Acts of Gaiety : LGBT Performance and the Politics of Pleasure Hardback
by Sara Warner
Part of the Triangulations: Lesbian/Gay/Queer Theater/Drama/Performance series
Hardback
Description
Acts of Gaiety explores the mirthful modes of political performance by LGBT artists, activists, and collectives that have inspired and sustained deadly serious struggles for revolutionary change.
The book explores antics such as camp, kitsch, drag, guerrilla theatre, zap actions, rallies, manifestos, pageants, and parades alongside more familiar forms of ""legitimate theatre."" Against queer theory's long-suffering romance with mourning and melancholia and a national agenda that urges homosexuals to renounce pleasure if they want to be taken seriously by mainstream society, Acts of Gaiety seeks to reanimate notions of ""gaiety"" as a political value for LGBT activism. The book mines the archives of lesbian-feminist activism of the 1960s-70s, highlighting the outrageous gaiety that lay at the center of the social and theatrical performances of the era and uncovering original documents long thought to be lost.
Juxtaposing historical figures such as Valerie Solanas and Jill Johnston with more recent performers and activists (including Hothead Paisan, Bitch & Animal, and the Five Lesbian Brothers), Warner shows how reclaiming this largely discarded and disavowed past elucidates possibilities for being and belonging.
Acts of Gaiety explores the mutually informing histories of gayness as politics and as joie de vivre, along with the centrality of liveliness to queer performance and protest.
Information
-
Available to Order - This title is available to order, with delivery expected within 2 weeks
- Format:Hardback
- Pages:256 pages, 11 B&W illustrations
- Publisher:The University of Michigan Press
- Publication Date:30/10/2012
- Category:
- ISBN:9780472118533
Other Formats
- Paperback / softback from £26.95
Information
-
Available to Order - This title is available to order, with delivery expected within 2 weeks
- Format:Hardback
- Pages:256 pages, 11 B&W illustrations
- Publisher:The University of Michigan Press
- Publication Date:30/10/2012
- Category:
- ISBN:9780472118533