ABSTRACT
This chapter widens the focus from looking at specific productions to discussing more far-reaching cultural and political implications of the kind of theatre studied here. Specifically, Chantal Mouffe's theories of agonism and critical art are used to investigate what kind of political implications engaging with the canon and canonicity on stage can have. This chapter discusses how theatre can contribute to disrupting hegemony, form new collective identities, and create agonistic public spaces. I argue that theatre, and particularly directors’ theatre engaged with canonical texts, has a potential for becoming ‘critical art’ in Mouffe's sense and I discuss to what extent productions by the directors I discuss realise this potential. I argue that instances where these directors come closest to realising the critical potential of their work with canonical texts are when the ideological implications of the canon are explicitly played out, negotiated, and challenged on stage in a self-reflexive fashion.
