| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 110.1

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| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 110.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Methods and Theory

Tracy C. Davis and Thomas Postlewait, editors. Theatricality. New York: Cambridge University Press. 2003. Pp. xi, 243. Cloth $55.00, paper $20.00.

To the extent that historians are increasingly drawn to discussions of theater, performance, and spectacle (broadly defined), this volume provides some provocative insights into the strengths and weaknesses of a central category: "theatricality." Perhaps the most useful section of the volume is the introduction by editors Tracy C. Davis and Thomas Postlewait, which examines the inflationary use of that term and its recent rival, "performativity." Davis and Postlewait are rightfully concerned that "the idea of theatricality ... serves too many agendas" (p. 4) and risks losing meaning altogether. Via the metaphor of theatrum mundi ("all the world's a stage") it has expanded to embrace all of society. The word "theatricality" also conveys the contradictory attitudes toward theater itself, which for some is a forum for authentic expression; for others, the epitome of artifice and deceit; and for Brechtians and their successors, a means of analyzing society through an "alienating" approach that willfully employs that very artifice. The purpose of the six ensuing essays is to escape this muddle and rescue the utility of "theatricality" as a concept, without insisting on a unitary definition.

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