Stages of battle: Theater and war in the plays of Bernhardt, Raynal, and Anouilh

Noting a neglect of theater in literary and cultural histories of the Great War, this article contributes to a much-needed correction of this oversight by analyzing three plays: Sarah Bernhardt's propagandistic Du théâtre au champ d'honneur (1916), Paul Raynal's controversial and antimilitaristic Le tombeau sous l'Arc de triomphe ( 1924) and Jean Anouilh's ironical Le voyageur sans bagage (1937). Despite their contrasting attitudes toward the armed conflict itself, all of these plays call explicit attention to the significant role that theatrical performance plays in wartime and/or the practices of commemoration that follow.