ABSTRACT
It is becoming increasingly apparent that Jean Genet's small body of work dating from the mid-1950s to the early 1960s-The Balcony, The Blacks and The Screens-is one of the most politically astute theatre5 that we possess. Unlike the plays of Jean-Paul Sartre, Genet's earliest biographer, and, to a certain extent, those of Bertolt Brecht, a playwright whose work he detested, Genet's influence has grown to the point where he is now considered, by some, as the most politically sophisticated dramatist of his generation. 1 According to Marie Redonnet, for instance, 'Genet is very much our contemporary. He's the only one who saw with lucidity what the new face of the enemy would look like' (2000, p. 1 56). 2
Redonnet is not alone in her claims. In a recent article, Rustom Bharucha argues that the geo-political tensions produced by 11 September 2001 have finally disclosed the profound political significance of Genet's theatre:
[TJo process [Genet's] radical insights into our own practice today ... we have to find the courage to betray him imaginatively, not to disprove his politics and reject its anarchist affinities, but rather to test these affinities within the interruptions of the 'real' in the global terror of our times. Genet challenges us to spell out our politics in relation to where he stands. (2003, p. 24)
Redonnet's and Bharucha's observations are ostensibly based on three aspects of Genet's theatre. First, its critique of the conservativism inherent in national-liberation movements in Africa and the Arab world in the 1950s and 1960s; second, its suspicions about the effectiveness of committed art; and third, its preference for raising uncomfortable questions rather than providing simple solutions. This last point is particularly
importanttoBharucha.Accordingtohim,thepoliticalpotentialof Genet'stheatreisfoundinitsanarchicrefusaltosidewithanyform ofestablishedsocialorder.Bybreakingwiththe'falsesentimentality'of community,Genet,claimsBharucha,'articulate[s]anewrisk-takingin performance'andallowsspectatorsto'open[themselves]tonew alliancesthatchallengethecomfortofoldsolidarities'(ibid.,p.27).In thisway,heoffers,Bharuchabelieves,thepossibilityoftranscendingthe 'terrorofthetimes'whichareincreasinglybasedonessentialized notionsofcollectiveidentity.
