Murder by Accident: Medieval Theater, Modern Media, Critical Intentions

310 Pages·2009·0.75 MB·English

by  Jody Enders

Murder by Accident

Murder
by Accident
medieval theater,
modern media,
critical intentions
Jody Enders
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS /
CHICAGO AND LONDON
Jody Enders is professor of French and
theater at the University of California, Santa
Barbara. She is the author of three books, most
recently of Death by Drama and Other Medieval
Urban Legends (2002), published by the Univer-
sity of Chicago Press.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2009 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2009
Printed in the United States of America
18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09
1 2 3 4 5
isbn-13: 978-0-226-20783-4 (cloth)
isbn-10: 0-226-20783-8 (cloth)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication
Data
Enders, Jody, 1955–
Murder by accident : medieval theater, modern
media, critical intentions / Jody Enders.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn-13: 978-0-226-20783-4 (cloth : alk. paper)
isbn-10: 0-226-20783-8 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Drama, Medieval—History and criticism.
2. Theater—History—Medieval, 500–1500.
3. Violence in the theater. 4. Intention in litera-
ture. I. Title.
pn2152.e544 2009
809.2'9355—dc22
2008048165
The paper used in this publication meets
the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences—
Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ansi z39.48-1992.
To the Memory of Bert O. States
What did I just do? I analyzed what I accidentally felt and
what I accidentally did as a result of those feelings.
CONSTANTIN STANISLAVSKI, Creating a Role
Not much is common between going to the theater and
taking up a book.
ERVING GOFFMAN, Frame Analysis
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments, ix
List of Abbreviations, xi
Mise en Scène, xv
Introduction: Doing Theater Justice, 1
PART I Back to the Medieval Future
1 Behind the Seen: All Hell Breaks Loose, 29
2 The Final Run-Through, 47
3 Fear of Imminence and Virtual Ethics:
Staging Rape in the Middle Ages, 67
4 Killing Himself by Accident: Of Broken Frames,
Mimetic Blindness, and a Dance of Death, 89
Entr’Acte: This Fallacy Which Is Not One, 109
PART II The Theater and Its Trouble
5 The Theatrical Contract, 123
6 In Flagrante Theatro, 143
7 Theater Nullifi cation, 163
Talk-Back: Black Box and Idiot Box, 185
Appendix: Original Documents in French and Latin, 197
Notes, 209
Works Cited, 249
Index, 275
vii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have profi ted enormously over the past several years from the insights
and expertise of many colleagues whom I wish to thank for their invalu-
able intellectual feedback during the preparation of this book. Any and all
shortcomings are my own.
At a very early stage, my colleagues Paul Hernadi, David Marshall, and
the late Bert States off ered that rare combination of generosity and bril-
liance as they engaged me in numerous dialogues and debates; much ear-
lier than that, David Lee Rubin was my fi rst undergraduate teacher to in-
troduce me to the very concept of literary theory. Three readers for the
University of Chicago Press—David Bevington, Steven Mailloux, and Julie
Stone Peters—challenged and encouraged me with their sage advice. At the
University of Illinois, Chicago, Marya Schechtman has always had an un-
canny ability to refer me to fascinating work in philosophy. For their will-
ingness to brainstorm with me, I also acknowledge Philip Auslander, Wil-
liam Condee, Tracy Davis, Shannon Jackson, Elizabeth MacArthur, Clare
Macdonald, Didier Maleuvre, Stephen Nichols, Rebecca Schneider, Dar-
win Smith, Jack Talbott, and William Warner. And it is a special pleasure to
thank by name a number of graduate students whom it has been an honor
to teach. In the course of their work in seminars, they grappled intelligently
with the ethical dimensions of theater, for ten weeks at a time, in ways that
I found inspirational: Clareann Despain, Carol Fischer, Andrew Gibb, Jason
Narvy, Emily Weisberg, Hank Willenbrink, and Beth Wynstra. Very spe-
cial thanks go as well to my friend Rita Copeland, who encouraged me to
develop for Oxford’s New Medieval Literatures an early version of my fi rst
thoughts on this topic.
I am thankful to the Interlibrary Loan Offi ce at Davidson Library of
my home institution, whose staff diligently assisted me in securing even the
ix