Helen E M Brooks
I am Reader in Theatre and Cultural History at the University of Kent, where I teach in both the School of Arts (Drama) and School of History. My current research is largely focussed on the theatre of and about Great War. I am editor of the forthcoming 'Cambridge Companion to First World War Theatre' and am also writing a book on representations of the war in British Theatre between 1914 and 1918.
More broadly my interests and previous research span the eighteenth to early twentieth century, and I have published extensively on women, gender and theatre.
I am Co-Investigator on 'Gateways to the First World War' an AHRC consortium for public engagement with the centenary and Primary Investigator on the Great War Theatre Project, which is aimed at recovering the history of theatre and playwrights active during the First World War (www.greatwartheatre.org.uk). In 2017-2018 I was also Co-Investigator on 'Performing Centenaries', an AHRC project exploring how the Great War has been performed in centenary theatre.
I began my career with a PhD at the University of Exeter, after which I worked as a lecturer in the School of English at the University of Nottingham. I moved to the University of Kent in 2009.
Phone: 01227 82 7142
Address: Jarman Building
School of Arts
CT2 7UG
More broadly my interests and previous research span the eighteenth to early twentieth century, and I have published extensively on women, gender and theatre.
I am Co-Investigator on 'Gateways to the First World War' an AHRC consortium for public engagement with the centenary and Primary Investigator on the Great War Theatre Project, which is aimed at recovering the history of theatre and playwrights active during the First World War (www.greatwartheatre.org.uk). In 2017-2018 I was also Co-Investigator on 'Performing Centenaries', an AHRC project exploring how the Great War has been performed in centenary theatre.
I began my career with a PhD at the University of Exeter, after which I worked as a lecturer in the School of English at the University of Nottingham. I moved to the University of Kent in 2009.
Phone: 01227 82 7142
Address: Jarman Building
School of Arts
CT2 7UG
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All of the texts were drawn from 'St. Barnabas Pilgrimages', 1923 (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, n.d.). Extracts from the book include material from the Daily Express coverage of the pilgrimage; the testimony of Mrs William McLean to the People’s Journal; Mary Macleod Moore’s account for the Toronto Saturday Night. Macleod Moore was the London correspondent for the paper and the Montreal Gazette. During the war she had reported from the France and Belgium having forced her way through the army’s laborious accreditation system. On arrival, she travelled extensively behind the lines during the war reporting on conditions, and in 1919 she published a history of Canadian Red Cross services during the conflict. Major B.S. Browne was a member of the Christian movement, Toc H, which was founded by the Reverend P.B. ‘Tubby’ Clayton, at Poperinge, during the war, and the Ypres League.
The performance was given at the Passchendaele Memorial Field as part of 'Ypres 100'. The cast were as follows:
Phoebe Hopwood (Drama Graduate, School of Arts, University of Kent): Mary Macleod Moore.
Jayne Thompson (School of Arts, University of Kent): Mrs William McLean.
Emma Thornton (Drama student, School of Arts, University of Kent): B.S. Browne.
Sarah Twyford (Drama student, School of Arts, University of Kent): Daily Express reporter.
Conference Papers
Yet this was not the only Grand-Guignol to be licensed that year. 1915 also saw the production of Le Poison Hindou (Coronet, 30 June 1915) La Fugue de Madame Caramon (Garrick, 23 July 1915), Compiègne 28 Aout 1914 (Garrick, 16 August 1915), and Stafford and Myer’s The Man Who Came Back (Camberwell Empire, 11 October 1915) which featured a man whose face has been half blown off in an accident.
Examining this spate of Grand-Guignols, this paper will consider the demand for these ‘artificial horrors’ in the context of the war, arguing that their popularity was in response to, rather than being in spite of the war. Examining these plays in relation to the wider context of the war, the paper will show how the representations of death, disfigurement and claustrophobia central to these plays served to articulate and mediate contemporary anxieties and traumas. At the same point, it will argue that the experience of watching these works of horror also had a cathartic function for a society undergoing mass trauma.
As a theatre historian Brooks’ focus is on theatre as a cultural form and institution, and the models, methodologies and approaches she will share in this seminar will therefore be applicable as models to a range of other historical projects.
This paper will detail some of these initial findings around both what was being produced and how it was being produced. Placing these findings in the wider context of the war, it will argue, we can also begin to see how theatre across England, Scotland and Wales responded to the experiences and conditions of the First World War. The paper will also show how these insights into working practices, have been made available through the use on the one hand, of diverse archival materials and attention to the dialogue between these sources, and on the other, a new model of citizen-history research.
