This book studies the constitutive links between comedy and the public
sphere. Its central thesis is that the public ‘sphere’ is not simply an open space
for rational discussion, rather has theatrical qualities, and dominance in this
arena can be achieved by ridicule and
mocking. Such a study requires a genealogical approach, focusing on the
re-birth of theatre in late Renaissance Europe. The book has four parts, each
having three chapters. The first, theoretical part starts with a critique of
Habermas, then discusses the ‘performative turn’ and ideas by Nietzsche, Plato,
Baudelaire, Bergson, Elias, and Pizzorno, among others. The second part reconstructs
the re-emergence of theatre as comedy, focusing on the most important source of
this re-birth, the Byzantine world. The third part turns to the effect mechanism of comedy, arguing that the
new theatre transformed the tissue of European society as schismogenic
counterpart to the disciplinary mechanisms of the rising absolutist states and
the Puritan sects and movements. The last part shows how after the French
Revolution popular theatre transmuted into political and artistic avant-grade,
discussing the fascination of French Romantics for mime play, Richard Wagner,
the Ballets Russes of Diaghilev, and Meyerhold’s ‘biomechanical’ acting.