A Mystery of Liturgy or a Theatrical Imitatio? A Liturgical Perspective in Studies of Medieval Dramatizations

Abstract

It was first of all literature and theatre historians who were the authors of studies and articles concerning liturgical dramatisations. However, such an approach is not complete; only an inter-disciplinary approach gives a full vision. Attention should be paid to at least a few other aspects, the most important of which seems to be liturgy. It turns out that knowledge of widely understood liturgy in numerous cases modifies our understanding of the texts of dramatisations to a considerable degree. They do not have to be understood as just a stage on the way to a complete theatrical spectacle. They can be received as texts with a completely different (from later dramatic forms) character; as ones that have their own specificity and are built by a somewhat different set of rules. The article is an attempt at seeing some of the most important issues connected with dramatisations in a new light: the origin of those texts, their structure, contents, the way they were performed, the way the symbols contained in them functioned, as well as the place they take in the medieval writings.