CV, Ioanna PapageorgiouΒιογραφικό Ιωάννας Παπαγεωργίου

Name: Ioanna Papageorgiou Place of birth: Chalkidiki,Greece Assistant Professor – Department of Theatre Studies  – Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences – University of Patras, Greece RESEARCH INTERESTS: 18th– and 19th-Century British Theatre, Relationship between Modern Greek and European Theatre, Theatre Star System, Greek Shadow Theatre, Boulevard Comedy, Women’s Studies. ERASMUS+  Coordinator of the Department of Theatre Studies   CONTACT: e-mail: ipapag@upatras.gr Tel. 0030 2610 969916 Skype: ioannavrastama

QUALIFICATIONS

  • 1995-2002 Ph.D. in Drama, Goldsmiths College, University of London Subject of the thesis: The Origins of the Star Phenomenon: Stars and the Starring System in the Eighteenth-Century British Theatre. The thesis was supervised by Professor Simon Shepherd and examined by Professors Linda Fitzsimmons and Leonee Ormond.
  • 1989-1994: MA in Theatre Studies University of Crete, Greece
  • 1984-1988: BA in Greek Literature, University of Crete

RESEARCH PRΟJECTS – GREEK SHADOW THEATRE

 

2010- 2013 Principal investigator in the project The Repertory of Greek Shadow Theatre in Patras during the Interwar Period (1922-1940) funded by The Research Committee, Program C. Carathéodory, University of Patras
1988-1994 Research assistant of a project on Modern Greek Theatre at the Institute for Mediterranean Studies (Crete, Greece) [Link]

  PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS: STR Society for Theatre Research

PUBLICATIONS

(in English)

  1. ‘Adelaide Ristori’s tour of the East Mediterranean (1864-1865) and the discourse on the formation of Modern Greek Theatre’. Theatre Research International, Vol. 33, No. 2 (July 2008), pp. 161-175.
  2.  ‘Enchanting evil: English romantic criticism on Edmund Kean’s interpretation of Richard III and Schiller’s theory on the immoral characters in art’. Restoration and Eighteenth- Century Theatre Research, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Summer 2008), pp. 19-33.
  3.  ‘Oscar Wilde’s Salomé on the Stage of Athens (1908-1925)’. The Wildean, No. 36 (Jan. 2010), pp. 77-96.
  4. ‘The mountain-bandits of the Hellenic shadow theatre of Karaghiozis: Criminals or heroes?’. Popular Entertainment Studies (University of Newcastle, Australia), vol. 5, No. 2 (Sept. 2014), pp. 79-102.  https://novaojs.newcastle.edu.au/ojs/index.php/pes/article/view/125
  5. ‘Traditional oral culture meets written popular drama: The Greek shadow theatre puppeteer Vasilaros’.  Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies. Vol. 39, No. 1 (Μarch 2015), pp. 117-137

PUBLICATIONS

(in Greek)

