Dramatic Revisions of Myths, Fairy Tales and Legends

Dramatic Revisions of Myths, Fairy Tales and Legends PDF Author: Verna A. Foster
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786465123
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
These new essays explore the ways in which contemporary dramatists have retold or otherwise made use of myths, fairy tales and legends from a variety of cultures, including Greek, West African, North American, Japanese, and various parts of Europe. The dramatists discussed range from well-established playwrights such as Tony Kushner, Caryl Churchill, and Timberlake Wertenbaker to new theatrical stars such as Sarah Ruhl and Tarell Alvin McCraney. The book contributes to the current discussion of adaptation theory by examining the different ways, and for what purposes, plays revise mythic stories and characters. The essays contribute to studies of literary uses of myth by focusing on how recent dramatists have used myths, fairy tales and legends to address contemporary concerns, especially changing representations of women and the politics of gender relations but also topics such as damage to the environment and political violence.

Dramatic Revisions of Myths, Fairy Tales and Legends

Dramatic Revisions of Myths, Fairy Tales and Legends PDF Author: Verna A. Foster
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786465123
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 259

Get Book Here

Book Description
These new essays explore the ways in which contemporary dramatists have retold or otherwise made use of myths, fairy tales and legends from a variety of cultures, including Greek, West African, North American, Japanese, and various parts of Europe. The dramatists discussed range from well-established playwrights such as Tony Kushner, Caryl Churchill, and Timberlake Wertenbaker to new theatrical stars such as Sarah Ruhl and Tarell Alvin McCraney. The book contributes to the current discussion of adaptation theory by examining the different ways, and for what purposes, plays revise mythic stories and characters. The essays contribute to studies of literary uses of myth by focusing on how recent dramatists have used myths, fairy tales and legends to address contemporary concerns, especially changing representations of women and the politics of gender relations but also topics such as damage to the environment and political violence.

Theatre History Studies 2014, Vol. 33

Theatre History Studies 2014, Vol. 33 PDF Author: Elizabeth Reitz Mullenix
Publisher: University of Alabama Press
ISBN: 0817358072
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Theatre History Studies 2014, Volume 33, brings together an original collection of essays that explore a topic of growing interest--theatre and war.

Text & Presentation, 2013

Text & Presentation, 2013 PDF Author: Graley Herren
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786478934
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 245

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Book Description
Text & Presentation, 2013 gathers some of the best work presented at the 2013 Comparative Drama Conference in Baltimore. Subjects ranging from Ancient Greece to 21st century America are covered with a variety of approaches and formats. Celebrated playwright Edward Albee's presentation is the lead piece, followed by 12 research papers, one review essay, and seven book reviews. This volume represents the latest research in the fields of comparative drama, performance, and dramatic textual analysis.

Myth and Fairy Tale in Contemporary Fiction

Myth and Fairy Tale in Contemporary Fiction PDF Author: Alexandra Cheira
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN: 1527591336
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
This volume provides more sustained critical attention on the use of myth and fairy tales in contemporary fiction, both stand-alone tales and those which are embedded in the wider frame of a novel or novella. In this light, the book examines contemporary retellings of myths and fairy tales in a productive dialogue with tradition as an extended appreciation of this productive creative and theoretical dialogue. The individual chapters evince a robust variety of conceptions and approaches, all thoroughly observant of the nature and workings of the relationship between story and genre, and theoretically informed by innovative critical approaches. Hence, the volume demonstrates the undeniable importance of myth and fairy tales in contemporary fiction, suggesting questions for future consideration, and hopefully pointing towards new texts and new critical inquiries.

Re-Thinking Literary Identities

Re-Thinking Literary Identities PDF Author: Laura Monrós-Gaspar
Publisher: Universitat de València
ISBN: 8491342613
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
Great Britain is changing, and so is Europe. The aim of this book, therefore, is to reflect upon the processes of (re)creation of art and literature within and against the backdrop of the shifting paradigms of the world as we know it. At a time when the political relations between Great Britain, Europe and the rest of the world are being redefined, this book examines the (de)construction of modern identities through the (de)codification of classical and contemporary mythologies.

