Theatre
he medieval feast of fools was an event
where established hierarchies were
overturned. sexual and social proprieties were transgressed and the everyday laws of the culture were suspended. It's the subject of academic study all over Europe. where various versions of the same festival were practiced. The idea of making the village idiot king for a day was common to many of them. and few eschewed the benefits of the good old-fashioned booze-up.
Historians are fascinated by such phenomena. but why trawl through all those parish registers when the same event is mounted all over the UK every year‘.’ The modern day office party is a
living. breathing manifestation of the
carnivalesque feast of fools.
As the latest large-scale, high camp extravaganza Whether the “me. puny
valve for the lessoning of workplace tensions
that build up through the year. or simply add to
_ . O . those tensions the following year is a moot l a point. But there can be no doubt that office
. . . . . workers denied the Bacchanalia offered by these occasions might provoke workplace discontent
on a scale not seen the General Strike of 1926.
pa Given the scale of the phenomenon. sooner or
‘1
54 THE LIST FESTIVAL MAGAZINE 31 Jul-7 Aug .9008