Abstract

In this study, I examine the roles of reader, playwright, and character in the emergence of the drama from the lines of the text, and I provide a pedagogically practicable method of understanding dramatic texts based on techniques used by directors and actors. The study is intended to contribute to literary theory and hermeneutics, and to establish a rationale for creative dramatics in the college classroom. Accordingly, my central claims reflect the influence of Gadamer, Merleau-Ponty, and Stanislavski, but the course of argument is my own, and the study as a whole is addressed to those interested both in the theory and in the teaching of dramatic literature. ;The first chapter establishes the perspective and terminology of the dissertation, and suggests that our understanding of a dramatic text must be performative. In Chapter Two, I describe the performative element in our reading experience of the text, using Margolis's concept of the emergence of artworks, Veltrusky's theory of dramatic literature, and Casey's analysis of the imagination. I also examine in detail the initial emergence of the drama during our first reading of a text, and I suggest how our first reading influences our subsequent encounters with the continually emerging drama. ;In the third chapter, I examine certain techniques of professional theatre in light of the theory of understanding presented in Chapter Two, and combine them into a performative hermeneutic method appropriate both for individual study of a text and for classroom use. Although I use as models the director's and actor's approaches to a text, the hermeneutic procedures proposed require no previous experience in professional theatre, and can benefit experienced scholar and college freshman alike. The fourth chapter explains how this performative hermeneutic might be integrated into a college-level course in dramatic literature. I use the concepts of tradition and play both to correlate the results of my previous discussions and to clarify the potential contributions of both student and instructor to the emergence of the drama in the classroom situation