American playwrights since 1945 : a guide to scholarship, criticism, and performance

Informative and economically written, this book is a useful tool for theatre and literary practitioners.
American Theater

This guide to the state of research on forty major American playwrights and the history of their productions is among the first of its kind. It is actually many books: a bibliography, a stage history, an assessment of scholarly works about each playwright, and an invaluable guide to the types of research studies--biographical, bibliographical and critical--that remain to be done on each playwright. The essays were written by leading experts in American drama and theatre and focus on playwrights whose works have in some way shaped and influenced the American stage. Each essay follows a standard format and provides information on the playwright's reputation and achievements; primary bibliography; production history of where, when, how often, and how well his or her works were performed; a rigorous identification and evaluation of secondary materials on bibliographies, biographies, influence studies, general works, and analyses of plays, and, most significantly, a detailed analysis of future research opportunities.

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This outstanding scholarly overview of contemporary American playwrights has long been needed. Its 40 analytical bibliographic essays "assess the playwrights' reputations, offer a production history of their works, and classify, survey, and evaluate scholarly and critical opinion" (pref.). The expert contributors follow a structured six-part format; Kolin's editing achieves a seamless style. For each playwright there is an assessment of reputation and achievements as perceived through reviews and critical commentary; a primary bibliography that shows the extent and variety of the dramatist's canon; a history of where, how often, and how successfully the works have been performed; a survey of secondary sources including bibliographies, biographies, influences, general studies of the dramatist, and analyses of individual plays; a section in which "contributors alert readers to particular scholarly and critical problems that need to be solved or issues that need further investigation"; and a checklist of all sources cited parenthetically throughout the essays. A few popular, well-known playwrights, e.g., Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, Arthur Miller, receive highly selective and focused commentaries, but most entries treat younger playwrights whose works generally appeared after 1960 and who unquestionably are shaping American theater now. Bullens, Gelber, Guare, Henley, Kopit, Mamet, McNally, Rabe, Shange, Terry, Wasserstein, A. Wilson, and L. Wilson are among those included. Highly recommended for all academic collections. -R. G. Stephen, Rider College

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This unique contribution to scholarship in American drama surveys 40 major mainstream, ethnic, and regional playwrights after Eugene O'Neill. Each author is given several analytic bibliographic essays: reputation assessment, primary source bibliography, performance history, survey of secondary sources, and, what is most unique about this work, an assessment of scholarly opportunities for future work. The critical commentary is not as extensive as in C.W.E. Bigsby's three-volume survey, A Critical Introduction to Twentieth-Century American Drama ( Vol. 1, LJ 8/82; Cambridge, 1982-85). Yet because it lays out the scholarly groundwork that has been done on all major aspects of these writers and provides a largely complete bibliography through 1987, American Playwrights will be the starting point for work on these figures for many years to come. Thomas E. Luddy, Salem State Coll., Mass. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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