Jean Genet and the politics of theatre is the first publication to
situate the politics of Genet's theatre within the social, spatial and
political contexts of France in the 1950s and 1960s. The book's
innovative approach departs significantly from existing scholarship on
Genet. Where scholars have tended to bracket Genet as either an
absurdist, ritualistic or, more recently, a resistant playwright, this
study argues that his theory and practice of political theatre have more
in common with the affirmative ideas of thinkers such as Henri Lefebvre,
Jacques Rancière and Alain Badiou. By doing so, the monograph positions
Genet as a revolutionary playwright, interested in producing progressive
forms of democracy. This original and interdisciplinary reading of
Genet's late work will be of interest to students and practitioners of
Theatre, as well as those interested in French and History.