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The Decades of Modern American Playwriting series provides a
comprehensive survey and study of the theatre produced in each
decade from the 1930s to 2009 in eight volumes. Each volume equips
readers with a detailed understanding of the context from which
work emerged: an introduction considers life in the decade with a
focus on domestic life and conditions, social changes, culture,
media, technology, industry and political events; while a chapter
on the theatre of the decade offers a wide-ranging and thorough
survey of theatres, companies, dramatists, new movements and
developments in response to the economic and political conditions
of the day. The work of the four most prominent playwrights from
the decade receives in-depth analysis and re-evaluation by a team
of experts, together with commentary on their subsequent work and
legacy. A final section brings together original documents such as
interviews with the playwrights and with directors, drafts of play
scenes, and other previously unpublished material. The major
playwrights and their plays to receive in-depth coverage in this
volume include: David Mamet: Edmond (1982), Glengarry Glen Ross
(1984), Speed-the-Plow (1988) and Oleanna (1992); David Henry
Hwang: Family Devotions (1981), The Sound of a Voice (1983) and M.
Butterfly (1988); Maria Irene Fornes: The Danube (1982), Mud (1983)
and The Conduct of Life (1985); August Wilson: Ma Rainey's Black
Bottom (1984), Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1984) and Fences (1987).
The Decades of Modern American Playwriting series provides a
comprehensive survey and study of the theatre produced in each
decade from the 1930s to 2009 in eight volumes. Each volume equips
readers with a detailed understanding of the context from which
work emerged: an introduction considers life in the decade with a
focus on domestic life and conditions, social changes, culture,
media, technology, industry and political events; while a chapter
on the theatre of the decade offers a wide-ranging and thorough
survey of theatres, companies, dramatists, new movements and
developments in response to the economic and political conditions
of the day. The work of the four most prominent playwrights from
the decade receives in-depth analysis and re-evaluation by a team
of experts, together with commentary on their subsequent work and
legacy. A final section brings together original documents such as
interviews with the playwrights and with directors, drafts of play
scenes, and other previously unpublished material. The major
playwrights and their plays to receive in-depth coverage in this
volume include: David Mamet: Edmond (1982), Glengarry Glen Ross
(1984), Speed-the-Plow (1988) and Oleanna (1992); David Henry
Hwang: Family Devotions (1981), The Sound of a Voice (1983) and M.
Butterfly (1988); Maria Irene Fornes: The Danube (1982), Mud (1983)
and The Conduct of Life (1985); August Wilson: Ma Rainey's Black
Bottom (1984), Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1984) and Fences (1987).
Providing a detailed portrait of American playwright August Wilson
(1945-2005), this collection of new essays explores the development
of the author's ethos across his twenty-year creative career-a
process that transformed his life as he retraced the lives of his
fellow ""Africans in America."" While Wilson's narratives of
Pittsburgh and Chicago are microcosms of black life in America,
they also reflect the psychological trauma of his disconnection
with his biological father, his impassioned efforts to discover and
reconnect with the blues, Africa and poet/activist Amiri Baraka,
and his love for the vernacular of Pittsburgh.
Fences is the story of a responsible yet otherwise flawed black
garbage collector in pre-Civil Rights America who, in August
Wilson's hands, rises to the level of an epic hero. Deemed a
"generational play," it mirrors the classic struggle of status quo,
tradition, and age, versus change, innovation, and youth. During
its 1987 Broadway run, Fences garnered four Tony Awards, the New
York Drama Critics Circle Award, and the Pulitzer Prize. It has
been produced around the world and is one of the most significant
African-American plays of the 20th century. This reference is a
comprehensive guide to Wilson's dramatic achievement. The volume
begins with an overview of Wilson's aesthetic and dramatic agenda,
along with a discussion of the forces that propelled him beyond his
potentially troubled life in Pittsburgh to his current status as
one of America's most gifted playwrights. A detailed plot summary
of Fences is provided, followed by an overview of the play's
distinguished production history. The play's historical and
cultural background and themes are explored, as is Wilson's
dramatic art. The reference closes with a look at the critical and
scholarly reception of Fences and a bibliographical essay. Included
are rare photos from the play's Broadway premiere and its 1999
premiere in Beijing.
The award-winning playwright August Wilson used drama as a medium
to write a history of twentieth-century America through the
perspectives of its black citizenry. In the plays of his Pittsburgh
Cycle, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Fences and The Piano
Lesson, Wilson mixes African spirituality with the realism of the
American theater and puts African American storytelling and
performance practices in dialogue with canonical writers like
Aristotle and Shakespeare. As they portray black Americans living
through migration, industrialization, and war, Wilson's plays
explore the relation between a unified black consciousness and
America's collective identity. In part 1 of this volume,
""Materials,"" the editors survey sources on Wilson's biography,
teachable texts of Wilson's plays, useful secondary readings, and
compelling audiovisual and Web resources. The essays in part 2,
""Approaches,"" look at a diverse set of issues in Wilson's work,
including the importance of blues and jazz, intertextual
connections to other playwrights, race in performance, Yoruban
spirituality, and the role of women in the plays.
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