Revolutionary Postcolonial Drama: Ngūgī Wa Thiong'o and Saadallah Wannous

Simple item page
dc.contributor.advisorAboul-Ela, Hosam M.
dc.contributor.committeeMemberBackus, Margot G.
dc.contributor.committeeMemberMajumder, Auritro
dc.contributor.committeeMemberTakriti, Abdel Razzaq
dc.creatorYassin, Dawlat Sami
dc.creator.orcid0000-0002-9661-1134
dc.date.accessioned2020-10-12T18:43:20Z
dc.date.available2020-10-12T18:43:20Z
dc.date.createdAugust 2020
dc.date.issued2020-08
dc.date.submittedAugust 2020
dc.date.updated2020-10-12T18:43:20Z
dc.description.abstractRevolutionary Postcolonial Drama: Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o and Saadallah Wannous This dissertation is a comparative project that studies the common aspects of the revolutionary theaters of two important postcolonial dramatists Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong’o (1938) from Kenya and Saadallah Wannous (1941-1997) from Syria. I argue that the adoption of the Brechtian non-cathartic form by the two playwrights has enabled the transculturation of their theaters and rendering them revolutionary. Non-cathartic drama differs from classical Aristotelian drama in the absence of a purifying ending that purges the audience of already charged emotions of pity and fear and brings calmness to the world of the play. Contrary to what happens at the end of an Aristotelian play where calmness prevails in the world of the play, a non-cathartic ending leaves emotions charged and minds alert thinking about solutions to wrong situations. The non-cathartic ending sends the audience home with the knowledge that there is still work to be done. The absence of a catharsis is the main factor that makes the Brechtian form suitable for moving audiences to action. Saadallah Wannous and Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong’o, who share with Bertolt Brecht a Marxist outlook of the world, find in Brecht’s dramatic form a flexible framework for the exigencies of their postcolonial resistance theaters that aim oppressed classes to question, refuse, and take action to change unjust status quos. The Brechtian form also plays a big role in the transculturation of the two playwrights’ theaters. The narrative, rather than dramatic structure of events and independence incidents of the form, also allow including native theatrical traditions like songs, dance, ritual, and ceremony within the framework of the play. Native theatrical forms are not originally performances of a manuscript or text of a play and they do not enact a story with a masterplot. These aspects belong to Western drama where the playwright produces the text and the theater group rehearses the play behind closed doors to present it to the audience as a piece of perfection. The absence of the catharsis in the Brechtian form allows for integrating native performance elements in a play that is written and rehearsed beforehand like a Western play, and which at the same time resembles native theatrical traditions in including song, dance, ritualistic, and ceremonial elements. This makes the adoption of the European dissenting form a main factor of the transculturation of the genre.
dc.description.departmentEnglish, Department of
dc.format.digitalOriginborn digital
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdf
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10657/7021
dc.language.isoeng
dc.rightsThe author of this work is the copyright owner. UH Libraries and the Texas Digital Library have their permission to store and provide access to this work. Further transmission, reproduction, or presentation of this work is prohibited except with permission of the author(s).
dc.subjectPostcolonial drama, revolutionary theater, Brecht, experimental theater, epic theater, native performance forms, transculturation, cultural resistance, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Saadallah Wannous
dc.titleRevolutionary Postcolonial Drama: Ngūgī Wa Thiong'o and Saadallah Wannous
dc.type.dcmiText
dc.type.genreThesis
thesis.degree.collegeCollege of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
thesis.degree.departmentEnglish, Department of
thesis.degree.disciplineEnglish
thesis.degree.grantorUniversity of Houston
thesis.degree.levelDoctoral
thesis.degree.nameDoctor of Philosophy

Files

Original bundle

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Thumbnail Image
Name:
YASSIN-DISSERTATION-2020.pdf
Size:
1.01 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download

License bundle

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
PROQUEST_LICENSE.txt
Size:
4.43 KB
Format:
Plain Text
Description:
Download
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
LICENSE.txt
Size:
1.81 KB
Format:
Plain Text
Description:
Download

Collections

Published ETD Collection