Section One addresses how the emotions have been communicated in dramatic narratives and through acting in theatre. It illustrates the way ideas of the emotions change across three key periods of theatre history: ancient Greece, early modern England, and twentieth-century Western theatre. For much of history, theatre has had to conform to prevailing social values about emotional relationships and yet it often managed to surreptitiously challenge propriety. From questioning a mother’s love in Euripides’s Medea and in Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle to playful romantic partnerships in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, drama focuses on the emotional bonds of fundamental human relationships.
Aristotle addressed controversies around theatre’s depiction of emotionally charged behaviour by championing the value of tragedy and criticizing comedy, whereas the Puritans in early modern England opposed all kinds of stage drama for emotionally corrupting audiences. Aristotle’s writing, Greek theatre and Shakespeare’s drama are discussed here not only because these continue to be important in contemporary theatre and dramatic theory, but also because they remain central to the philosophical and theatrical interpretation of the emotions. By the twentieth century, however, controversies in theatre had shifted primarily to the acting of emotional feeling. The main approaches derived from Constantin Stanislavski’s ‘System’, including techniques for lifelike acting, proved contentious and were opposed by Bertolt Brecht’s epic theatre, which advocated stylistic shifts and interludes to prevent an audience becoming emotionally absorbed in the performance.
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