2025 Theses Doctoral

Illusion beyond the Fourth Wall: Ludwig Tieck in the Folds of Performance Studies

Tedford, Bryson

Since the historical avantgarde declared war on the fourth wall in the early twentieth century, the notion of theatrical illusion has seemed at odds with any kind of critical performance aesthetics. In this dissertation, I examine how this opposition has shaped the disciplines of theater and performance studies, informing both the division of dramatic from postdramatic theater as well as the critique of representational aesthetics. I illustrate how these dualities inform a particular view of theater history and illusion’s place within it, which I contest by examining the theater writings of Ludwig Tieck (1773-1853).

Associated with German romanticism, Tieck’s plays have long served as exemplary works of a quintessentially unstageable genre. But through my analysis of his historical and dramaturgical essays, I demonstrate that Tieck’s vision of theater simply exceeds the historical frameworks produced by a field grounded in anti-illusion bias. I adopt his play about the performance of a play by the same name, Der gestiefelte Kater (1797), to illustrate how Tieck’s depiction of illusion theater stages an intervention into the discussion of theater around 1800, liberally crossing the fourth wall in order to advance a less restrictive notion of illusion. By locating aesthetic effect in the interplay of perception and imagination, empathy and enchantment, Tieck’s model of illusion advances the mission he assigns to the institution of public theater: overcoming partisanship by revealing the dogmatic dimensions of paratheatrical discourses.