History Books?

[Road Mage]

Hey Everyone,

As some of you know I'm finishing my Theater Studies degree in Dublin this year and I'm writing a 7000 word essay on street performance for it. I'm currently reading all the accademi texstbooks which i need to provide a "framing" for the subject but will soon need to go into studying the street itsef. Was wanting to open with a breif history of street performance. Anyone know of any good books providing a history of busking? Or anything similar that would be useful for studying busking in an academic way?

All the best

Owen

[martin ewen]

Its hardly contemporary, but then busking isn't

Enid Welsford's, The Fool: His Social and Literary History (London: Faber and
Faber, 1935)
there's certainly a gap regarding say anything comprehensively dealing with the last century.
Another street performer did his dissertation on the performance history of covent garden.(He was one of the goofy brit duo-I worked with him in Singapore-What was his Name?) And various people threaten from time to time to write books.
But apart from i think an early 70's street book I think the pickings are fairly slim.
I could suggest you do 7000 words on the diceman.
He was a Dublin Legend.

[Chris Griffith]

Check these out

"Street Theater and Other Outdoor Performance" by Bim Mason
(looks at various types of outdoor theater & performance - a well organized textbook of the genre)

"Drawing a Circle in the Square: Street Performing in New York's Washington Square Park" by S Harrison Pepper (someone's dissertation-- lots of academic research on traffic patterns and location; other useful info)

Good luck!

[Road Mage]

Many thanks guys. Will get looking into those immediatly.

Owen

[Butterfly Man]

Passing the buck

“Street Magic: An Illustrated History of Wandering Magicians and Their Conjuring Acts” by Jeff Sheridan

“Drawing a Circle in the Square: The Street Performers of Washington Square Park” by S. Harrison-Pepper

“Underground Harmonies: Subway Musicians in NY” by S. Tanenbaum

“Taking it to the Streets: The Social Protest Theater of Luis Valdez and Amiri Baraka” by Elam

“Street Theater and Other Outdoor Performances” by Bim Mason

“Radical Street Performance: An International Anthology” by Cohen-Cruz

“On the Streets: A Guide to New York City’s Buskers” by W. Boyle

[GlassHarper]

History of Busking

The Buskers: A History of Street Performance by David Cohen;
David & Charles, London: 1981

This 209-page book is listed on Amazon.Com at $139.38! Apparently it is a collectors' item. Get it thru interlibrary loan at your school library.

Although some of it's assumptions about the murky dark 1000-year history of street performance may be a little outlandish it is a well researched book with a concentration on the English experience of street entertainment from the ancient days of community harvest festivals thru the English eccentric artists of the 1980's.

I was discouraged to find that a search of Amazon for Patty Campbell's 1980 book "Street Performance in America" had no hits whatsoever. The book has been out of print for a number of years, but only a few years ago I found a used copy on Amazon. It is a classic about the buskers of that era (some of whom are still active). More importantly, however, it reviews ALL of the common American venues and characterizes them in ways that, amazingly, are still valid (absent the loss of New Orleans, at least temporarily). You certainly can find hard-cover copy by interlibrary loan. There also was a soft cover edition. My library is in N.O. so I can't give you the publisher.

Wait! I just realized, you are in Dublin. Never mind about that interlibrary loan stuff!

[harmonicakev]

community arts advocates

hi Owen,
Stephen has a few more books listed here:

http://communityartsadvocates.org/saabooks.html

Have fun! - kevin M.

[Road Mage]

Once again. Many thanks to everyone for there help here. This is all fantastic stuff.

Term starts agian in a week. As soon as it doesI'll be hitting the library for as many of these books as I can - am guessing I may have to interlibrary loan a lot of them.

All the best

Owen