Jan Roubal was a theatre theorist and historian. He was a member of the Institute for Theatre Research in the years 2007-2015. Through translations and his own observations he introduced contemporary trends in theatre studies especially from German-speaking countries and Poland into the Czech academic environment. He published, among others, a pioneering anthology Hledání souřadnic a kontextů divadla. Příspěvky k současné německé divadelní teorii, k jejím otázkám, možným výzvám a inspiracím (In Search of Coordinates and Contexts of Theatre. Papers on Contemporary German Theory of Theatre, Its Issues, Possible Challenges and Inspirations,2005), which became a canonical resource in the field.
His theoretical conceptions were inspired mainly by E. Fischer-Lichte and J. Fiebach, he emphasised the processuality of both theatre work and its presentation, and innovated the terminology of theatre studies. He also promoted the discussion of the oft-neglected field of audiovisual record of theatre performances and its heuristic potential for theatre studies. Over his long-term collaboration with the Institute of Theatre Studies at Freie Universität Berlin he participated on a joint documentation of the international festival Divadlo in Plzeň.
He also consistently reflected Czech studio and devised (or “authorial”) theatre. Together with Tatjana Lazorčáková he published a monograph K netradičnímu divadlu na Moravě a ve Slezsku 60.–80. let dvacátého století (Towards Non-Traditional Theatre in 1960s to 1980s Moravia and Silesia, 2003). He delivered insightful analyses of, among others, the work of HaDivadlo, to whose circle he belonged in the 1970s and 80s. He employed his erudite and original methodology, for instance, in a bookDivadlo jako pocitový deník (Theatre as a Sensational Diary, 2011), in which he analysed one of the company’s productions, Bylo jich pět a půl (There Were Five and a Half of Them).
He worked as an assistant professor at the studios of dramatic acting and drama education at JAMU in Brno in the years 1990-1998. From 1990 he also held a post at the Department of Theatre, Film and Media Studies at the Palacký University Faculty of Arts in Olomouc, where he focused primarily on the field of theory of theatre and the issues concerning studio and devised theatre. In 2007 he returned to the Faculty of Theatre at JAMU, where he became a researcher at the Institute for Theatre Research, he tutored post-graduate students, and also taught at the Theatre and Education and Audiovisual Art and Theatre studios. Jan Roubal was awarded the degree of associate professor in 2010; he, however, passed away during the process of achieving his full professoriate.
He was born in Broumov, he graduated in History and Czech at the Palacký University Faculty of Arts in Olomouc, where he subsequently also graduated in Polish with a focus on translation, and was awarded a PhDr. degree. In the years 1973-1990 he was the head of the section for literature and drama at Vladimír Ambros School of Art in Prostějov. At the same time he collaborated with HaDivadlo and led amateur theatre groups with whom he won several high national awards.