1979 and All That: Periodization in Postwar British Theatre History

2006 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa Dana Gibson
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Economic Policies ◽  
Theatre History ◽  
Royal Court ◽  
Margaret Thatcher ◽  
Look Back ◽  
Royal Court Theatre ◽  
The Revolution

Until recently, postwar British theatre history was shaped and bounded by a very stable periodization that located its origin in the premiere of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger at the Royal Court Theatre on 8 May 1956. As the story goes, the new kind of theatre ushered in by the Revolution of 1956 at the Royal Court grew more politicized with a second revolution, the birth of the alternative, or Fringe, theatre in 1968. Ultimately that revolutionary fervor was crushed by the conservative cultural and economic policies of Margaret Thatcher, who was elected prime minister in 1979. Contained within this history are many elements not directly related to the 1956|1968|1979 period markers; however this revolution model and its tripartite division of the era affected the conceptualization and positioning of all events within postwar theatre history.

scholarly journals Losing the Discursive Battle but Winning the Ideological War: Who Holds Thatcherite Values Now?

2021 ◽  
pp. 003232172098670
Author(s):  
Stephen Farrall ◽  
Emily Gray ◽  
Phil Mike Jones ◽  
Colin Hay
Keyword(s):  
Survey Data ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Public Attitudes ◽  
New Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Margaret Thatcher ◽  
The Uk

In what ways, if at all, do past ideologies shape the values of subsequent generations of citizens? Are public attitudes in one period shaped by the discourses and constructions of an earlier generation of political leaders? Using Thatcherism – one variant of the political New Right of the 1980s – as the object of our enquiries, this article explores the extent to which an attitudinal legacy is detectable among the citizens of the UK some 40 years after Margaret Thatcher first became Prime Minister. Our article, drawing on survey data collected in early 2019 (n = 5781), finds that younger generations express and seemingly embrace key tenets of her and her governments’ philosophies. Yet at the same time, they are keen to describe her government’s policies as having ‘gone too far’. Our contribution throws further light on the complex and often covert character of attitudinal legacies. One reading of the data suggests that younger generations do not attribute the broadly Thatcherite values that they hold to Thatcher or Thatcherism since they were socialised politically after such values had become normalised.

India, Indira and After

1985 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. J. Nossiter
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Greek Tragedy ◽  
Soap Opera ◽  
Margaret Thatcher ◽  
Political Management ◽  
Fair Assessment ◽  
Western Media

IN THE WESTERN MEDIA RECENT EVENTS IN INDIA HAVE OFTEN been trivialized by comparison with a soap opera called Dynasty. A more appropriate analogy would be the Greek tragedy: the rejection of Mrs Gandhi at the polls in 1977; her sweeping return to power in 1980; the death of her heir apparent, Sanjay, in 1980; the invasion of the Golden Temple in June 1984; and on 31 October her assassination. Greatness, tragedy, hubris and nemesis are all there.A fair assessment of Mrs Indira Gandhi's contribution to her country is far from easy, not least because she was regally enigmatic. Her friendships ranged from Michael Foot to Margaret Thatcher. Her presence was formidable yet both to old and non-political family friends she was a loving sister or aunt. Alone among Indian politicians she drew massive crowds and, Sikhs apart, her death was mourned by her opponents as much as her supporters. Indira had not expected to enter politics but by acting as her widowed father Pandit Nehru's hostess and confidante, and, in the late 1950s, as Congress General Secreta , she gained an invaluable apprenticeship in the techniques of political management and the art of statecraft. When Nehru's immediate successor as Indian Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri, died after less than two years in office, Congress chiefs found it easier to nominate Nehru's daughter as their leader than to agree on one of their own number, particularly since they all underestimated her strength of character and purpose.

