A multidisciplinary examination of the forms taken by withdrawal.

What forms does withdrawal—meaning either that which withdraws itself or which is being withdrawn—take in artistic and cultural practices? What movements does it create or follow in specific contexts, and with what theoretical, material, and political consequences? The contributors to this book address these questions in a variety of writing practices, each focusing on specific scenes.
 
Through interviews, artistic and literary texts, visual contributions, and academic texts, On Withdrawal explores various modalities of withdrawal, ranging from a silencing of critical voices to a political and aesthetic strategy of refusal.

Contributors: Arnika Ahldag, Sofia Bempeza, Lauren Berlant, Kathrin Busch, Helen Cammock, Knut Ebeling, Sebastián Eduardo Dávila, Mutlu Ergün-Hamaz, Stefanie Graefe, Rebecca Hanna John, Ulrike Jordan, Pinar Ögrenci, Pallavi Paul, Thorsten Schneider, Judith Sieber, Diana Taylor, Deniz Utlu, Marivi Véliz, Nele Wulff, and Akram Zaatari

 

The first-ever English translation of this dramatic work by Nikolai Evreinov.

In the 1910s the Russian theater director and theorist Nikolai Evreinov (1879–1953) insisted on the theatricalization of life. Twenty years later, Evreinov, who had left Russia in 1924, was in exile in Paris when Stalin staged three elaborate political show trials in Moscow. Evreinov then meticulously read the transcripts of the trials in the Russian-language press, collected material on Nikolai Bukharin and the other defendants, consulted with experts, and finally wrote a play, his response to the staging of a judicial farce. With this response, he also wanted to rehabilitate his idea of the theatricalization of life. After all, the theatricalization of life does not mean performing false confessions, constructing conspiracies, fabricating facts, or casting hired witnesses. In his theatrical theory, Evreinov was careful not to make the theater of life invisible. His play is therefore not a historical reconstruction, but an imaginary look behind the scenes, in which the Stalinist perpetrators confess to the real crime in the end: the theater. Expertly translated into English for the first time by Zachary King, The Steps of Nemesis brings a fascinating play to a whole new world.