International Theatre

Between the end of World War II and the fall of the Berlin Wall, theatre on both sides of the Iron Curtain was a battlefield for ideas, national identity, and artistic freedom. John Elsom was uniquely placed to write this account as President of the International Association of Theatre Critics from 1985 to 1992. The result is a vivid, wide-ranging, and deeply personal history of the theatre as a political instrument and a space of resistance.

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First posed by the critic Jan Kott in 1964, the question of Shakespeare’s contemporary relevance has never been answered but only endlessly reopened. This collection, edited by Elsom and arising from a series of international IATC conferences, gathers responses from directors, critics, and scholars across Europe, Asia, and the Americas. The answers together form a fascinating portrait of how Shakespeare functions as a mirror for each generation’s preoccupations. The book remained in print for twenty years.

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