What is a dramaturg? What is dramaturgy? What are the political implications for the way that plays produce meaning in performance?
Over the last decade, the role of the dramaturg has become more common in the theatrical process, but it is still a new term for many theatre-goers. Theatre & Dramaturgy offers a working definition of what dramaturgy means, and asks how understanding theatre from the perspective of dramaturgy can help us understand the world around us.

This concise study examines how western histories and practices of theatre have functioned to achieve their effects, through understanding dramaturgy as the arrangement or structure of the work in time and space - both at the fictional level and in relation to performance. Exploring the relationship between plays and their meaning in production, this guide focuses on how understanding dramaturgy is critical to understanding how plays achieve their effects.

Zoë Svendsen is a director and dramaturg who has created intercultural theatre, performance and installation projects exploring contemporary political contexts of climate crisis and consumer capitalism, nationally and internationally. Zoë has worked as dramaturg at the Globe and Sam Wanamaker theatres, the National Theatre, the Young Vic and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Zoë lectures on dramaturgy at the University of Cambridge.