Chained into That Machine: John Jesurun’s Mediaturgical Adaptations

Year 2014, Issue: 39, 31 - 42, 01.04.2014

Christophe Collard

Abstract

Communication unites, but communication also divides. This wellworn media studies tenet was never more applicable than in Everything That Rises Must Converge, a 1990 experimental echo of Flannery O’Connor’s short story staged by John Jesurun, the Pope of Greenwich Village’s “postsurrealist” Feingold 85 theater scene. It is an avant-garde adaptation of a work within a larger collection itself inspired by French philosopher’s Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s conceptualization of the “Omega Point,” wherein the latter urges his readers to Remain true to yourself, but move ever upward toward greater consciousness and greater love! At the summit you will find yourselves united with all those who, from the same direction, have made the same ascent. For everything that rises must converge 11 .

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