  •  Book: -European Theatre from the 17th to 19th centuries (from Classicism to Romanticism), Patras: University of Patras Press, 2011.
  • Papers:
  1. ‘Roidis and Octave Feuillet: “Advice to future husbands”’, per. Palimpsiston, 9/10 (Dec. 1989-June 1990), pp. 103-107.
  2. ‘The Actor Leonidas Capellos: His Contribution to the Theatrical Life of [the island of] Syros and to the Forming of Modern Greek Theatre’. Papers Read in a Symposium on [the actress] Marika Kotopouli and the Theatre of Syros in August 1994. Athens: National Research Institute, 1996, pp. 203-215.
  3. ‘The Impact of European Ideological Movements on Nikos Kazantzakis’ play “The Sacrifice”’. The Greek Theatre from the 17th to the 20th Centuries. Papers Read in the First Conference on Greek Theatre Studies in December 1998. Athens: Ergo Publications and Department of Theatre Studies, University of Athens, 2002, pp. 235-242.
  4. ‘The Integration of Boulevard Comedy in the Athenian Stage and the Role of the Suburban Theatre of Neapolis, 1899-1902’, The Influence of European Theatre on Modern Greek Theatre. Papers Read in the Second Conference on Greek Theatre Studies in April 2002. Athens: Ergo Publications and Department of Theatre Studies, University of Athens, 2004, pp. 251-264.
  5.  ‘The Digressive Heroines of Melodrama and Their Contribution to the Discourse on Women (Constantinople and Smyrna, 1871-1879), ΖητήματαΙστορίαςτουΝεοελληνικούΘεάτρου. Μελέτες αφιερωμένες στον Δημήτρη Σπάθη, επιμ. Νικηφόρος Παπανδρέου – Έφη Βαφειάδη, Πανεπιστημιακές Εκδόσεις Κρήτης, Ηράκλειο, 2007, σσ. 135-151.
  6. ‘The Dramatic Heroes in Ioannis Zambelios Dramas’, Παράδοση και εκσυγχρονισμός στο Νεοελληνικό θέατρο. Πρακτικά του Γ΄ Πανελλήνιου Θεατρολογικού Συνέδριου Ρέθυμνο 23-26 Οκτωβρίου 2008. Αφιερωμένο στον Θόδωρο Χατζηπανταζή, επιμ. Αντώνης Γλυτζουρής, Κωνσταντίνα Γεωργιάδη, Ηράκλειο, Πανεπιστημιακές Εκδόσεις Κρήτης, 2010, σσ. 25-35.
  7. ‘Female Identity in the Hellenic Shadow Theatre during the Interwar Period (1918-1940): The Demand of Sexual Emancipation’, Paper read in the proceedings of the 4th European Congress of Modern Greek Studies (Granada, 9-12 September 2010) http://www.eens.org/EENS_congresses/2010/Papageorgiou_Ioanna.pdf
  8. ‘Sophocles’  Oedipus Rex  in Hellenic Shadow Theatre’ Logeion,Vol. II (2012), pp. 229-54.  http://www.logeion.upatras.gr/
  9. ‘From the Cosmopolitan Humanism to Patriotic Nationalism and the Questioning of Feudal Order. Petros Katsaitis’ The Lament of Peloponnese and Ifigenia’, Kefalliniaka Chronika, Vol. 15 (2014), pp. 411-430
  10. ‘The Shadow-Theatre Puppeteer Vasilaros and His “Playwriting”‘Για μία επιστημονική προσέγγιση του Καραγκιόζη. Πρακτικά ημερίδας αφιερωμένης στους καθηγητές Θόδωρο Χατζηπανταζή και Γρηγόρη Σηφάκη, επιμ. Κωνσταντίνα Γεωργιάδη, Πανεπιστημιακές Εκδόσεις Κρήτης, Ηράκλειο, 2015, pp. 11-129.
  11. “”Ttravel Adventures of Greek Shadow Theatre: Compositional Process of the Performances”, Kathedra, 2 (April 2016), issue dedicated to the International Conferance Greek Traditional Culture in European Context (5-8 April 2016)”, State University of Lomonosof, Moscow, Department of Byzantine and Modern Greek Philology, Society of Modern Greek Studies, Moscow, 2016, pp. 153-163. https://www.academia.edu/24332685/%CE%97_%CE%B4%CE%B9%CE%B1%CE%B4%CE%B9%CE%BA%CE%B1%CF%83%CE%AF%CE%B1_%CE%B4%CE%B7%CE%BC%CE%B9%CE%BF%CF%85%CF%81%CE%B3%CE%AF%CE%B1%CF%82_%CF%84%CF%89%CE%BD_%CF%84%CE%B1%CE%BE%CE%B9%CE%B4%CE%B9%CF%89%CF%84%CE%B9%CE%BA%CF%8E%CE%BD_%CF%80%CE%B5%CF%81%CE%B9%CF%80%CE%B5%CF%84%CE%B5%CE%B9%CF%8E%CE%BD_%CF%84%CE%BF%CF%85_%CE%BA%CE%B1%CF%81%CE%B1%CE%B3%CE%BA%CE%B9%CF%8C%CE%B6%CE%B7

Article summaries

‘Adelaide Ristori’s tour of the East Mediterranean (1864-1865) and the discourse on the formation of Modern Greek Theatre’. Theatre Research International, Vol. 33, No. 2 (July 2008), pp. 161-175

  • The new aesthetic experience offered by the Italian diva to the Hellenic upper classes of the Orient was filtered through their broader concerns related to social and national visions. Adelaide Ristori was received as a representative of Western culture, which at that time bore the double significance of social progress and economic exploitation in the Near East. For a minority of commentators, she was one more European speculator who was taking advantage of the supposed treasures of the East. For the supporters of westernization, however, the performances and her personality raised issues which had been discussed in Western Europe a long time previously, regarding the power of the theatre to shape national and social conscience and the relationship between art and material culture.

