Voices in the Creation of an Indigenous Trinidad and Tobago Theatre - Patrick Brennan

This book explores how, from the mid-20th century, a new form of theatre emerged in Trinidad and Tobago as its playwrights came to mine the Afro-Creole Trinidadian folk milieu. This book focuses primarily on the period from the 1950s through to the contemporary moment, investigating how Trinidad’s theatrical practitioners developed methodologies that formulated an indigenous theatre. It examines how in its creation, it would distance itself from Western forms as the stage was decolonized, making way for a variety of new forms that mimetically reflect the reality of Trinidad’s Afro-Creole folk. This book establishes a premise on which the terms “folk” and “indigenous” have been shaped by Trinidad’s socio-historical past. It develops an argument that outlines how Trinidad’s African cultural retentions form a central basis on which a theatrical tradition was established. This book traces the historical impetus and driving forces that gave rise to a body of writers for whom the vitally important link between the production of drama and the search for identity in the immediacy of the post-colonial period is established. The book develops a structure that forms three lines of discrete research: folk expression, women, their portrayal and their emergence as theatrical practitioners, and theatrical developments through the decades. These subject areas are examined through the work of a broad body of playwrights. Exploring their th
více informací