We are delighted to announce that The Heart of Teaching: Empowering Students in the Performing Arts is now available. The Heart of Teaching is a book about teaching and learning in the performing arts. Its focus is on the inner dynamics of teaching: the processes by which teachers can promote—or undermine—creativity itself. It covers the many issues that teachers, directors and choreographers experience, from the frustrations of dealing with silent students and helping young artists ‘unlearn’ their inhibitions, to problems of resistance, judgment and race in the classroom.
‘Stephen Wangh tackles an important but rarely discussed aspect of performance teaching. He brings a particular set of hard-won insights based on extensive teaching and personal experience, and doesn’t shy away from teasing out the difficult personal lessons drawn from that experience.’
Anthony Jackson, University of Manchester, UK
The Heart of Teaching speaks to experienced teachers and beginning teachers in all disciplines, but is particularly relevant to those in the performing arts, from which most of its examples are drawn. It brings essential insight and honesty to the discussion of how to teach. Find out more.
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In 1939, a young, inexperienced actor wrote to a famous actress of his acquaintance, asking for advice on playing comedy. She responded enthusiastically, and they corresponded variously over the next year. The Craft of Comedy, a record of these exchanges, soon emerged as one of the few classic texts in the field of comedy acting.
This major new edition takes a brilliant book and makes it better. Editor Robert Barton has devised extensive supplementary material, including:
• An introduction to the correspondents, the culture of the time, and the evolution of their book;
• Summaries, definitions, and exercises and practice scenes for readers wishing to explore Athene Seyler’s invaluable advice;
• Photographs, additional essays by Seyler, and a guide to easily accessed video clips of her performing.
]]>Stanislavski: The Basics is an engaging introduction to the life, thought and impact of Konstantin Stanislavski.
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Regarded by many as a great innovator of twentieth century theatre, this book examines Stanislavski’s:
• life and the context of his writings
• major works in English translation
• ideas in practical contexts
• impact on modern theatre.
With further reading throughout, a glossary of terms and a comprehensive chronology, this text makes the ideas and theories of Stanislavski available to an undergraduate audience.
This book gives a new view on the legacy of Jerzy Grotowski (1933-1999), one of the central, and yet misunderstood, figures who shaped 20th-century theatre, focusing on his least known last phase of work on ancient songs and the craft of the performer.
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Salata posits Grotowski’s work as philosophical practice, and more particularly, as practical research in the phenomenology of being, arguing that Grotowski’s departure from theatrical productions (and thus critical consideration) resulted from his uncompromising pursuit of one central problem, "What does it mean to reveal oneself?" — the very question that drove his stage directing work.
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Curtain up!
It's show-time for the Routledge Performance Archive (RPA), as we are now live. We are pleased to bring you the first of our regular news updates, including: cupcakes and transatlantic celebrations for the launch of the RPA; press coverage, rave reviews and endorsements; and new content from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London for 2013.
eBooks from Taylor & Francis - Helping you to choose the right eBooks for your Library
As we enter 2013, we are seeing more and more institutions and libraries investing in electronic information products and resources. There is increasingly less space for physical books, and students are now accessing more information remotely.
A 2012 IFLA report rightly makes the point that 'eResources present a number of challenges not encountered with the selection and acquisition of traditional analogue materials'. For this reason, at Taylor & Francis we endeavour to offer you as much support as possible to help you integrate our eProducts into your library as easily as possible. And with our eBooks, we have made things super simple.
At first glance, the sheer scale of our eBook backlist and frontlist can be quite daunting. We have over 30,000 eBooks across the Humanities, Social Sciences, Behavioural Sciences and Law, from leading imprints, including Routledge, Focal Press and Psychology Press.
With eBooks covering everything from Language & Linguistics and Philosophy of Film to Commercial Law and Development Economics, there is a lot to choose from. For that reason, we have made our purchase options nice and flexible; subject eCollections, interdisciplinary eFocus packages, Pick n' Mix and more ...
Give our new video a watch and get a snapshot of what T&F eBooks could do for your library:
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Now Available
Theatre in Practice provides students with all of the ‘must have’ Drama skills required for A-Level, International Baccalaureate, BTEC and beyond.
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Practical, step-by-step exercises and diagrams give access to the key figures and processes central to drama, including:
• Stanislavski, Brecht, Lecoq and Berkoff
• devising theatre
• rehearsing and performing monologues and duologues
• how to approach directing a play
• improvising.
Each chapter offers advice for both students and teachers, with notes and follow-on exercises ideal for individual study and practice. Written by specialists with extensive experience leading workshops for the 'post 16' age-group, Theatre in Practice is a thorough and imaginative resource that speaks directly to students.
Contemporary Mise en Scène is Patrice Pavis’s masterful analysis of the role that staging has played in the creation and practice of theatre throughout history.
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Contemporary Mise en Scène is Patrice Pavis’s masterful analysis of the role that staging has played in the creation and practice of theatre throughout history. This stunningly ambitious study considers:
• the staged reading, at the frontiers of mise en scène;
• scenography, which sometimes replaces staging;
• the reinterpretation of classical and contemporary works;
• the development of intercultural theatre and ritual;
• new technologies and their usage live on the stage;
• the postmodern practice of deconstruction.
But it also applies sustained critical attention to the challenges of defining mise en scène, of tracking its development, and of exploring its possible futures. Joel Anderson’s powerful new translation lucidly realises Pavis’s investigation of the changing possibilities for stagecraft in the context of performance art, physical theatre and modern theory.
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The first comprehensive diagnostic handbook for building, caring for, and maintaining an ensemble.
