Stage and Politics: Giuseppe Fava and South Italy Theatre

The function of theater has always been to tell stories that allow the community to grow and critically self reflect, both as a society and as individual members of it. This pertains broadly to what we can refer to as political theater, and in the Italian context for example to works of Giuseppe Fava. In the south Italian context characterized by the presence of a community tormented by social marginalization, historical domination, lack of develop ment opportunities, youth hard ships, which have favored the establishment of the mafia, the theater, both the popular and the erudite has always been an instrument of denunciation and derision of the powerful. A courageous and disruptive voice was that of the Sicilian playwright Giuseppe Fava, whose plays represented the protest of the Southern man, victim of corrupt and mafia political power that did not allow a "revolution of consciences". His politic altheatrewas an instrument of denunciation of a mafia increasing linked to political affairs thath adcrossed the regional borders, so much so as to lead the same mafia to kill him in 1984 right in front of the permanent theatre of Catania, the place of his performances. 424 In this paper I look at the life and works of Fava, trying to understand the political in terms of instigating a larger resistance within the community in face of repression and coercion. Fava’s plays have assumed greater singificance in an increasingly globalized society in the grip of climate change, intimidated by migratory flows and divided by strong economic disparities and high rates of youth unemployment. In this connection I assess how Fava’s plays have new relevance and how the text takes on different forms to make an impact.