What did modern theatre in Russia look like and how did it foreground tradition building and transmission processes? The book challenges conventional historiographical approaches by weaving contemporary theories on cultural transmission into its historical narrative. It argues that processes of transmission – training spaces, acting manuals, photographic evidence, newspaper reports, international networking, informal encounters, cultural memories – contribute to the formation and consolidation of theatre traditions. Through English translations of rare Russian sources, the book...

This is the first collection of primary sources that addresses the amateur theatre produced by the workers in the first decade after the Russian Revolution. Newly translated from the Russian, the essays capture both theoretical articulations on the scene – by luminaries such as Alexander Bogdanov, Platon Kerzhentsev, Valerian Pletnev, Alexander Mgebrov and Valentin Smyshliaev – and the more fleeting descriptions and first-hand accounts of the productions staged, accounts and voices which are typically harder to capture. The essays tell a story of unabashed optimism in the creativity of...