Africa on the Contemporary London Stage

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xv

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Tiziana Morosetti

   Pages 1-15

3. Africa on the London Stage, 1955–2013

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 17-17

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   2. Freedom, London 1955: A Story of Modern Africa Written and Acted by Africans, or Perhaps Not

      • James Gibbs

      Pages 19-43

   3. Africa on the British Stage, 1955–1966

      • Steve Nicholson

      Pages 45-65

   4. ‘On One of Those Sunday Nights’: 50 Years of Africa at the Royal Court Theatre

      • Tiziana Morosetti

      Pages 67-86

   5. Biyi Bandele’s Theatre of the Afropolitan Absurd

      • Michael Pearce

      Pages 87-108

   6. Nigerian Political Satire at the Soho Theatre: Class, Culture, and Theatrical Languages in Oladipo Agboluaje’s The Estate and Iyale (The First Wife)

      • Lynette Goddard

      Pages 109-127

   7. Black Masculinity and the Black Voice: Casting and Canonicity in the National Theatre Gala

      • Sophie Duncan

      Pages 129-146

4. Companies and Theatre Practitioners

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 147-147

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   2. Disrupting Historical Mis-representations and Constructions: Talawa Theatre, Tiata Fahodzi, and Representations of Polyphonic Africa on the Contemporary London Stage

      • Victor Ukaegbu

      Pages 149-166

   3. IROKO Theatre and the African Theatre-in-Education Scene in London

      • Alex Oma-Pius

      Pages 167-184

   4. ‘But [We] Will Delve One Yard Below Their Mines/And Blow Them at the Moon’: Two Gents—‘Africa’, Shakespeare, and the Silent Revolution

      • Arne Pohlmeier

      Pages 185-199

   5. Interview with Ade Solanke

      • Tiziana Morosetti

      Pages 201-210

   6. Interview with Rotimi Babatunde

      • Ying Cheng

      Pages 211-218

   7. Interview with Dipo Agboluaje

      • Tiziana Morosetti

      Pages 219-227

5. Back Matter

   Pages 229-246

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This collection of essays investigates the way Africa has been portrayed on the London stage from the 1950s to the present. It focuses on whether — and, if so, to what extent — the Africa that emerges from the London scene is subject to stereotype, and/or in which ways the reception of audiences and critics have contributed to an understanding of the continent and its arts. The collection, divided into two parts, brings together well-established academics and emerging scholars, as well as playwrights, directors and performers currently active in London. With a focus on Wole Soyinka, Athol Fugard, Bola Agbaje, Biyi Bandele, and Dipo Agboluaje, amongst others, the volume examines the work of key companies such as Tiata Fahodzi and Talawa, as well as newer companies Two Gents, Iroko Theatre and Spora Stories. Interviews with Rotimi Babatunde, Ade Solanke and Dipo Agboluaje on the contemporary London scene are also included.

• stereotypes
• Black British theatre
• prejudice
• identity
• Afropolitanism
• postcolonial studies

“In Africa on the Contemporary London Stage, Tiziana Morosetti assembles a collection of essays from contributors spanning the broad range of expertise in the field of African theatre in the diaspora, its presence and the historical representation of Africans on the London stage. Each chapter is distinct in its focus, yet the book achieves a seamless cross-referencing and dialogue between the chapters that yields a clearer understanding of the subject. This is major contribution to the field of African theatre in general, and African diaspora theatre /Black British theatre in particular.” ( Professor Osita Okagbue, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK)

“Dr Tiziana Morosetti’s book is dynamic and evolutionary. It interrogates the egregious practices of Theatre critics who for almost a century have marginalized the presence of African drama on the British stage. They deemed it as irrelevant, unprofessional, sub-standard and unsuitable for British audience appreciation. This book painstakingly reveals what can best be described as deliberate attempts at a cultural hegemony, apartheid and the vicissitudes. The experience of African migrants from former British colonies as well as those of their descendants born in Britain have coalesced to define a definitive wave of British drama that is undeniably a fabric of the British experience which consequently, and unavoidably must be defined as British drama. With Morosetti’s book, it becomes impossible for any Theatre scholar writing about African or British drama to ignore this praxis and the evolution that has followed. ” (Professor ‘Niyi Coker, University of Missouri, USA)

 

• University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

  Tiziana Morosetti

Tiziana Morosetti is a fixed-term affiliate with the African Studies Centre, Oxford, UK, where she teaches African Literature. She is deputy-director of the journal Quaderni del ’900, and the membership secretary of the African Theatre Association (AfTA). She is the editor of Staging the Other in Nineteenth-Century British Drama (2016).



   

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