, but has implications for the relationship between theatre and contemporary society around the world. --Marvin Carlson, CUNY Graduate Center

Performing Unification is written clearly, is attentive to its reader...and avoids obscuring its findings in jargon. It provides a stimulating and accessible way into an otherwise dense and difficult topic and will reward the reader wishing to extend Cornish's findings. This study will be useful not just for researchers with an interest in theatre's relationship to history and memory but also for those looking for perspectives on aesthetic developments in German theatre in the last thirty years. --Modern Drama-- (10/05/2018) Cornish skillfully examines the neo-documentary style of groups like Rimini Protokoll and the hybridized post-migrant theater. More than 60 pages of notes, bibliography, and index lend the book authority...Highly recommended. --Choice Reviews-- (02/20/2018) Matt Cornish has written a very good investigation into history and nation on the German stage after 1989 ... He arrives at some fascinating conclusions. --The German Quarterly-- (10/05/2018) Cornish offers exemplary readings of important, recent productions. The book makes a significant contribution to German studies, where theater tends to get short shrift; and to theater studies, where scholars have been both intrigued and baffled by German directors' irreverent approach to classical texts and nationalist myth-making. --German Studies Review-- (06/12/2018) This important study not only sheds significant new light on the modern German stage, but has implications for the relationship between theatre and contemporary society around the world. --Marvin Carlson, CUNY Graduate Center

This important study not only sheds significant new light on the modern German stage, but has implications for the relationship between theatre and contemporary society around the world. -Marvin Carlson, CUNY Graduate Center Cornish skillfully examines the neo-documentary style of groups like Rimini Protokoll and the hybridized post-migrant theater. More than 60 pages of notes, bibliography, and index lend the book authority...Highly recommended. -Choice Reviews Cornish offers exemplary readings of important, recent productions. The book makes a significant contribution to German studies, where theater tends to get short shrift; and to theater studies, where scholars have been both intrigued and baffled by German directors' irreverent approach to classical texts and nationalist myth-making. -German Studies Review Performing Unification is written clearly, is attentive to its reader...and avoids obscuring its findings in jargon. It provides a stimulating and accessible way into an otherwise dense and difficult topic and will reward the reader wishing to extend Cornish's findings. This study will be useful not just for researchers with an interest in theatre's relationship to history and memory but also for those looking for perspectives on aesthetic developments in German theatre in the last thirty years. -Modern Drama Matt Cornish has written a very good investigation into history and nation on the German stage after 1989 ... He arrives at some fascinating conclusions. -The German Quarterly

Author Information

Matt Cornish is Assistant Professor of Theater History at Ohio University.

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