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Successful ensembles don’t happen by chance; they must be created, nurtured, and maintained through specific actions. Achieving common goals in rehearsal and performance requires group trust, commitment and sacrifice. Ensemble Theatre Making is a step-by-step guide to these processes.
]]>'This is a great teaching aid, packed with anthropological observations, written by academics from the UK and the States.' - WhatsOnStage.com
Visit the re-designed support website offering links to new audio-visual resources, expanded bibliographies, approaches to teaching theatre and performance history, discussion questions relating to case studies and an online glossary.
With The Politics of American Actor Training, coeditors Ellen Margolis and Lissa Tyler Renaud make an important contribution to the fields of theatre history and acting pedagogy. Along with twelve contributors, they have created an excellent publication that moves seamlessly among history, pedagogy, theory, and practice. As such, The Politics of American Actor Training serves several needs and deserves consideration from scholars, teachers, and professional theatre artists alike.
In the introduction, Margolis and Renaud articulate their goals in pursuing this project: "Our collective aim has been to assess current and past training policies and practices, and to propose new ideas that will inform twenty-first century actor training in America" (2). The book offers several chapters that address one or both of these points. Divided into two parts, it covers topics as diverse as the many misunderstandings of Stanislavsky's work in the United States, recruiting a more diverse student body, and the difficulties of script selection and acting opportunities in one's larger academic community. The first part concerns the broader milieu of actor training, both in the United States and abroad, while the second part (neither part receives a name or heading) offers several approaches to teaching acting and specific techniques to employ in particular situations. Although the book contains two sections, many chapters could easily reside in either part of the book, as most of them address both ambitions of the co-editors and clearly speak to each other, making for a useful collection of essays.
Part 1 begins with Sharon Marie Carnicke's consideration of Stanislavsky and how his work has been misunderstood both in his native country and the United States. Carnicke builds upon her excellent work in the second edition of Stanislavsky in Focus: An Acting Master for the Twenty-First Century (2009). Jonathan Chambers's chapter on historicizing actor training follows Carnicke's. Both Carnicke and Chambers encourage historical contextualization in considering approaches to acting and acting theories. The Indian theatre scholar/artist Chadradasan outlines ways in which American actor training (and Western actor training writ large) has seeped into Indian theatre training and practice, as well as the ramifications of that influence. Leigh Woods and Lissa Tyler Renaud offer chapters suggesting ways to achieve a more satisfying artistic life through interdisciplinarity—Woods by encouraging actors to collaborate with those in other departments and community engagement, Renaud by suggesting more intellectual rigor (specifically with the European avant-garde). Donna Aronson looks at the growing Hispanic population in the United States and outlines how she actively pursued a more diverse student body in her previous theatre department. Renaud caps off part 1 with her second chapter, this one focusing on her experiences teaching acting in Asia for several years. Part 1's strengths reside not only in the intellectual precision of the authors' works, but also in the specific pedagogical experiences they contemplate.
The second part is equally compelling, emphasizing the reasons to diversify theatre programs. David Eulus Wiles suggests that "we should select artists to train based on their aptitude, as students in other disciplines are selected" (136). Mary Cutler's brief but thorough chapter looks at gender, typecasting, and script selection. Derek Mudd recounts his abusive experiences while pursuing an acting degree, particularly while rehearsing The Exonerated. He explains that he felt as though he had no agency, since it was the first opportunity for him to perform in his school's new Equity theatre. Micha Espinosa and Antonio Ocampo-Guzman negotiate reinforcing and subverting stereotypes in their teaching Latina/o performers. Venus Opal Reese proposes a new approach to acting pedagogy based around dramaturgical experimentations by playwrights, specifically African American dramatists. Reese's chapter, in which she proposes "embodiment," offers a group of exercises useful to an embodiment approach to acting. Victoria Ann Lewis's chapter, "Disability and Access: A Manifesto for Actor Training," is a brief overview of disabled students who have pursued actor training at the university level, as well as specific ways to involve disabled individuals in the acting classroom without changing one's expectations or standards. Ellen Margolis's chapter—the final one of the book—thoughtfully examines how she has navigated the tricky issue of garnering a student's consent to touch her or him when teaching vocal training. Part 2 functions as a series of approaches and techniques for acting pedagogy and training.
The Politics of American Actor Training often tends to accentuate those areas of actor training that theatre departments and acting teachers are not providing to their students, and the ways in which acting students are not prepared for a world filled (presumably) with rejection. However, many, if not most, of the authors who do write about the limitations of actor training suggest ways of addressing these potential problems. Taken as a whole, The Politics of American Actor Training is an admirable addition to the Routledge Advances in Theatre & Performance Studies series. While the series does not appear to have a stated mission or goal—at least not in this book—this book offers a wide array of scholarship that eludes obvious or simple categorization, but is nonetheless worthy of inclusion in the discourse of theatre and performance studies. The Politics of American Actor Training is an important publication and belongs in the library of anyone teaching acting, acting theory, or theatre history.
Adrian Noble was the Artistic Director and Chief Executive of the Royal Shakespeare Company between 1990 and 2003, having previously served as Associate Director for nine years. He has held key positions at the Bristol Old Vic and Manchester Royal Exchange and in 2010 served as Artistic Director for the Old Globe's Shakespeare Festival in San Diego. Throughout his career he has received over 20 Olivier Award Nominations.
How to Do Shakespeare addresses the perennial issues of performing Shakespeare and draws on Adrian Noble's several decades of top-level experience to shed new light on how to bring some of theatre’s seminal texts to life. Watch Adrian Noble discuss the book on the Routledge Theatre and Performance YouTube channel.
Each month we will be celebrating one of the many practitioners that we have had the pleasure publishing books about. Check back at the beginning of each month to find out a bit more about them.
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