‘Enchanting evil: English romantic criticism on Edmund Kean’s interpretation of Richard III and Schiller’s theory on the immoral characters in art’. Restoration and Eighteenth- Century Theatre Research, Vol. 23, No. 1 (Summer 2008), pp. 19-33.

  • The essay investigates a version of the captivating evil of Romanticism, in Edmund Kean‟s representation of Richard III. More specifically, it examines the way Kean’s interpretation of the stage hero was perceived by a group of critics and commentators whose writings form a part of what we may call the English Romantic theatre criticism of the early nineteenth century. This group includes William Hazlitt, Thomas Barnes, John Hamilton Reynolds, an anonymous critic of The New Monthly Magazine, and the diarist Henry Crabb Robinson. The positive reaction of those writers toward Kean’s novel interpretation presents many affinities with Friedrich Schiller’s theory about immoral characters in art. Comparing these two parallels in England and Germany, the essay draws attention to both their common aspects and their differentiations regarding the aesthetics of evil. Furthermore, it traces in Kean‟s interpretations and in the corresponding criticism certain points of departure from the eighteenth-century English tradition of dramatic character.

‘Oscar Wilde’s Salomé on the Stage of Athens (1908-1925)’. The Wildean, No. 36 (Jan. 2010), pp. 77-96.

