Fiery Temporalities in Theatre and Performance : The Initiation of History (Paperback)

Acknowledgments ix 1 Introduction 1 Political Mother: Introductory Remarks on Chronological Time and Changing Time 2 Fire 8 Theatre and Beginnings 13 Initiations of History 15 Processional History, Historicism, and Walter Benjamin's Radical Time 18 The Now, the New, and the Present 24 The Field: In Three Sections 27 Methodology/Positionality 42 The Chapters 45 2 There Are No More Slaves: The New Present and a Temporal Philosophy of Revolt (Plays on the Haitian Revolution) 57 The Problem with Tragedy 58 C. L. R. James, Communism, and Black International Radicalism 62 Plays on the Haitian Revolution 67 Toussaint Louverture: The Story of the Only Successful Slave Revolt in History 70 The Tragedy of King Christophe 90 3 Changing Time in the Time Before the End 115 You Are Nowhere 120 Refuse the Hour 135 Before Your Very Eyes 154 On the Concept of the Face: Regarding the Son of God 166 4 The Volatility of Time in the Hold: Kairos and the To-Come 173 Real Magic 174 Tiresias 185 Beytna 200 Thoughts in the Time Before the End 206 Notes 215 Bibliography 231 Index 239