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Life’s but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act V, Scene V, lines 17–28

The Manager [furious]... [Turning to the CHARACTERS.] Who are you, please? What do you want?
The Father [coming forward a little, followed by the others who seem embarrassed]. As a matter of fact... we have come here in search of an author...
The Manager [half angry, half amazed]. An author? What author?
The Father. Any author, sir.
The Manager. But there's no author here. We are not rehearsing a new piece.
The Step-Daughter [vivaciously].So much the better, so much the better! We can be your new piece.

Luigi Pirandello, Six characters in search of an author, Act 1

McDermott & Aron 1978 "Pirandello in the classroom: On the possibility of equal educational opportunity in American culture." in Futures of education. Edited by M. Reynolds. Council on Exceptional Children. pp. 41-64.

 

Given some human beings, assembled, while working at surviving, at some moments in their history, given resources (ecology, etc.), how are "we" (human beings, poets, anthropologists) going to talk about this?

  1. Variations on the theater metaphor
    • the most common
      • author
      • act
      • actor
      • stage
      • role
      • set(ting)?
    • and then
      • actant
      • performance
      • animation
    • expansions (that may be metaphors in other domains/stages)?
      • direction
      • script
      • production
      • interpretation
      • improvisation
  2. Other metaphors ?
    • dance (Yeats)
    • flowing like water? (with thanks to Esther Fan and Bruce Lee)
  3. no metaphor?
    • "doing"? (with assembled others?)