Shakespeare, Technicity, Theatre W. B. Worthen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020, pp. vii + 271, 11 illustrations. $105 cloth, $29.99 paper, $24 e-book.

formance’s location and duration. Part 1 also includes a chapter on Tadeusz Kantor by Magda Romanska (Chapter 6), as well as one by Edith Cassiers, Timmy De Laet, and Luk Van den Dries (Chapter 3) that examines Guy Cassiers’s and Romeo Castellucci’s notebooks and creative processes, both of which will easily complement courses examining these international artists’ work. Cassiers, De Laet, and Van den Dries aptly note that genetic theatre studies—research examining the genesis of a performance—tends to focus on scripts and text-based material, thus clinging “to characteristics that are foundational of classical drama, forsaking the expanded aesthetics that typify postdrama” (34). The chapter highlights how even a performance’s preparatory materials contribute to its form. Part 2 investigates the impact of different social contexts on performance. In Chapter 8, for example, Andrew Friedman considers the curation of avant-garde performance festivals, in which performers may disrupt or exploit one another’s work. In Chapter 9, Ryan Anthony Hatch considers the gallery setting of David Levine’s Habit using Lacanian analysis. Kate Bredeson, in Chapter 10, extends Lehmann’s theory to the contemporary French scene, which was underrepresented in Postdramatic Theatre, by linking it to Bruno Tackels’s concept of “set writing” (148). And, in Chapter 11, Yvonne Hardt considers reperformances from dance archives. The case studies in Part 2 illuminate how postdramatic theatre is not simply shaped by the dramaturgical choices of the artistic team but is also influenced by the broader social context in which it is presented. As with Lehmann’s original book, it is impossible to capture the full range that postdramatic forms may take. However, Postdramatic Theatre and Form offers a strong variety of case-study analyses that will encourage readers to consider more fully the extent to which a multitude of formal elements within a performance’s dramaturgy and its social context work to shape the overall meanings of a piece. In focusing specifically on form, the book extends Lehmann’s ideas into fruitful theoretical territory, simultaneously adding more recent performances to the discussion. The book consequently can ably serve to supplement and renew studies on postdramatic theatre sixteen years after Lehmann’s original publication.