Frank Thomasson | Akateeminen Kirjakauppa

Frank Thomasson provides a pioneering study of theatre in Guyana. Before this work there were only a handful of articles in local journals on this topic. By putting his survey within the context of Guyana as an ethnically diverse society, Thomasson is able to make the case for the importance of the Guyanese theatre, even though very few of its playwrights are known outside the country. In Guyana, theatre has been one of the few means by which ethnic groups have had access to images of the lives of ethnic others or to their concerns. Historically, the study covers the performing arts, some of them related to their religions, which the six peoples brought with them, along with the beginnings of European theatre in nineteenth century Georgetown, the emergence of theatre organised by the new African and Indian Guyanese middle classes in the early twentieth century, to the explosion of an ethnically diverse and socially committed theatre in the 1950s, the period leading up to independence. The struggle to maintain theatre in the economic depression of the post 1980s is applauded.
Thomasson's definition of theatre is appropriately wide, taking in not only the emergence of serious repertory theatre, but also regular public entertainments, and state organised public spectacles. His study explores the national and regional contexts for the encouragement of theatre, from the Booker company's encouragement of theatre groups and competitions on the sugar estates, the role of the leading schools, the National Cultural Centre and Carifesta. The longest section of his history is a more detailed study of the Theatre Guild of Guyana, the longest lived (but presently in limbo) and most 'professional' of the repertory groups. Significant plays are described and there is a very useful bibliography of Guyanese plays and articles on theatre.