Approaching Caryl Churchill’s Plays From The Perspective Of Dramatic Art

As one of the most influential female playwrights among the world dramatic stage since1960s, Caryl Churchill has won a great deal of acclaim for her creative innovations in theatrical techniques, extensive subjects in theatrical themes and bold experiments on dramatic languages. Churchill is not confined by any established dramatic theory; instead, in her writings she interweaves many contradictory dramatic elements harmoniously to present her various and attractive dramatic art style.This study of dramatic art represented in Churchill’s plays mainly focus on her dramatic structural models, role-casting models and language forms, which constitutes three chapters of my thesis. Chapter One concentrates on Churchill’s deft employment of various dramatic structural models. The typical feature is that many contradictory structural elements are combined harmoniously in her plays. From the inheritance of elements from Brecht’s Epic Theatre to the adoption of structural models in Modern theater, Churchill shows her ingenious craft ship and displays the ever-lasting glamour in her plays. Chapter Two is devoted to Churchill’s innovative role-casting. She overthrows the traditional role-casting model by utilizing the techniques of cross-casting and doubling of roles. Churchill develops the two techniques and finally achieves the multiple alienation effects in performers and characters, and in the audience and the characters. Chapter Three mainly focuses on the discussion of Churchill’s experimenting in theatrical language forms. By inventing the overlapping dialogue, inserting dances and songs, and integrating the rhymed verse and obscene language, Churchill gets rid of the boundaries of language lexicon, and enlarges the expressive scope of theatrical language, and most importantly, foregrounds the motif of her plays.This thesis aims at providing readers with a systematical overview of Churchill’s dramatic features, and also helping readers to deepen the understanding of Churchill’s plays. At the same time, based on the detailed textual-analysis, I venture to draw the conclusion that the dramatic art represented in Churchill’s plays is not always the same, but in constant change. This also corresponds to the characteristics of contemporary era when Churchill creates her works:ever-changing, dynamic, and captivating.