Epilogue:

Abstract

By way of drawing to a close, let us examine directly the fact that many people still think of theatrical performances as performances of something else, usually works of literary art. There is a good reason they think this, even though it is mistaken. It has to do with the nature of what has been the dominant tradition of theater in Western culture at least since the late 1700s. Let us begin this examination by reminding ourselves of some of the reasons adduced earlier in the book for why this belief is mistaken. Not everything we regard as a performance is intentional. Consider what you have in mind when you compliment your friend after watching her deftly wriggle out of a very public and socially awkward moment. “Good performance,” you say, after the dust has settled. You feel no need to think there must be a something of which hers was a performance. For there is nothing that corresponds to that “of.” The “ingredients model” of the text–performance relation in theater generalizes this idea to all theatrical performances. More specifi cally, adherents of the ingredients model hold these claims to be true.