  • In 1906, the Greek writer Nikolaos Poriotis translated Oscar Wilde’s Salomé.  It was the first play by Wilde to be translated into Greek, and was published in the periodical Panathinaia in 1907.8  In the following year, Thomas Oikonomou, the first stage director of the Greek theatre, undertook the play’s stage representation.  He was followed much later by his pupil Marika Kotopouli in 1922, and then by the playwright and journalist Spyros Melas in 1925.  The article examines those three productions of Salomé, and will attempts an analysis of the factors that prompted its selection, as well as an interpretation of the performances styles, in relation to both the specific aims of the creators and the wider social and cultural framework.
‘Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex in the Hellenic Shadow Theatre’, Logeion, Vol. 2, pp. 229-254.
  • This paper examines three adaptations of Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex for the Modern Greek shadow theatre of Karaghiozis created by the puppeteers Vassilaros (1930, 1973), Kouzaros (1937-38), and Panagiotis Michopoulos (around 1951). Despite the inherent difficulties in studying written transcriptions of works of oral tradition, it attempts to unravel some crucial issues related to the adaptation of texts drawn from the learned tradition to an oral form of art. Initially, the paper investigates the puppeteers’ motives in selecting the specific tragedy. Subsequently, it explores the issue of the conformity of the adaptations to the poetics and worldview of Modern Greek shadow theatre. The established structure of the original compelled the puppeteers to sacrifice many conventions of their genre, especially with regard to patterns of plot and type-characters. However the plot of the myth itself, involving the concepts of fate, honour and family, provided the puppeteers with a chance to adopt a perspective closer to their own tradition and to deviate signifi­cantly from the original. On the whole, the singular approach of the subject by each artist indicates that they tended to work outside the collective tradition of the art form of Karaghiozis. The papers on Karaghiozis are part of a research project in progress on the shadow theatre of the city of Patras, Greece, during the interwar period. The project is financed by the Research Committee, University of Patras.
‘The mountain-bandits of the Hellenic shadow theatre of Karaghiozis: Criminals or heroes?’. Popular Entertainment Studies (University of Newcastle, Australia), vol. 5, No. 2 (Sept. 2014), pp. 79-102.
  • From the time of the legendary mountain bandit Davelis in the 1850s (and almost since the foundation of the modern Hellenic state in 1828), the fate of the modern Hellenic State has been marked either by a weakness to meet with the citizens’ expectations or, in order to quieten subsequent reactions, by a series of oppressive measures, including dictatorships. This policy would unavoidably instigate some kind of aggressive retaliation in the form of banditry. Karaghiozis, a form of traditional shadow theatre that articulated the worldview of the lower social strata for more than half a century (1890-1960), became a vehicle through which artists and spectators communicated their own standpoint towards banditry and violent retaliation. It formulated a special category of plays that dramatised actual or fictitious bandits. In the first place, that group of plays may be regarded as an indication of the spectators’ fascination with bandits or as a surrogate experience for the desire to take vengeance brought about by their misery. However, as it gradually developed its own poetics, it revealed a capacity for discrimination by establishing a series of codes regarding acceptable and objectionable banditry. Ioanna Papageorgiou is Assistant Professor in the Department of Theatre Studies at the University of Patras in Greece
‘Traditional oral culture meets written popular drama: The Greek shadow theatre puppeteer Vasilaros’.Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies. Vol. 39, No. 1 (Μarch 2015), pp. 117-137
  • In contrast with the majority of his illiterate fellow players, the shadow theatre puppeteer Vasilaros (Βασίλειος Ανδρικόπουλος, 1899-1979) was relatively well-educated, an attribute that allowed him to have immediate access to written sources. Facing a hard competition from contemporary theatre and cinema, he attempted to update his repertory by adapting – among other written sources – popular plays with strong bourgeois ethics such as the melodramas The Two Sergeants by Baudoin D’Aubigny and August Mailliard (1931) Femme X by Alexandre Bisson (1937), and The Two Orphans by Adolphe D’Ennery (1944). However the aesthetics and ethics of melodrama differed significantly from the oral theatre of Karaghiozis. Karaghiozis’ plays had been by tradition structured around a loose plot with standard types and, ideologically, its carnivalesque humour paid no respect to prevalent moral values but to God and fatherland. Elements of bourgeois aesthetics and morals had permeated Karaghiozis since it acquired Hellenic identity in the 1890s. Nevertheless, the adaptation of melodramas such as those mentioned above indicates that by the mid-1930s the borders between traditional oral art and mainstream popular written tradition had been considerably blurred. Vasilaros’ activity actually brought the oral tradition of his art to its limits, that is, to the verge with popular middle-class culture. The paper, through the analysis of Vasilaros’ melodramas, will examine the features of the convergence between the two traditions in terms of dramatic structure and ideology.

 

  •  “Ttravel Adventures of Greek Shadow Theatre: Compositional Process of the Performances”, Kathedra, 2 (April 2016), pp. 153-163 [in Greek]

    Expanding the compositional model that G. Sifakis has applied on Karaghiozis’ performances (based on V. Propp’s analysis of Russian fairy tales), the paper suggests a syntagmatic pattern of fifteen functions. The proposed pattern delineates the structure of a series of Karaghiozis’ comedies that could be labelled as “travel adventures”. Without being restrictive the model was helpful in the creation of new performances.

 

