To become sovereign, one must be seen as sovereign. In other words, a sovereign must appear—philosophically, politically, and aesthetically—on the stage of power, both to themselves and to others, in order to assume authority. In this sense, sovereignty is a theatrical phenomenon from the very beginning.

This book explores the relationship between theater and sovereignty in modern political theory, philosophy, and performance. Arthur Bradley considers the theatricality of power—its forms, dramas, and iconography—and examines sovereignty’s modes of appearance: thrones, insignia, regalia, ritual, ceremony, spectacle, marvels, fictions, and phantasmagoria. He weaves together political theory and literature, reading figures such as Plato, Aristotle, Montaigne, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Schmitt, Benjamin, Derrida, and Agamben alongside writers including Shakespeare, Cervantes, Schiller, Melville, Valéry, Kafka, Ionesco, and Genet.

Formally inventive and deeply interdisciplinary, Staging Sovereignty offers a surprising and original narrative of political modernity from early modern political theology to the age of neoliberal capitalism.

Formally inventive and deeply interdisciplinary, Staging Sovereignty offers a surprising and original narrative of political modernity from early modern political theology to the age of neoliberal capitalism. * Progressive Geographies *
relentless scholarly and philosophical acumen * Textual Practice *
Arthur Bradley’s exciting new book, Staging Sovereignty, uses the lens of theater to examine the forms and mechanisms through which sovereignty is constituted. * Theory, Culture & Society *
From the coronations of kings to the mass rallies of totalitarian leaders to the inaugurations of presidents, political authority has always depended on its stage-managed modes of appearance. Staging Sovereignty offers a brilliant analysis of the immanence of theatricality to political power and authority in the modern European tradition. In a series of stunning readings of literature, philosophy, and political theory from Hobbes to Agamben, from Shakespeare to Genet, Arthur Bradley brings us behind the curtain of the stagecraft of that special effect called sovereignty. -- Eric Santner, Philip and Ida Romberg Professor in Modern Germanic Studies, University of Chicago
Writing in an extraordinarily innovative style, Arthur Bradley stages an engagement between theatrical space and geopolitical space. Interarticulating political philosophy and the humanities, his treatment of the concept of sovereignty poses challenges to both canonical histories of political thought and contemporary approaches to the politics of aesthetics. -- Michael J. Shapiro, professor emeritus of political science, University of Hawai‘i, Manoa
Why must a sovereign "appear" in order to be sovereign? Bradley’s Staging Sovereignty is a pivotal reflection on the philosophical and political sense of ‘appearance’ as the center of a particular and common sensible experience. Legitimacy, recognition, artistic, symbolic, and ritualistic representability are at the core of this impressive journey through literature, art history, theater, philosophy, and political theory. -- Elettra Stimilli, professor of theoretical philosophy, Sapienza University of Rome
Arthur Bradley’s Staging Sovereignty offers a remarkably incisive and erudite interpretation of the ways in which theoretical and theatrical representations interact to produce different forms of power relations. From Plato’s cave to Genet’s Balcony and Peter Brook’s ‘empty space,’ Bradley convincingly demonstrates how spatial deployment, ‘staging,’ can be even more significant, politically, theoretically, and theatrically, than today’s ubiquitous celebration of ‘narrative’ would suggest. -- Samuel Weber, Avalon Foundation Professor of Humanities, Northwestern University

Arthur Bradley is professor of comparative literature at Lancaster University. His most recent book is Unbearable Life: A Genealogy of Political Erasure (Columbia, 2019).