@article{ART003236555},
author={Kim, Yungduk},
title={Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events},
journal={Journal of Modern English Drama},
issn={1226-3397},
year={2025},
volume={38},
number={2},
pages={7-29}
TY - JOUR
AU - Kim, Yungduk
TI - Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events
JO - Journal of Modern English Drama
PY - 2025
VL - 38
IS - 2
PB - 한국현대영미드라마학회
SP - 7
EP - 29
SN - 1226-3397
AB - This paper examines how David Greig’s The Events transforms theatre into a participatory ritual that draws the audience into a performative community. While terrorism enacts rupture and division, the play seeks to respond by staging processes of healing through ritual performance. Greig’s dramaturgy unfolds across three interwoven layers: the shamanic ritual of the Boy, the healing ritual led by Claire and the choir, and the play itself as a choral ritual. Each layer, composed of strips of “restored behaviour,” recursively echoes and mirrors the others. By dramatizing ritual and theatre as performative practices that can be re-imagined and re-enacted, the play opens up the possibility of alternatives to violence. At the heart of this dramaturgy lies the community chorus, which acts as a liminal hinge between stage and auditorium, inviting audience participation. Through its interactive dramaturgy, the play creates a shared space of affective and synaesthetic exchange between performers and spectators, thereby envisioning a form of communitas grounded in a cosmopolitan ethic—one in which cultural and ideological boundaries temporarily dissolve. In this sense, The Events is not merely a representation but an event in itself: a collective rehearsal of connection, healing, and transformation.
KW - David Greig;The Events;shamanism;ritual;performance;chorus;community;terrorism
DO -
UR -
ER -
Kim, Yungduk. (2025). Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events. Journal of Modern English Drama, 38(2), 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. 2025, "Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events", Journal of Modern English Drama, vol.38, no.2 pp.7-29.
Kim, Yungduk "Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events" Journal of Modern English Drama 38.2 pp.7-29 (2025) : 7.
Kim, Yungduk. Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events. 2025; 38(2), 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. "Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events" Journal of Modern English Drama 38, no.2 (2025) : 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events. Journal of Modern English Drama, 38(2), 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events. Journal of Modern English Drama. 2025; 38(2) 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events. 2025; 38(2), 7-29.
Kim, Yungduk. "Staging Ritual, Ritualizing the Stage: A Dramaturgy for Forging Community in David Greig’s The Events" Journal of Modern English Drama 38, no.2 (2025) : 7-29.
