Ch. Menke, Tragic Play: Irony and Theater from Sophocles to Beckett

Christoph Menke, Tragic Play: Irony and Theater from Sophocles to Beckett (translated by James Phillips; first published 2005),  New York:  Columbia University Press, coll. "Columbia Themes in Philosophy, Social Criticism, and the Arts",  2009.  Pp. xi, 232.  

• ISBN 9780231145565.  
• $55.00.  
  

Recension par Joshua Billings (Merton College, Oxford University) dans Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2009.10.63.

Présentation de l'éditeur:

Tragic Play explores the deep philosophical significance of classic and modern tragedies in order to cast light on the tragic dimensions of contemporary experience. Romanticism, it has often been claimed, brought tragedy to an end, making modernity the age after tragedy. Christoph Menke opposes this modernist prejudice by arguing that tragedy remains alive in the present in the distinctively new form of the playful, ironic, and self-consciously performative. Through close readings of plays by William Shakespeare, Samuel Beckett, Heiner Muller, and Botho Strauss, Menke shows how tragedy re-emerges in modernity as "tragedy of play." In Hamlet, Endgame, Philoktet, and Ithaka, Menke integrates philosophical theory with critical readings to investigate shifting terms of judgment, curse, reversal, misfortune, and violence.

L'auteur:

Christoph Menke is professor of philosophy at the University of Frankfurt am Main. His publications in English include The Sovereignty of Art, Aesthetic Negativity in Adorno and Derrida, and Reflections of Equality.

Table des matières:

Part I. The Excess of Judgment: A Reading of Oedipus Tyrannus 1. "It was I myself": The Shape of Destiny Acting, Knowing, Judging "In the Manner of Tragedy" 2. From Judging to Being Judged: The Story of Oedipus The Juridification of the Oracle Placing a Curse Self-Condemnation The "Curse of the Law" 3. Author and Character: Oedipus's Existence Dramatic Existence Transcendental Dramatics Excursus: The Concept of Tragic Irony 4. The Violence of Judgment: Oedipus's Experience Philosophy and Tragedy The Objectivity of Judgment Oedipus's Lament Errors Great and Small The Paradox in the Judgment of an Error 5. "Learning from Suffering": Tragedy and Life Part II. Theoretical Interlude: The Process of Tragedy 6. Toward an Aesthetics of Tragedy: From the Beautiful to Play The Suspension of the Tragic in the Beautiful Contemplation or Reflection Acting Out Action The Freedom of the Actor 7. Promise and Impotence of Play Parody of Tragedy and Tragedy of Parody: Romantic Comedy The Untragic Hero: The Dialectical Lehrst?ck Meta-theater, Meta-tragedy Part III. The Tragedy of Play 8. Tragedy and Skepticism: On Hamlet Action, Knowledge, Play "Madness" and Irony Dizziness of Reflection: Theater and Tragedy 9. Three Sketches: Beckett, M?ller, Strauss The Score of the Feud: Samuel Beckett's Endgame Gladiators of Play: Heiner M?ller's Philoktet Never: Botho Strauss's Ithaka