Despite the recent upsurge of interest in Women’s Studies in general, and in Feminist Studies in particular, very little feminist dramaturgy has entered the canon. This is reflected by its virtual absence from university curricula in most European institutions, which, even when addressing Theatre Studies or Feminist Studies, seem nevertheless reluctant to establish fruitful connections between the two. Specifically to the Italian situation, no study to date has offered a comprehensive exploration of the intertwined dynamics between feminist activism and women’s self-representation in theatre. This scholarly neglect is not easily forgivable, especially in relation to a country such as Italy, where the interconnection between theatre and feminism has been even greater than elsewhere.
Following an interdisciplinary approach combining feminist theory, Italian literature, women’s writing for theatre and socio-historical contextualisation, this project has provided the first study on a fundamental moment of Italian history — i.e. the emergence of feminist activism — and its intersection with the history of national theatre. Whilst focusing on the Italian context, the project has helped charting new waters in the fields of Theatre and Women’s Studies, impacting also on contemporary European Theatre Studies.
The research objective of the project was twofold. i) looking at how theatre served as an ideological vehicle for feminism, that is, as a means to rethink the representation of women’s gender roles; ii) assessing the effects of feminist ideology on the theatrical practice in affording feminist playwrights the possibility of rethinking women's role in performance art, overthrowing centuries-old worship for the Aristotelian mimemis (i.e. drama understood as ‘imitation’ and ‘realism’) and replacing it with active performance. To best achieve this scope, the study was articulated on three main grounds:
i. Historical context/Feminist theory. This section has explored the extent to which theatre was (re)appropriated and exploited by feminist playwrights.
• how did theatre become a political tool for feminism?
• to what extent did feminism benefit from a (re)appropriation of the theatrical means?
ii. Theatrical practice. This section has assessed the impact of feminist dramaturgical techniques on the coeval theatrical practice at a time when, across Europe, the tendency was to place great emphasis on the body of the actors/actresses at the expense of the literary text.
• how did feminist theory impact upon the existing theatrical
techniques?
• what is the legacy of feminist dramaturgy nowadays?
iii. Live materials. This final section intended to collect testimonies from direct and indirect sources by means of conducting interviews with feminist playwrights active in the 1970s and by researching private and public archives in Italy.
• what is the first-hand experience of the feminist playwrights who worked at the time?
• what new insights can we gain from these accounts?
