Laughter, Power, and the Unconscious

Researching Emotional Responses in a Contemporary Audience Spectating Early Modern Comedy at Shakespeare's Globe
1. Auflage 2025
ISBN: 978-0-367-63317-2
Verlag: Routledge

Buch, Englisch, 276 Seiten, Format (B × H): 161 mm x 240 mm, Gewicht: 584 g

Reihe: Audience Research

Laughter, Power, and the Unconscious offers paradigm-breaking insights into the psychological and sociopolitical dimensions of humour and comedy. Based on an innovative audience experiment at Shakespeare's Globe, the authors develop a revolutionary theory of humour as manic defence, challenging Freud's classic formulations while engaging with contemporary humour theories.

The text explores three key domains: firstly, it establishes and evaluates the theory in comparison to Freud's work in Jokes and their Relation to the Unconscious, while positioning it within major humour frameworks; secondly, it demonstrates the theory's application to Renaissance comedy, examining characters like Malvolio from Twelfth Night alongside stock figures of cuckolds and madmen in both English theatrical traditions and commedia dell'arte; finally, it investigates the theory's broader sociopolitical relevance by analysing war-related humour and racist jokes while addressing comedy's dual capacity to both challenge and reinforce existing power structures.

This volume will appeal to the scholars and students of theatre and performance studies, psychology, literary theory and cultural studies interested in the sociopolitical implications of humour.

Zielgruppe

Academic

Autoren/Hrsg.

Grazia Turri, Maria

Escolme, Bridget

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziologie Allgemein
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturwissenschaft: Dramen und Dramatiker
• Geisteswissenschaften Theater- und Filmwissenschaft | Andere Darstellende Künste Tanz Andere Darstellende Künste
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Europäische Geschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Theater- und Filmwissenschaft | Andere Darstellende Künste Theaterwissenschaft Schauspieltechnik, Theaterpädagogik
• Geisteswissenschaften Theater- und Filmwissenschaft | Andere Darstellende Künste Theaterwissenschaft Theatergeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Weltgeschichte

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of figures

List of tables

Acknowledgements

1. Introduction: the Research in Action audience experiment at Shakespeare’s Globe

Bridget Escolme and Maria Grazia Turri

2. Psychoanalytic rationale of the audience experiment

Maria Grazia Turri

3. Researching unconscious responses to early modern characters at Shakespeare’s Globe: results

Maria Grazia Turri

4. A new theory of humour as manic defence

Maria Grazia Turri

5. Reading theories of humour through the manic defence

Maria Grazia Turri

6. The ecology of laughter and humour at the intersection of culture and biology

Maria Grazia Turri

7. New insights into the socio-politics of humour

Maria Grazia Turri

8. The historicised subject: psychoanalytic discourse, Cultural Materialism, laughter and power

Bridget Escolme

9. Cuckolds and madmen: comic strength in the notoriously weak

Bridget Escolme

10. Laughing with the ‘whole pack’ of us: Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and comic strength in contemporary production of early modern drama

Bridget Escolme

11. Reading comedy as genre through the manic defence

Maria Grazia Turri

12. Elements of unconscious emotional processes for a socio-politics of comedy

Maria Grazia Turri

Conclusions: a dialogue

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Maria Grazia Turri is Senior Lecturer in Creative Arts and Mental Health at Queen Mary University of London, UK. She is a former psychiatrist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist.

Bridget Escolme is Professor of Theatre and Performance at Queen Mary University of London. She is co-convenor of Queen Mary’s MSc Creative Arts and Mental Health.