The Routledge Introduction to Theatre and Performance Studies

Erika Fischer-Lichte's introduction to the discipline of Theatre Studies is a strikingly authoritative and wide ranging guide to the study of theatre in all of its forms. Its three-part structure moves from the first steps in starting to think about performance, through to the diverse and interrelated concerns required of higher-level study:

Part 1 - Topics and Basic Terms - introduces the language and key ideas that are used to discuss and think about theatre: concepts of performance; the emergence of meaning; how the theatrical event is experienced. It also traces the history of Theatre Studies as a discipline in the West, putting this book's themes in context.

Part 2 - Subject Areas, Theories and Methods - looks at how to analyse a performance and begin to formulate and develop theories on what takes place. This section is concerned with the 'doing' of Theatre Studies: establishing methods, understanding different approaches, exploring sources and recognising theoretical assumptions.

Part 3 - The Bigger Picture - spreads out to apply the lessons of parts 1 and 2 to wider global cultures. It looks at the concept of 'interweaving' different cultures in performances, the interrelation of theatre with the other arts, and how theatre itself can be 'applied' to a practical end.

Case studies throughout the book root its discussion of how to study theatre in specific examples. These focused accounts of plays, practitioners and performances show both the development of Theatre Studies as an academic discipline, and of the theatre itself as an art form. This is the most comprehensive and sophisticated introduction to the field available, written by one of its foremost scholars.

Erika Fischer-Lichte is Professor of Theatre Studies at the Freie Universitat Berlin and Chair of the Institute for Advanced Studies on "Interweaving Cultures in Performance" founded in 2008. Among her many publications are Global Ibsen. Performing Multiple Modernities (2010), The Transformative Power of Performance: A New Aesthetics (2008, German 2004), and Theatre, Sacrifice, Ritual. Exploring Forms of Political Theatre (2005).

Ramona Mosse is Lecturer in Theatre Studies at the Freie Universitat Berlin, where she previously completed a fellowship at the International Research Center "Interweaving Performance Cultures."

Minou Arjomand is Assistant Professor of English at Boston University. Her research focuses on the relationship between theatre and political trials in postwar Germany and the United States.