"In this exciting new anthology, Wesley Brown and Aimée K. Michel bring together six wonderfully teachable plays by some of the greatest American women dramatists of the past fifty years-- Ntozake Shange, Suzan-Lori Parks, Paula Vogel, Lynn Nottage, Beth Henley, and Susan Yankowitz. The editors provide a helpful Introduction to the last 100 years of theatrical activity, from suffrage and anti-lynching plays, through the explosive 1960s, to recent Broadway triumphs, highlighting women's struggle-a struggle that continues--to put their vision and voices on the American stage." Elin Diamond, Rutgers University, USA
This volume celebrates the iconoclastic power of six American women playwrights who pushed the boundaries of the form outside the box of conventional drama.
Each play is accompanied by a short introduction providing the biographical background of the playwright as well as discussing the dramatic style of her writing, the extent to which her work is informed by major playwrights of the period, and how the specific work illustrates the overarching themes of her body of work.
The plays included are:
Gun by Susan Yankowitz
Spell #7: geechee jibara quik magic trance manual for
technologically stressed third world people by Ntozake Shange
The Jacksonian by Beth Henley
The Baltimore Waltz by Paula Vogel
In the Blood by Suzan-Lori Parks
Intimate Apparel by Lynn Nottage
Brown, Wesley: - Wesley Brown is Professor Emeritus at Rutgers University and teaches literature and creative writing at Bard College at Simon's Rock, USA. He co-edited the multicultural anthologies, 'Imagining America' (fiction), 'Visions of America' (non-fiction), edited the Teachers & Writers Guide to Frederick Douglass and wrote the narration for a segment of the PBS documentary, W.E.B. DuBois: A Biography in four Voices. In addition, he is the author of four produced plays, Boogie Woogie and Booker T, Life During Wartime, A Prophet Among Them, and Dark Meat on a Funny Mind; three novels, Tragic Magic, Darktown Strutters, PushComes to SHOVE and a short story collection, Dance of the Infidels.
Michel, Aimée K.: - Aimée K. Michel is Associate Professor of Theater at Bard College at Simon's Rock, USA. She was the Artistic Director of the New Orleans Shakespeare Festival for over 10 years where she produced new American plays. Before this, she was Artistic Director of the Drama League's Directors Project in New York City where she created the New Directors/New Works program. As a freelance director, she has directed in theaters all over the country. She was a recipient of both the Drama League's Directors Project Fellowship and the Boris Segal Directing Fellowship at Williamstown Theater Festival.
Shange, Ntozake: - Ntozake Shange was born in Trenton, New Jersey and educated at Barnard College and the University of Southern California, where she received an MA in American Studies. Her choreopoem for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf brought her Broadway success and international recognition. She is the author of an acclaimed adaptation of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children and has written three novels: Sassafrass, Cypress and Indigo; Betsey Brown; and Liliane. Her poetry includes nappy edges, A Daughter's Geography, Ridin' the Moon in Texas and From Okra to Greens. Her first collection of plays was published by Methuen Drama in 1978.
