London's Grand Guignol and the Theatre of Horror

A companion to UEP's Grand-Guignol: The French Theatre of Horror (now in its third reprint). A genre that has left more of a mark on British and American culture than we may imagine" (Gothic Studies).

London's Grand Guignol was established in the early 1920s at the Little Theatre in the West End. It was a high-profile venture that enjoyed popular success as much as critical controversy. On its side were some of the finest actors on the English stage, in the shape of Sybil Thorndike and Lewis Casson, and a team of extremely able writers, including Noel Coward.

London's Grand Guignol and the Theatre of Horror considers the importance and influence of the English Grand Guignol within its social, cultural and historical contexts. It also presents a selection of ten remakarble English-language Grand Guignol plays, some of which were banned by the Lord Chamberlain, the censor of the day, and have never been published or publicly performed. Among the plays in the book is a previously unpublished work by Noel Coward, The Better Half, first performed at the Little Theatre in 1922.

The reviewer in the journal Gothic Studies wrote, of the authors' previous book: "having recently taught a module on Grand Guignol with third year drama students, it is also worth noting that this book captured their imaginations in a way that few other set texts seem to manage."

Short-listed for Theatre Book Prize 2007

“'...Richard J. Hand and Micheal Wilson, who have previously written on the French Grand Guignol for this excellent series from the University of Exeter Press, now turn to the English variant...' '...London's Grand Guignol is a fine introduction to a neglected corner of the twentieth-century arts world.' (TLS, 18. 04. 08)”

'...Richard J. Hand and Micheal Wilson, who have previously written on the French Grand Guignol for this excellent series from the University of Exeter Press, now turn to the English variant...'

`...London's Grand Guignol is a fine introduction to a neglected corner of the twentieth-century arts world.' (TLS, 18. 04. 08) "Altogether this is a well-researched book on a fascinating piece of theatre history."'

(Year's Work in English Studies, vol. 89, no. 1, 2010)

`...London's Grand Guignol allows Hand and Wilson to make a persuasive case for Grand Guignol's place not only in modern theatre history, but also in the film history of thrillers and horror films. This book will be useful as a hands-on theatre history and practice text for programs where one might imagine offering students an opportunity to apply their creativity to the same challenges Jose Levy faced.'

(Theatre Survey, Vol 50/2, November 2009)

'Altogether this is a well-researched book on a fascinating piece of theatre history.'

(Year's Work in English Studies, vol. 89, no. 1, 2010)

Richard J. Hand is Professor of Drama at the Cardiff School of Creative and Cultural Industries, University of Glamorgan. Michael Wilson is Dean of the School of Media and Performance at University College, Falmouth. Together they have delivered workshops on Grand Guignol, and presented Grand Guignol performances at universities, international conferences and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

' An utterly original treatment of an interminably discussed issue. Combining anthropological reflection with interviews, social theorizing with hospital reports, Boltanski produces an account that recasts the question of abortion, even as it cannot fail to annoy all sides in the current debate' Nancy Fraser, The New School for Social Research 'The Foetal Condition is not a political intervention, it does not rehash for us the endless arguments for or against abortion. Rather, it is about a far more startling topic: the connection between abortion and the process of engendering, becoming a member of the human species, at once generic and particular. Using a large range of anthropological evidence, Boltanski shows that societies have always practiced abortion, and that the silences, prohibitions or tacit acceptation of abortion touch on the troubling question of how societies define a "human being". This highly original book cannot fail to become a classic among anthropologists, sociologists, philosophers, and ethicists.' Eva IIIouz, Hebrew University of Jerusalem Abortion is a contentious issue in social life but it has rarely been subjected to careful scrutiny in the social sciences. While the legalization of abortion has brought in into the public domain, it still remains a sensitive topic in many cultures, often hidden from view and rarely spoken about, consigned to a shadowy existence. Drawing on reports gathered from hospital settings and in-depth interviews with women who have had abortions, Luc Boltanski sets out to explain the ambiguous status of this social practice. Abortion, he argues, has to remain in the shadows, for it reveals a contradiction at the heart of the social contract: the principle of the uniqueness of beings conflicts with the postulate of their replaceable nature, a postulate without which no society would achieve demographic renewal. This leads Boltanski to explore the way human beings are engendered and to analyse the symbolic constraints that preside over their entry into society. What makes a human being is not the foetus as such, ensconced within the body, but rather the process by which it is taken up symbolically in speech - that is, its symbolic adoption. But this symbolic adoption presupposes the possibility of discriminating among embryos that are indistinguishable. For society, and sometimes for individuals, the arbitrary character of this discrimination is hard to tolerate. The contradiction is made bearable by a grammatical categorization: the 'authentic' foetus - adopted by its parents, who use speech to welcome the new being and give it a name - is juxtaposed with the 'tumoral' foetus, an accidental embryo that will not be the object of a life-forming project. Bringing together grammar, narrations of life experience and a historical perspective, this highly original book sheds fresh light on a social phenomenon that is widely practiced but poorly understood

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