Zeitgeist. Theater and the Spirit of the Age, or From the Ghost in Hamlet to Mr. Spock

Abstract

The article examines the way theater constantly reinvents itself in relation to science and technology, opportunistically employing the means of each era in order to survive and to critique the spirit of the age. Theater emerges as a hybrid space of miracle, in which scenic illusion is born from an ingenious alliance between art and technology. Within the logic of the “Double Great Divide” and the “Constitution” (Latour), theatrical performance becomes a critical instrument that metabolizes social and epistemic transformations, yet preserves its essence through the uniqueness of the living encounter between artists and audience. The post-dramatic (Lehmann) marks the shift from text to event, from drama to technological experiment and shared experience, consolidating theater’s status as a paradoxical form: opportunistic and critical, ephemeral and at the same time atemporal.