Philosophy and theater have both their role in human sciences. As philosophy is about thinking the reality, theater is about representation. Both fields have the common ground to interpret reality. Concerning philosophy Marx told that « philosophy is interpreting reality while it has to be changed » and concerning theater the term character comes from the word « persona » (which means mask). These fields have the ability to give different meanings to words and to put a context that is shading another light on how to see the space and the time.
Philosophy and literature have from a long time common grounds. For instance Plato was one of the first philosophers, in Hippias Major, to talk about esthetism. Aristotle wrote as well about the rules of poetry and tragedy. Another example of this link is the first christian thinkers and their interractions with anciant greek philosophers : for instance Plotin, concerning the procession of the soul, is taking into account this scene that can be linked to esthetism. Sanct Augustine talked about the interractions about Christian doctrine and beauty.
Theater disappeared in the Western countries between the Antiquity and the Renaissance. The art to interpret the texts, which is an characteristic of theater, was a consequence of the return of the reference to Antiquity. For instance the great theater writer Racine was impregnated by classical letters. He wrote his tragedies compliant to the reference to Antiquity. Hume celebrated in this book the Esthetics the fact that French theater went beyond the Greek one. Authors like Moliere participated to the will of Louis XIV or Colbert to make France able to rival the Roman Empire in terms of power of cultural strenght.
Philosophy and theater were separate, however they met several ways. For instance both fields participated to enlightment in the XVIIIth century. Plays like the false confidences of Marivaux were in similar movements as the enlightment philosophers. It was in the context of contestation of an order more and more criticized. Philosophers like Kant, in his criticism to the faculty to judge, was talking about beauty as the ability to « universally please without concept ». It is a way to subjectivize the idea of beauty which is in the same process as theatre as his time.
The XIXth century was creating common grounds between these two fields with political engagement. As philosophy as first marked by great thinkers like Hegel or Marx ; Nietzsche was as well building his works linked to literature. His criticism of morals, for instance religious moral limits, is linked to a search for creativity that can be linked to the imagination of literature. Theater in fundamentally benefiting from this idea. The XXth century was as well creating links between these fields : a great example is Sartre. This philosopher and writer, For instance his play Huis clos is an example of the combinaison of theater and philosophy. Even his theory, in the being and the nothingness, of the bad faith is showing a theatrical scene between two lovers at their first appointment.
The link between these two fields can be extended to the art of the scene. For instance the theatrical scene or the masks of Antiquity. Theater is in itself an apart reality with masks, scenes, a peculiar room… Philosophy is a world in itself as well with its own reflection on reality, and is at the same time linked to everything an in a kind of parallel reality. Recent philosophers like Badiou combined philosophy and theater to express better their ideas. Both can enrich the reality of today, invaded by screen and social networks, and create bridges between old cultural traditions and modernity.