Ph.D. SummaryThe Origins of the Star Phenomenon: Stars and the Starring System in the Eighteenth-Century British Theatre.
Thesis supervised by Professor Simon Shepherd and examined by Professors Linda Fitzsimmons and Leonee Ormond The word ‘star’ normally denotes well-known performers in the area of entertainment and the arts, such as the theatre, cinema, music, opera and dance. During the past few decades, the same word has also been assigned to popular sports players. Examining these performers and athletes as a group functioning in the wider cultural context, one could say that they are part of the more comprehensive category of ‘celebrities’. The latter is used to signify individuals, who, owing to the widespread impact of the media, and because of their public position in economics, politics, arts, sports and fashion, become objects of common interest to large sections of people at a national or international level. Clearly, the issues of the star and the celebrity are too extensive to become the subject of a single essay. For this reason, this thesis has confined itself to the study of the theatre star-performer in the eighteenth-century British theatre, approaching only the periphery of the general issue of stars. Moreover, any remarks related to the hyper-category of ‘celebrity’ are only occasional because it is a fairly unexplored area and it lacks conclusive studies which could be used in a specific account such as the present one. Celebrated personalities in the area of performing arts initially appeared in the opera. A century before the emergence of theatrical stars, well-known castrati travelled all around Europe causing hysterical reactions among the ladies of the aristocracy. They were worshipped by the nobility, and, to a limited extent, were popular even among the lower classes of Italy. They were probably the first performing stars, but their ‘stardom’ remained quite ambiguous due to their sexual indeterminacy. By the beginning of the eighteenth century they had to share their privileged status with the first famous prima donnas. Their impact was closely inter-linked with the cultural models of the aristocracy, and it has to be examined in terms of both commercialism and dependence on private patronage. Taking the period of Enlightenment as the starting point of the modern era, the dramatic star as a distinct social phenomenon is chiefly the product of the modern world. Stars emerged in Britain earlier than in other countries, as a result of particular conditions that favoured this artistic and social mode. The American theatre presented its first stars, most of whom were imported from Europe, at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Although, France, the cultural centre of Europe at the time, produced exceptional performers such as Talma, Mlle Duchenois and Fleury, in practice it suppressed their star-activities through the restraints of a strong tradition and a strict state regulation of the spoken drama. The first acknowledged star who defied the hierarchy of seniority in the Comédie Française is supposed to have been Rachel (career 1838-58), but the matter requires closer examination. This study covers a historical area which has not so far become the subject of thorough research despite its theoretical and social significance. Stars, and more generally, celebrities have attracted the interest of scholars mainly for their activity in more recent times; the period of their emergence has almost been ignored. The principal objective of the thesis is to examine the origins of the star phenomenon in Britain and to construct a coherent interpretation that seeks to explain it both as a professional practice in theatre and as a historical event, the roots of which extend into different artistic and social conditions. As well as uncovering the conditions which generated or favoured the advent of star personalities in theatre, this project also ventures to examine the development of what could be termed ‘star-status’ in the eighteenth century. The latter is approached in its relationship with wider social and theatrical changes and in its specific impact on the production and interpretation of the performance. At that point, the research concerned mainly with the female stars of the period because they illustrate more distinctively the fragile social status of their peers. A central issue in the analysis is the relationship between the star and the spectator inside and outside the theatre. The first part of the thesis deals with the events which confirm the emergence and the professional consolidation of stars during the period 1756-1775. Here, the emphasis lies on the economic terms of the consolidation and on what nineteenth-century theatrical practice termed as ‘starring engagements’ of the London players in the provinces. The research begins by examining the economic rewards of the leading players at the beginning of the century aiming to elucidate the extraordinary economic achievements of the stars later on in the same century. The second section explores the cultural and theatrical circumstances which caused, or at least favoured, the emergence of the star phenomenon in Britain. The star as a mode of expression and communication at the social and individual level is an extremely complicated and diversified historical development. Initially, the study tries to establish that the main determining factor for their emergence was the development of subjectivism in perception. Subjectivism constitutes an almost generic characteristic of modern Western thinking and has generated a specific mode through which people associate themselves with the world. This mode was marked by an increased stress on the human subject and its experience and has determined the social significance of public personalities. The increasing interest of the eighteenth-century audience in the principal characters of a play, and the development of a specific manner of viewing the performance, are also correlated to these issues and to the advent of stars. Furthermore, the second part of the thesis investigates the impact of some other historical events on the establishment of the phenomenon. These include the innovations in acting style, the shift of the spectator’s interest from the text to the performer, the improvements in the social and artistic status of the player, the creation of a national network of communication and ideology and the dominance of the middle-class world view. Regarding the role of economics in the formation of the phenomenon, an issue closely related to middle-class ideology, the project investigates only the category of commodities. The economic factor did not actually determine the phenomenon in its appearance, but it undoubtedly conditioned the structure it subsequently obtained in the Hollywood industry. The third part concentrates on the peculiar character of star-status in the commencement of the phenomenon, using as a case study the undisputed tragic star of the mid-century, Susannah Maria Cibber. The thesis outlines the course of the actress to star-status, examining the promotional methods applied in her case, her acting style and the repertory choices. Finally, it explores the impact of her public and private persona on the interpretation of the performance by the spectator.