Jefferson and Madison Enter Upstage Center: A Dialogue about Living Frameworks for Dead Plays
Laurel Ann Painter
Abstract
Who or what determines how a play is to be performed? Does the determination matter if a play is performed multiple times? Should all of the performances be classified as unique or the same? How does the theatrical tradition respond to these questions, and are the responses adequate for theatre practitioners today? Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the author of this article examine these questions through selected lenses of philosophy of aesthetics (the epistemology and ontology of theatrical performances) and early American political philosophy (Jeffersonian democracy and the Madisonian model). The article is written as a Platonic dialogue with hopes to educate, advocate, and open discussion. A Platonic dialogue does not “create a fictional world for the purposes of telling a story” but is a philosophical discussion among multiple characters within a particular setting. It is framed by first-person narration by one of the dialogue’s characters (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato/#DiaSetCh).
Who or what determines how a play is to be performed? Does the determination matter if a play is performed multiple times? Should all of the performances be classified as unique or the same? How does the theatrical tradition respond to these questions, and are the responses adequate for theatre practitioners today? Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the author of this article examine these questions through selected lenses of philosophy of aesthetics (the epistemology and ontology of theatrical performances) and early American political philosophy (Jeffersonian democracy and the Madisonian model). The article is written as a Platonic dialogue with hopes to educate, advocate, and open discussion. A Platonic dialogue does not “create a fictional world for the purposes of telling a story” but is a philosophical discussion among multiple characters within a particular setting. It is framed by first-person narration by one of the dialogue’s characters (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato/#DiaSetCh).
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