Eight Men Speak

A Play by Oscar Ryan et al.

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, Canadian, Drama History & Criticism, Nonfiction, Social & Cultural Studies, Political Science, Politics, Labour & Industrial Relations
Cover of the book Eight Men Speak by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg, University of Ottawa Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg ISBN: 9780776620756
Publisher: University of Ottawa Press Publication: March 30, 2013
Imprint: University of Ottawa Press Language: English
Author: Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
ISBN: 9780776620756
Publisher: University of Ottawa Press
Publication: March 30, 2013
Imprint: University of Ottawa Press
Language: English

This volume comprises a reprinting and gloss of the original text of the 1933 Communist play Eight Men Speak. The play was banned by the Toronto police after its first performance, banned by the Winnipeg police shortly thereafter and subsequently banned by the Canadian Post Office. The play can be considered as one stage–the published text–of a meta-text that culminated in 1934 at Maple Leaf Gardens when the (then illegal) Communist Party of Canada celebrated the release of its leader, Tim Buck, from prison. Eight Men Speak had been written and staged on behalf of the campaign to free Buck by the Canadian Labour Defence League, the public advocacy group of the CPC.

In its theatrical techniques, incorporating avant-garde expressionist staging, mass chant, agitprop and modernist dramaturgy, Eight Men Speak exemplified the vanguardist aesthetics of the Communist left in the years before the Popular Front. It is the first instance of the collective theatrical techniques that would become widespread in subsequent decades and formative in the development of modern Canadian drama. These include a decentred narrative, collaborative authorship and a refusal of dramaturgical linearity in favour of theatricalist demonstration. As such it is one of the most significant Canadian plays of the first half of the century, and, on the evidence of the surviving photograph of the mise-en-scene, one of the earliest examples of modernist staging in Canada.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

This volume comprises a reprinting and gloss of the original text of the 1933 Communist play Eight Men Speak. The play was banned by the Toronto police after its first performance, banned by the Winnipeg police shortly thereafter and subsequently banned by the Canadian Post Office. The play can be considered as one stage–the published text–of a meta-text that culminated in 1934 at Maple Leaf Gardens when the (then illegal) Communist Party of Canada celebrated the release of its leader, Tim Buck, from prison. Eight Men Speak had been written and staged on behalf of the campaign to free Buck by the Canadian Labour Defence League, the public advocacy group of the CPC.

In its theatrical techniques, incorporating avant-garde expressionist staging, mass chant, agitprop and modernist dramaturgy, Eight Men Speak exemplified the vanguardist aesthetics of the Communist left in the years before the Popular Front. It is the first instance of the collective theatrical techniques that would become widespread in subsequent decades and formative in the development of modern Canadian drama. These include a decentred narrative, collaborative authorship and a refusal of dramaturgical linearity in favour of theatricalist demonstration. As such it is one of the most significant Canadian plays of the first half of the century, and, on the evidence of the surviving photograph of the mise-en-scene, one of the earliest examples of modernist staging in Canada.

More books from University of Ottawa Press

Cover of the book Foucault and the Indefinite Work of Freedom by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book The 1940 Under the Volcano by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Confronting Discrimination and Inequality in China by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Gilles Paquet by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Recovering the Body by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Deep Cultural Diversity by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Translating Canada by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Engendering Genre by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Drugs and Crime by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Gomery's Blinders and Canadian Federalism by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Le poids du temps by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Waste Heritage by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Jacob Isaac Segal by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book The Service State: Rhetoric, Reality and Promise by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
Cover of the book Antonine Maillet : Les trésors cachés - Our Hidden Treasures by Oscar Ryan, Edward Cecil-Smith, Frank Love, Mildred Goldberg
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy