In this engaging cross-disciplinary study, Timothy Murray examines the artistic struggle over traumatic fantasies of race, gender, sexuality, and power. Establishing a retrospective dialogue between past and present, stage and video, Drama Trauma links the impact of trauma on recent political projects in performance and video with the specters of difference haunting Shakespeare's plays.
The book provides close readings of cultural formations as diverse as Shakespearean drama, the Statue of Liberty, contemporary plays by women, African-American performance, and feminist interventions in video, performance and installation. The texts discussed include:
* installations by Mary Kelly and Dawn Dedeaux,
* plays by Ntozake Shange, Rochelle Owens, Adrienne Kennedy, Marsha Norman and Amiri Baraka
* performances by Robbie McCauley, Jordan, Orlan, and Carmelita Tropicana
* stage, film and video productions of King Lear, Othello, Romeo and Juliet and All's Well that Ends Well.

About the Author

Timothy Murray is Professor of English at Cornell University. His most recent publications include Like a Film: Ideological Fantasy on Screen, Camera and Canvas (Routledge 1993) and Mimesis, Masochism and Mime: The Politics of Theatricality in Contemporary French Thought (1997).

Reviews

' ... an intelligent, finely-argued, and always interesting book ... Murray provides a bravura performance of his own.' - Film-Philosophy

Book Information
ISBN 9780415157896
Author Timothy Murray
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 566g