Analysing these trends in relation to the wider context of the conflict the paper will reveal how theatrical representations engaged with both national and local experiences of, and attitudes towards the war. It will show, for example, how the spate of 1914/15 spy plays such as The Man Who Stayed at Home reflected contemporary newspaper-fuelled hysteria over naturalised German spies; how the melodramatic representations of Hun villainy which dominated in 1915 plays such as In the Hands of the Hun drew on refugee stories of German brutalities; and how after the Military Service Act of 1916 plays like My Superior Officer turned away from encouraging men to enlist and focussed instead on encouraging civilians to fulfil their national duties. It will also consider the social function of ‘front line’ plays such as The Better ‘Ole (1917), and of those tackling the return of the soldier such as Settling Day (1918). In mapping these temporal shifts in wartime repertoire the paper will also consider the impact of geographic locality: examining, for example, whether towns serving as gateways to the war or which had experienced air raids, staged plays in response to their experiences. Through combining an overarching analysis of wartime theatre production with specific examples of plays, the paper aims to show that wartime theatre offers a valuable and long-overlooked lens through which to understand the experience of conflict.
Both ‘Experiences of War’ and ‘The Show Must Go On’ are the result of a close collaboration between a theatre historian from the University of Kent and the TRB. The projects have developed over 18 months and we have faced a number of challenges: not only with different institutional drivers, timeframes, and financial constraints, but also with issues around copyright of the archival material and questions of how to achieve a balance between presenting the archival material as history or as engaging performance. In this paper we will discuss our collaboration, the process of co-production and how we dealt with challenges. We will also show how our collaboration is leading to new projects and possibilities.
All of the texts were drawn from 'St. Barnabas Pilgrimages', 1923 (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, n.d.). Extracts from the book include material from the Daily Express coverage of the pilgrimage; the testimony of Mrs William McLean to the People’s Journal; Mary Macleod Moore’s account for the Toronto Saturday Night. Macleod Moore was the London correspondent for the paper and the Montreal Gazette. During the war she had reported from the France and Belgium having forced her way through the army’s laborious accreditation system. On arrival, she travelled extensively behind the lines during the war reporting on conditions, and in 1919 she published a history of Canadian Red Cross services during the conflict. Major B.S. Browne was a member of the Christian movement, Toc H, which was founded by the Reverend P.B. ‘Tubby’ Clayton, at Poperinge, during the war, and the Ypres League.
The performance was given at the Passchendaele Memorial Field as part of 'Ypres 100'. The cast were as follows:
Phoebe Hopwood (Drama Graduate, School of Arts, University of Kent): Mary Macleod Moore.
Jayne Thompson (School of Arts, University of Kent): Mrs William McLean.
Emma Thornton (Drama student, School of Arts, University of Kent): B.S. Browne.
Sarah Twyford (Drama student, School of Arts, University of Kent): Daily Express reporter.
Yet this was not the only Grand-Guignol to be licensed that year. 1915 also saw the production of Le Poison Hindou (Coronet, 30 June 1915) La Fugue de Madame Caramon (Garrick, 23 July 1915), Compiègne 28 Aout 1914 (Garrick, 16 August 1915), and Stafford and Myer’s The Man Who Came Back (Camberwell Empire, 11 October 1915) which featured a man whose face has been half blown off in an accident.
Examining this spate of Grand-Guignols, this paper will consider the demand for these ‘artificial horrors’ in the context of the war, arguing that their popularity was in response to, rather than being in spite of the war. Examining these plays in relation to the wider context of the war, the paper will show how the representations of death, disfigurement and claustrophobia central to these plays served to articulate and mediate contemporary anxieties and traumas. At the same point, it will argue that the experience of watching these works of horror also had a cathartic function for a society undergoing mass trauma.
As a theatre historian Brooks’ focus is on theatre as a cultural form and institution, and the models, methodologies and approaches she will share in this seminar will therefore be applicable as models to a range of other historical projects.
This paper will detail some of these initial findings around both what was being produced and how it was being produced. Placing these findings in the wider context of the war, it will argue, we can also begin to see how theatre across England, Scotland and Wales responded to the experiences and conditions of the First World War. The paper will also show how these insights into working practices, have been made available through the use on the one hand, of diverse archival materials and attention to the dialogue between these sources, and on the other, a new model of citizen-history research.
