Literary Criticism

"This set follows exactly the model of other Magill series (e.g., Critical Survey of Poetry, Critical Survey of Short Fiction). Five of the volumes cover 164 playwrights of English-language drama from the Wakefield Master to Paul Zindel, and include a broad range of British and American dramatists from the Restoration to the 20th century." -- From Books in Print

Critical essays examine representative plays and identify themes and characteristics employed by more than 170 dramatists ranging from Aeschylus in 400 B.C. to the contemporary Austrian Peter Handke.

Modern Drama by Women 1880s-1930s offers the first direct evidence that women playwrights helped create the movement known as Modern Drama. It contains twelve plays by women from the Americas, Europe and Asia, spanning a national and stylistic range from Swedish realism to Russian symbolism.

Covering the period 1879 to 1959, and taking in everything from Ibsen to Beckett, this book is volume one of a two-part comprehensive examination of the plays, dramatists, and movements that comprise modern world drama. Contains detailed analysis of plays and playwrights, connecting themes and offering original interpretations Includes coverage of non-English works and traditions to create a global view of modern drama

Martin Meisel's engaging account of how we read play plays on the page shows that the path to the fullest imaginative response is an understanding of how plays work.

The Elizabethan history play was one of the most prevalent dramatic genres of the 1590s, and so was a major contribution to Elizabethan historical culture. The genre has been well served by critical studies that emphasize politics and ideology; however, there has been less interest in the way history is interrogated as an idea in these plays.

In this book Professor Mastronarde draws on the seventeen surviving tragedies of Euripides, as well as the fragmentary remains of his lost plays, to explore key topics in the interpretation of the plays.

John Cox tells the intriguing story of stage devils from their earliest appearance in English plays to the closing of the theaters by parliamentary order in 1642. The book spans both medieval and Renaissance drama and includes the medieval Mystery cycles on the one hand, through to plays by Greene, Marlowe, Shakespeare (Henry VI Parts 1 and 2), Jonson, Middleton and Davenant.

"A modern guide to the comedies and tragedies of the Greek and Roman theater, with biographies of their authors." -- From Amazon.com

Of the revised edition's 538 profiles of individual dramatists, 79 are completely new essays--mostly on playwrights who have recently come to be regarded as established figures in the theater. In addition to the entirely new author profiles, more than 88 profiles have been updated and revised to include the authors' new works and achievements, as well as developments in their personal lives. The bibliographies in these and all other author profiles have been updated and annotated. Besides listing new productions and publications and honors and awards, these essays provide analyses of significant new works.

Anyone with an academic, professional, amateur, or recreational interest in the theatre is likely to want to look up details of particular plays sometimes - perhaps to check on the author, or on when they were first performed, or perhaps to see how many characters they have, and whether or not they would be suitable for their theatre company or drama group to perform. The Oxford Dictionary of Plays provides essential information on the 1000 best-known, best-loved, and most important plays in world theatre.

Each print volume in this long-standing series profiles approximately 4-8 of the greatest writers and thinkers of the late Middle Ages, Renaissance and Restoration periods by providing full-text or excerpted criticism taken from books, magazines, literary reviews, newspapers and scholarly journals. Among those profiled in this volume are: Aphra Behn, Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding, and Jonathan Swift.

"Ranging from the earliest drama to the theater of the 1980's this encyclopedia includes coverage of national drama and theater around the world, theater companies, and musical comedy. Arrangement of the 1,300 entries is alphabetically by name or subject with nearly 950 of these devoted to individual playwrights and their works." -- From Google Books

The playwrights covered in this study have among them won most of the available awards and experienced considerable success in the theater. They have not, however, found their way so easily into the academic canon. Christopher Bigsby examines, in some detail, the developing careers of some of America's most fascinating and original dramatic talent.

Features a combination of biography and critical analysis, covering major writers from outside the United States and their significant works in fiction, drama, poetry, and nonfiction. This title offers profiles of major authors of fiction, drama, poetry, and essays, each with sections on biography, and general analysis.

The Language of Drama applies contemporary linguistic research to a wide range of plays, soap operas and screenplays, ranging from Shakespeare to Stoppard.