This book contains the proceedings of a symposium that took place in Melbourne in September 2006. Its focus is on theatre at the intersection of culture and politics during and after German reunification and the evolution of the Berlin Republic. The book considers how canonical and new theatrical works, including those performed at the renowned former East German theatres – the Deutsches Theater, the Volksbühne and the Berliner Ensemble – resonated with reunification. Topics include the dynamics of theatrical performance, the emergent performative identities, the new alliances between theatre and the world, the re-engagement with history and the shifting perspectives of nationalism, transnationalisation and globalisation. These matters acquire renewed focus with the approach of the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the wall in 2009. The book is the first to offer English-speaking readers a collection of essays on the key theatrical productions of this dynamic period of cultural and political change. Underlying the collection is a reaffirmation of the continuing relevance of theatre to events in the public sphere.

The Editor: Denise Varney is a Senior Lecturer in Theatre Studies in the School of Culture and Communication at the University of Melbourne. She is the co-author with Rachel Fensham of The Dolls’ Revolution: Australian Theatre and Cultural Imagination (Melbourne, 2005) and has published widely on Australian theatre, Brechtian and contemporary German theatre and feminist theatre.