Poetics of Dance

A scholar of widespread international recognition, Gabriele Brandstetter is Professor for Theatre and Dance Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin, where she founded and directs the Centre for Movement Studies. She is also co-director of the International Research Center "Interweaving Performance Cultures". She is author of three scholarly books and editor or co-editor of ten scholarly books on dance and movement.

• Introduction ; Part I: Pathos Formulas. Body-Image and Danced Figuration ; 1. Dance in the Museum: Body and Memory ; 2. Patterns of Femininity and the Body-Image of Dance ; 3. Delirium of Movement and Trance Dance ; 4. The Dancer as Muse ; Part II: Topos Formulas. Dance Movement and Figuration of Space ; 1. Dance Costume and Movement Space: Spatial Formulas and their Metamorphoses into Fabric ; 2. Dance-Text. Transformations of Choreography ; 3. Aerodance. Futurist Dance and Aviation ; 4. Writing Dance and Spatial Writing. Between Alphabet and Topos Formula ; 5. Interruption Intermediality and Disjunction in the Movement Concepts of Avant-garde Dance and Theater ; Conclusion ; Bibliography ; Index

Poetics of Dance presents a foundational and original way of thinking about dance while also offering a radical re-evaluation of early twentieth century modernism across dance, literature, theater, and the visual arts. Brandstetter's brilliantly conceived approach to dance analysis foregrounds the intertextual connections among allied cultural practices in new ways through a theory of meaning-making based in spatial and psychic patterning. An invaluable contribution to the field of dance studies, this work will significantly expand our understanding of dance as part of culture and history.