小又短命：1990年代小劇場與咖啡空間

Small and Short-lived: The Little Theatre, Coffee Shops and Theatre History

本論文嘗試展開1990年代臺北小劇場的咖啡空間研究，以期啟動經典劇場史、空間使用以及人物活動之間的差異化思考過程。全文分成兩部分進行。第一部分突顯咖啡館空間的小型商業特性，以小、存在短暫、面對面消費這三項來分析小劇場與咖啡館相互呼應的特質，論證短暫的聚集和不斷對話是這份關係的核心。第二部分以1990年代的臺北咖啡館演出為案例，論述咖啡小劇場往前得以承繼1980年代傳統小劇場論述所關注的政治威權、社會禁忌，抑或意象拼貼等舊有問題意識；往後也足以邁向21世紀聚集、參與、社區、城市等更為根本，甚至過往習而不察的場域精神問題。於是，貌似失敗的短命，反而跳出對體制的長期依賴，維繫了咖啡館與小劇場在臺灣歷史中，以親密又騷動的精神持續浮現。

The paper tries to enact a close reading of the little theatre at small coffee shops in an attempt to derive a differentiation process upon the classical theatre history reading, the use of space and the activities of artists. It is divided into two main parts. The first part foregrounds how coffee shops function as a small business, by analyzing three mutual characteristics of small, short-lived, and face-to-face consumption, to demonstrate that short-term gathering and continuous dialogue are the core of this relationship. The second part focuses on the performance cases at coffee shops of the 1990s, in order to show how the coffee shops inherits the classical discourse of the Little Theatre as a political movement or a social taboo breaker in the 1980s. At the same time, it also set on a trajectory for the 21st century performing towards a more fundamental issues such as gathering, participation, community, or city. As a result, although seemingly failed, the characteristics of small, short-lived offer opportunities for little theatres to escape the dependence on the art production system, and to maintain the cafe and small theater in Taiwan's history continued to emerge dialogues in a spirit of disobedience.