Pirandello is extremely exciting to teach, precisely because theater in general, and Pirandello’s theater in particular, are particularly productive channels in order to reflect on what it means to interpret a text, and on the crucial role played by the body in the learning experience and in the creation of language and culture. I propose here some short prompts and cues for approaching Pirandello’s Questa sera si recita a soggetto in the classroom. The activities are meant for advanced learners who are able to read and discuss the text in Italian; most of them can be adapted for intermediate students as well, but this would of course require additional time and linguistic support, as this play is quite challenging in terms of both language and content.
Depending on the level of the students and the length of the sequence, students may be assigned different portions of the text to read as assignment. In the following example, I am envisioning a sequence of 5/6 sessions over 2/3 weeks, followed by a final class project in which the students collaboratively write an adaptation and stage a production of the play based on their own adaptation. This should not be considered a lesson plan to follow step by step, as of course classroom interactions are personal and specific to the teachers and students involved; my intention is to provide a few ideas for instructors to consider, experiment with, and make their own through recombination and adaptation to their own syllabi and teaching practice.
What follows is generally inspired by my personal teaching experience with other texts and by several resources for teachers and educators (which are cited in text when quoted directly). I would like to spend a few words on the slippery nature of authorship when it comes to pedagogical principles and activities: these are meant to be shared and are often impossible to track back to an original creator, since they evolve so much in the hands of the diverse educators that implement them. For these reasons, I cannot possibly fully describe all the genealogies that influence my practice as a teacher. What I can do is list a few resources that I find particularly meaningful, and which I encourage interested educators to look into; this list is necessarily extremely reductive, but it should provide the reader with a decent starting point to explore the field: The Habla Center for Language and Culture. The ArtsLiteracy Project at Brown University. The journal Scenario. Bräuer, Gerd, ed. Body and Language: Intercultural Learning Through Drama. Westport, CT: Ablex Pub., 2002. Blau, Sheridan D. The Literature Workshop: Teaching Texts and Their Readers. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2003. Ryan, Colleen, and Nicoletta Marini-Maio, ed. Dramatic Interactions: Teaching Languages, Literatures, and Cultures Through Theater – Theoretical Approaches and Classroom Practices. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2011.
by Anna Santucci (PhD Candidate, Brown University)