The Czech theatre theory has helped reflect on what theatre and performance is, does and could do. It is a critical tradition worth revisiting, rethinking, re-reading, studying and using again in our thinking about what happens in performance.
This website offers a basic overview with an introduction to the existing research, publications and other activities, primarily by the research team based at the Department of Theatre Studies at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic.
The team has undertaken two research projects:
- Czech theatre structuralism: context and potency (2011-2015)
- Theatre as Synthesis of Arts: Otakar Zich in context of modern science and actual potential of his concepts (2016-2018)
These two projects produced two summative publications:
- Theatre Theory Reader: Prague School Writings (Karolinum, 2016), ed. David Drozd, Tomáš Kačer and Don Sparling
- Otakar Zich: Aesthetics of the Dramatic Art: Theoretical Dramaturgy (Karolinum, 2024), ed. David Drozd and Pavel Drábek
Each of the books has its backstory and each is a result of lengthy and complex research and editorial work.
In the tabs you also find other publications, essays and studies that provide the contexts, offer further insights, and hopefully also inspiration for critical thinkers to use Czech theatre theory into their own research and teaching.
