ISSN : 2663-2187

SEMIOTICS OF NORDIC ELEMENT AS A THEATRICAL METAPHOR: AN INQUIRY INTO THE ‘SPATIALIZED AESTHETICS’ OF JON FOSSE AND CECILIE LOVEID

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Abstract

The Nordic Element, a multi-levelled concept, constitutes the metaphysics of Scandinavian life. As a signifier of the most dense sign system of theatre, this element enriches the semiosis of Norwegian theatre. This metaphysical element provides a new paradigm for understanding the prevalent patterns of postmodern theatrics of Norwegian drama. The ‘landscape dramaturgy’ through a ‘spatialized aesthetics’ has made it as one of the constituent elements of theatre that produces new structures of performance. Jon Fosse and Cecilie Loveid, the two famous contemporary playwrights of Norway, may be considered as pioneers of this new‘spatialized aesthetics’ who through an inspired mise-en-scene transform the Nordic landscape into a mental event. This new spatialized dramaturgy helps them to achieve an alternative Norwegian theatrical canon. In this paper, I am mapping out the aesthetic strategies utilized by these two playwrights to make Nordic element as a theatrical metaphor in the realm of theatrical sign system. This comparative study traces the postmodern treatment of psychology, structure and landscape which account for the similar patterns of staging geographic imagination. The study finally, explores the metaphysics of Nordic element as a theatrical metaphor which performs the Nordic identity in the postmodern framework of a ‘spatialized aesthetics’

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