A collection of playscripts and texts that give an English-reading audience access to key plays as well as less well-known and previously untranslated works - a superb resource for scholars and theatre practitioners. This volume makes available some of the most influential, imaginative and exciting plays to come out of East and West Africa from the 1970s to the present day. Deliberately excluding playscripts by the regions' two best known playwrights, Wole Soyinka and Ngugi wa Thiong'o, whose work was profiled in African Theatre 13 the editors have selected plays, some well-known and some less widely available, that represent the diversity and richness of thesetwo very different African regions. The playscripts include a new translation from Amharic, as well as the English version of a play originally written in French, making more theatre from some of Africa's multitude of languages accessible to an English-reading audience. Each script is accompanied by an essay from an expert on the work, the playwright, and the context in which the play was produced, so that the volume will be of maximum use to both researchers and students of African theatre. Volume Editors: MARTIN BANHAM & JANE PLASTOW Series Editors: Martin Banham, Emeritus Professor of Drama & Theatre Studies, University of Leeds; James Gibbs, Senior Visiting Research Fellow, University of the West of England; Femi Osofisan, Professor of Drama, University of Ibadan; Jane Plastow, Professor of African Theatre, University of Leeds; Yvette Hutchison, Associate Professor, Department of Theatre & Performance Studies, University of Warwick

Highlighted in this volume is the detective play The Inspector and the Hero by Femi Osofisan, one of Africa's leading playwrights. The play has until now only been published in Nigeria. This open issue of African Theatre is a departure from the traditional themed format to showcase the plethora of styles, approaches and perspectives that populate the contemporary field of African theatre studies, with contributions from Ethiopia, Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa and Ghana. Focusing mainly on case studies, contributors engage a variety of performance forms, ranging from investigations into radical dramatic and popular musical performances, through "street theatre" (festivals and masquerade shows) and pop culture, to consideration of applied theatre, dance, audience, cultural performances and folktales. Articles address African American and African cultural dialogue; choreographic study; the carnivalization of indigenous African festivals; the stigmatization of disability; the performance of nationality, as well as orality and African performance aesthetics. Highlighted in this volume is the playscript of the detective play The Inspector and the Hero by Femi Osofisan, one of Africa's foremost playwrights. Volume Editor: CHUKWUMA OKOYE Series Editors: Yvette Hutchison, Reader, Department of Theatre & Performance Studies, University of Warwick; Chukwuma Okoye, Reader in African Theatre & Performance, University of Ibadan; Jane Plastow, Professor of African Theatre, University of Leeds.