Analysing these trends in relation to the wider context of the conflict the paper will reveal how theatrical representations engaged with both national and local experiences of, and attitudes towards the war. It will show, for example, how the spate of 1914/15 spy plays such as The Man Who Stayed at Home reflected contemporary newspaper-fuelled hysteria over naturalised German spies; how the melodramatic representations of Hun villainy which dominated in 1915 plays such as In the Hands of the Hun drew on refugee stories of German brutalities; and how after the Military Service Act of 1916 plays like My Superior Officer turned away from encouraging men to enlist and focussed instead on encouraging civilians to fulfil their national duties. It will also consider the social function of ‘front line’ plays such as The Better ‘Ole (1917), and of those tackling the return of the soldier such as Settling Day (1918). In mapping these temporal shifts in wartime repertoire the paper will also consider the impact of geographic locality: examining, for example, whether towns serving as gateways to the war or which had experienced air raids, staged plays in response to their experiences. Through combining an overarching analysis of wartime theatre production with specific examples of plays, the paper aims to show that wartime theatre offers a valuable and long-overlooked lens through which to understand the experience of conflict.
Both ‘Experiences of War’ and ‘The Show Must Go On’ are the result of a close collaboration between a theatre historian from the University of Kent and the TRB. The projects have developed over 18 months and we have faced a number of challenges: not only with different institutional drivers, timeframes, and financial constraints, but also with issues around copyright of the archival material and questions of how to achieve a balance between presenting the archival material as history or as engaging performance. In this paper we will discuss our collaboration, the process of co-production and how we dealt with challenges. We will also show how our collaboration is leading to new projects and possibilities.
This paper takes up the conference theme of the ‘impact of the war at sea on the ‘Home Front’ by considering the alternate meaning of ‘theatre of war’. Theatrical productions which ‘staged’ Jutland in different ways will be examined as cultural artefacts of the battle and it will be suggested that they function in part as performed memorials. By examining critical and popular reception of these works moreover the paper will suggest that we can gain new insights into contemporary attitudes towards the battle as it developed in the cultural imagination.
This heartfelt speech from the 1916 play My Superior Office is given by Dick, a young soldier who has been wounded on the Western Front and just returned home after weeks recuperating in hospital. With its echoes of the famous ‘What did you do in the Great War’ poster, Dick could easily have been speaking to a group of potential recruits. Instead however he is addressing civilians: working men and women who, as Dick makes clear, also have an important a role to play in winning the war. My Superior Officer is not alone in addressing how those at home need to contribute to the war effort. In War Mates, another returning soldier berates his family: in this case for supporting impending strikes. Parodying the the popular hit ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’, he tells them to ‘Keep the home factories and the home mines going – keep ‘em turning out more and more till they bursts with the strain. Keep the home men training […] That’s the song you want’. The play culminates in a powerful address from the union leader calling on civilian workers and soldiers to stand together as the ‘war mates of England’.
It has long been recognised that the theatre played an important role in mobilizing young men in the first phase of the war. Yet, as this paper will demonstrate, theatre also played a key role in the second phase of the war: this time in mobilizing the civilian population. In plays such as Too Late, The Great Redding Street Burglary, My Superior Officer, and War Mates, thrift and subscription to war bonds was encouraged; industrial unrest was lambasted; and appropriate attitudes and behaviours were promoted. Examining production histories in their historical context, this paper will argue that these plays were a response to the new and particular challenges faced in 1916. It will further argue that from 1916 the theatre sought to erode the fissure developing between those fighting and those ‘at home’ by presenting the whole nation as active participants in a total war.
On the Bill:
How did Britain's touring trick-cyclists cope with the loss of their male colleagues to the Western Front?
What could you see at the movies at Christmas?
How did boredom in the trenches become the theme of a hit stage play?
What activity, first banned during the war, linked aristocrats and actresses, movie stars and prostitutes?
And what did audiences make of all this?
Find out as Matthew leads an evening of interviews, discussions and 100-year-old jokes with historians Fern Riddell, Ian Christie, Helen Brooks and Marek Kohn.
With piano accompaniment and contributions from Neil Brand, and song and play extracts performed by Ian Conningham and Hannah Genesius of the BBC Radio Drama Company.
Producer: Phil Tinline.