4. ‘Puritan’

2020 ◽  
pp. 54-69
Author(s):  
Christopher Wixson
Keyword(s):  
Royal Court ◽  
Creative Evolution ◽  
Life Force ◽  
Royal Court Theatre

‘Puritan’ focuses on George Bernard Shaw’s moulding of stage comedy to dramatize the workings of his emerging religion, christened ‘Creative Evolution’ in 1916. Under the aegis of the Life Force, Shaw’s ambition to create a ‘big book of devotion for modern people’ was fortified by an evangelism that would yoke all of his varied writings. The chapter then looks at Shaw’s Man and Superman (1901–2), which premiered at the Royal Court Theatre. Two other plays by Shaw—John Bull's Other Island (1904) and Major Barbara (1905)—continue his enquiry into how the institutions of worldly power can best be of service to the Life Force.

Vectia, Man-Made Censorship, and the Drama of Marie Stopes

2005 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-102
Author(s):  
Esther Beth Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Sex Education ◽  
Birth Control ◽  
Royal Court ◽  
Royal Court Theatre ◽  
Selling Sex

In the 1920s, the Royal Court Theatre still enjoyed the reputation earned earlier in the century by Harley Granville Barker and John Vedrenne, yet its daily fare was not remarkably distinctive from other West End theatres. In that context, an aspiring playwright was contracted to write a play for the Court's 1923 season. The playwright happened to be Marie Stopes, (in)famous author of the best-selling sex-education and birth-control manual Married Love. “Contracted” is the word Stopes uses. It could also be speculated that, in a year when the Court's five main undertakings had as many as five different producers and three different managers, the theatre was made available to Stopes, a celebrity on the London scene who had her own backing.

Thatcherism: An Historical Perspective

1999 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 17-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. H. H. Green
Keyword(s):  
Political Ideology ◽  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Conservative Party ◽  
The Political ◽  
British Politics ◽  
Policy Agenda ◽  
Margaret Thatcher ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Election Manifesto

Margaret Thatcher resigned as Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative party in November 1990, but both she and the political ideology to which her name has been appended continue to fascinate pundits and scholars. Indeed, since Thatcher's resignation in November 1990, curiosity about her political legacy has, if anything, increased, fuelled in part by the memoirs produced by the ex-premier herself and a large number of her one-time Cabinet colleagues. Since the early 1980s the bulk of work that has appeared on Thatcherism has been dominated either by what one might describe as the ‘higher journalism’ or by political science scholarship, both of which have been most exercised by the questions of what Thatcherism was and where it took British politics and society. In this essay I want to look at Thatcherism from an historical perspective and thus ask a different question, namely where did Thatcherism, and in particular the political economy of Thatcherism, come from?Given that Margaret Thatcher became leader of the Conservative party in 1975 this might seem a logical starting-point from which to track Thatcherism's origins. Some have argued, however, that Thatcher's election in itself was of little importance, in that the Conservative party's leadership contest in 1975 was a competition not to be Edward Heath, and that Thatcher won because she was more obviously not Edward Heath than anyone else. This emphasis on the personal aspects of the leadership issue necessarily plays down any ideological significance of Thatcher's victory, a point often reinforced by reference to the fact that key elements of the policy agenda that came to be associated with Thatcherism, notably privatisation, were by no means clearly articulated in the late 1970s and did not appear in the Conservative Election Manifesto of 1979.

Ruling Islamists set to win Morocco local elections

2015 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil Service ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Muslim Brotherhood ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Working Relationship ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Royal Court ◽  
Gulf States ◽  
The Muslim Brotherhood ◽  
Political Backlash

Significance King Mohammed VI has committed forces to the Saudi-led coalition conducing operations in Yemen to reinforce the alliance with Gulf states. It may be because of these ties that Morocco's Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD) survived the regional political backlash against the Muslim Brotherhood -- with which the PJD has some parallels, but no formal links. Prime Minister and PJD leader Abdelilah Benkirane has developed a close working relationship with King Mohammed and the royal court. With the economy performing well, Benkirane's chances of prolonging his mandate look promising. Impacts Local elections will signal the level of popular support for the PJD. If Benkirane retains the premiership post-2016, he may seek a more prominent role for the PJD -- in cabinet and the civil service. This could bring him into conflict with the king.

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