A Companion to Twentieth-Century American Drama
A Companion to Twentieth-Century American Drama

Author: David Krasner

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2008-04-15

Total Pages: 600

ISBN-13: 1405137347

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This Companion provides an original and authoritative surveyof twentieth-century American drama studies, written by some of thebest scholars and critics in the field. Balances consideration of canonical material with discussion ofworks by previously marginalized playwrights Includes studies of leading dramatists, such as TennesseeWilliams, Arthur Miller, Eugene O'Neill and Gertrude Stein Allows readers to make new links between particular plays andplaywrights Examines the movements that framed the century, such as theHarlem Renaissance, lesbian and gay drama, and the soloperformances of the 1980s and 1990s Situates American drama within larger discussions aboutAmerican ideas and culture

The Family in Twentieth-century American Drama
The Family in Twentieth-century American Drama

Author: Thaddeus Wakefield

Publisher: Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 138

ISBN-13:

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The central subject of American drama is, arguably, the American family. From Royall Tyler's colonial comedy The Contrast (1787) to August Wilson's King Hedley II (2000), relationships between husbands, wives, and their children have been used consistently by American playwrights to explore and illuminate the American experience. This study of the family in twentieth-century American drama explores how filial relationships are affected by the capitalistic culture of consumption that permeates twentieth-century American society. By analyzing relationships within both traditional and nontraditional families, this book examines how family members in American plays perceive themselves and others as «things» in American twentieth-century capitalistic society.

Censorship of the American Theatre in the Twentieth Century
Censorship of the American Theatre in the Twentieth Century

Author: John H. Houchin

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2003-06-26

Total Pages: 360

ISBN-13: 9780521818193

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John Houchin explores the impact of censorship in twentieth-century American theatre. He argues that theatrical censorship coincides with significant challenges to religious, political and cultural traditions. Along with the well-known instance of the House Un-American Activities Committee in the 1950s, other almost equally influential events shaped the course of the American stage during the century. The book is arranged in chronological order. It provides a summary of censorship in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century America and then analyses key political and theatrical events between 1900 and 2000. These include a discussion of the 1913 riot after the Abbey Theatre touring produdtion of Playboy of the Western World; protests against Clifford Odet's Waiting for Lefty, performed by militant workers during the Depression; and reactions to the recent play Angels in America.

American Drama of the Twentieth Century
American Drama of the Twentieth Century

Author: Gerald M. Berkowitz

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-07-15

Total Pages: 313

ISBN-13: 1317901738

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In this book Professor Berkowitz studies the diversity of American drama from the stylistic, experimental plays of O'Neill, through verse, tragedy and community theatre, to the theatre of the 1990s. The discussions range through dramatists, plays, genres and themes, with full supporting appendix material. It also examines major dramatists such as Eugene O'Neill, Arthur Miller, Sam Shephard, Tennessee Williams and August Wilson and covers not only the Broadway scene but also off Broadway movements and fringe theatres and such subjects as women's and African-American drama.

Tonality as Drama
Tonality as Drama

Author: Edward David Latham

Publisher: University of North Texas Press

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 238

ISBN-13: 1574412493

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Drawing on the fields of dramaturgy, music theory, and historical musicology, this book answers a question about twentieth-century music: Why does tonality persist in opera, even after it has been abandoned in other genres?

Dramas of the Past on the Twentieth-Century Stage
Dramas of the Past on the Twentieth-Century Stage

Author: Alexander Feldman

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-01-17

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 1136155007

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This book defines and exemplifies a major genre of modern dramatic writing, termed historiographic metatheatre, in which self-reflexive engagements with the traditions and forms of dramatic art illuminate historical themes and aid in the representation of historical events and, in doing so, formulates a genre. Historiographic metatheatre has been, and remains, a seminal mode of political engagement and ideological critique in the contemporary dramatic canon. Locating its key texts within the traditions of historical drama, self-reflexivity in European theatre, debates in the politics and aesthetics of postmodernism, and currents in contemporary historiography, this book provides a new critical idiom for discussing the major works of the genre and others that utilize its techniques. Feldman studies landmarks in the theatre history of postwar Britain by Weiss, Stoppard, Brenton, Wertenbaker and others, focusing on European revolutionary politics, the historiography of the World Wars and the effects of British colonialism. The playwrights under consideration all use the device of the play-within-the-play to explore constructions of nationhood and of Britishness, in particular. Those plays performed within the framing works are produced in places of exile where, Feldman argues, the marginalized negotiate the terms of national identity through performance.