Sarah Kane’s Phaedra’s Love

Abstract Chapter 1 explores the relationship between the classics, the postdramatic, and the so-called ‘in-yer-face’ theatre movement of Britain in the 1990s, taking the 1996 première production of Sarah Kane’s Phaedra’s Love as a paradigmatic example. Kane’s sparse, tightly woven script interrogated the Senecan themes of masculinity, sexuality, violence, and voyeurism; in performance, these themes were combined with a range of proto-postdramatic techniques to highlight their contemporary socio-political relevance. I suggest that the ‘in-yer-face’ movement can be viewed as a transitional period representing the gradual introduction of postdramatic techniques into British theatres. As a formative fusion of Greco-Roman tragedy and postdramatic theatre, Phaedra’s Love indicated the efficacious potential of this mode of performance to make powerful socio-political statements that have a visceral impact upon their audience.