Group Theory
BARTLEBY.
May 18-30, Dec 6-19, 2009
Group Theory probes the psychosonic landscapes of Melville’s classic novella ‘Bartleby, the Scrivener’ in an intimate chamber ritual that transforms the private act of reading into a communal encounter. A strange literary-theatrical hybrid, this ‘Bartleby’ is a performed palimpsest of rereadings, a hyper-lucid window onto a famously difficult text in all its haunting ambiguity and violent comedy.
Conceived and directed by Ben Vershbow
Created with the ensemble:
Jeremy Beck
Daniel Larlham
Craig Pattison
Designed by Ben Vershbow and Dorit Avganim
WORKSHOP SHOWINGS:
Dec 11-14 (Fri-Mon) and Dec 16-19 (Wed-Sat).
All shows 8pm
$10 suggested donation (or pay what you can)
Reservations: monroeedwards1@gmail.com
“When we have read a book or poem so often that we can no longer find any amusement in reading it by ourselves, we can still take pleasure in reading it to a companion. To him it has all the graces of novelty; we enter into the surprise and admiration which it naturally excites in him, but which it is no longer capable of exciting in us; we consider all the ideas which it presents rather in the light in which they appear to him, than in that in which they appear to ourselves, and we are amused by sympathy with his amusement which thus enlivens our own.”
– Adam Smith, A Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)