This selection of forty seminal texts from over thirty practitioners and theorists from around the world is pioneering because it encourages performance to be considered across disciplines, rather than presenting an historical survey.

The Twentieth Century Performance Reader is the key introductory text to all types of performance. Extracts from fifty practitioners, critics and theorists from the fields of dance, drama, music, theatre and live art make up an essential sourcebook for students, researchers and practitioners. A bestseller since its publication in 1996, this second edition has been fully updated and includes: New writings by practitioners and theorists Notes about each writer A completely new introduction New cross-references. Organised alphabetically, this reader invites cross-disciplinary comparisons. Each piece is fully supplemented by a contextual summary, detailed cross-references and suggestions for further reading. The editors' introductory essay provides an invaluable analysis of the field, and the definitive bibliography offers an essential reference source.

1. Laurie Anderson, The Speed of Change 2. Adolph
Appia, Actor, Space, Light, Painting 3. Antonin Artaud, Theatre and Cruelty 4. Sally Banes, Terpsichore in Sneakers: Post-modern Dance 5. Eugenio Barba, Words or Presence 6. Roland Barthes, The Grain of the Voice 7. Pina Bausch, Not how people move but what moves them 8. Julian Beck, Acting exercises 9. Walter Benjamin, What is Epic Theater? 10. Rustom Bharucha, Notes on the invention of tradition 11. Augusto Boal, The theatre as discourse 12. Bertrolt Brecht, Short description of a new technique of acting which produces an alienation effect 13. Peter Brook, The Deadly Theatre 14. Trisha Brown, Trisha Brown: An interview 15. John Cage, Four statements on the dance 16. Edward Gordon Craig, The Actor and the Uber-Marionette 17. Merce Cunningham, You have to love dancing to stick to
it 18. Isadora Duncan, The Dancer of the future 19. Hanns Eisler, Some remarks on the situation of the modern composer 20. Philip Glass, Notes on Einstein on the beach 21. Roselee Goldberg, Performance Art from Futurism to the present 22. Jerzy Grotowski, Statement of principles 23. Tatsumi Hijikata, Man, once dead, crawl back!, 24. Doris Humphrey, 'Check list', from The Art
of Making Dances 25. Alfred Jarry, Of the futility of the 'Theatrical' in Theater 26. Tadeusz Kantor, The
Theatre of Death: A Manifesto 27. Elizabeth LeCompte, Interview 28. Robert Lepage, Robert Lepage in discussion with Richard Eyre 29. F.T. Marinetti, The founding and manifesto of futurism 30. John Martin, Characteristics of the modern dance 31. Vsevolod Meyerhold,
First attempts at a stylized theatre 32. Heiner Muller, 19 Answers by Heiner Muller 33. Erwin Psicator, Epic Satire 34. Yvonne Rainer, A quasi survey of some 'minimalist' tendencies in the quantitatively minimal dance activity midst the plethora, or an analysis of trio A 35. Hans Richter, How did Dada begi? 36. Richard Schechner, The five avant gardes or ... or none? 37. Oskar Schlemmer, Man and art figure 38. Wole Soyinka, Theatre in African Traditional Cultures: Survival Patterns 39.
Konstantin Stanislavski, Intonations and pauses 40. Mary Wigman, The philosophy of modern dance 41. Raymond Williams, Argument: Text and Performance 42. Robert Wilson, Interview Chronology of Texts. Bibliography
of Twentieth-Century Performance. Index