Modern American Drama: Playwriting 2000-2009

Modern American Drama: Playwriting 2000-2009 PDF Author: Julia Listengarten
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350024759
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
The Decades of Modern American Drama 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: * Theresa Rebeck: Omnium Gatherum (2003), Mauritius (2007), and The Understudy (2008); * Sarah Ruhl: Eurydice (2003), Clean House (2004), and In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play) (2009); * Lynn Nottage: Intimate Apparel (2003), Fabulation or Re-Education of Undine (2004), and Ruined (2008); * Charles Mee: Big Love (2000), Wintertime (2005), and Hotel Cassiopeia (2006).

Political Adaptation in Canadian Theatre

Political Adaptation in Canadian Theatre PDF Author: Kailin Wright
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0228003245
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 231

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Book Description
In Canada, adaptation is a national mode of survival, but it is also a way to create radical change. Throughout history, Canadians have been inheritors and adaptors: of political systems, stories, and customs from the old world and the new. More than updating popular narratives, adaptation informs understandings of culture, race, gender, and sexuality, as well as individual experiences. In Political Adaptation in Canadian Theatre Kailin Wright investigates adaptations that retell popular stories with a political purpose and examines how they acknowledge diverse realities and transform our past. Political Adaptation in Canadian Theatre explores adaptations of Canadian history, Shakespeare, Greek mythologies, and Indigenous history by playwrights who identify as English-Canadian, African-Canadian, French-Canadian, French, Kuna Rappahannock, and Delaware from the Six Nations. Along with new considerations of the activist potential of popular Canadian theatre, this book outlines eight strategies that adaptors employ to challenge conceptions of what it means to be Indigenous, Black, queer, or female. Recent cancellations of theatre productions whose creators borrowed elements from minority cultures demonstrate the need for a distinction between political adaptation and cultural appropriation. Wright builds on Linda Hutcheon's definition of adaptation as repetition with difference and applies identification theory to illustrate how political adaptation at once underlines and undermines its canonical source. An exciting intervention in adaptation studies, Political Adaptation in Canadian Theatre unsettles the dynamics of popular and political theatre and rethinks the ways performance can contribute to how one country defines itself.

The Greek Trilogy of Luis Alfaro

The Greek Trilogy of Luis Alfaro PDF Author: Luis Alfaro
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 135015542X
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
Winner of the London Hellenic Prize 2020 The Greek Trilogy of Luis Alfaro gathers together for the first time the three 'Greek' plays of the MacArthur Genius Award-winning Chicanx playwright and performance artist. Based respectively on Sophocles' Electra and Oedipus, and Euripides' Medea, Alfaro's Electricidad, Oedipus El Rey, and Mojada transplant ancient themes and problems into the 21st century streets of Los Angeles and New York, in order to give voice to the concerns of the Chicanx and wider Latinx communities. From performances around the world including sold-out runs at New York's Public Theater, these texts are extremely important to those studying classical reception, Greek theatre and Chicanx writers. This unique anthology features definitive editions of all three plays alongside a comprehensive introduction which provides a critical overview of Luis Alfaro's work, accentuating not only the unique nature of these three 'urban' adaptations of ancient Greek tragedy but also the manner in which they address present-day Chicanx and Latinx socio-political realities across the United States. A brief introduction to each play and its overall themes precedes the text of the drama. The anthology concludes with exclusive supplementary material aimed at enhancing understanding of Alfaro's plays: a 'Performance History' timeline outlining the performance history of the plays; an alphabetical 'Glossary' explaining the most common terms in Spanish and Spanglish appearing in each play; and a 'Further Reading' list providing primary and secondary bibliography for each play. The anthology is completed by a new interview with Alfaro which addresses key topics such as Alfaro's engagement with ancient Greek drama and his work with Chicanx communities across the United States, thus providing a critical contextualisation of these critically-acclaimed plays.

Conversations with Beth Henley

Conversations with Beth Henley PDF Author: Jackson R. Bryer
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 1496844319
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 163

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Book Description
With roots in the American South, Beth Henley (b. 1952) has for four decades been a working playwright and screenwriter. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1981 at the age of twenty-eight, Henley so far has written twenty-five produced plays that are always original, usually darkly comic, and often experimental. In these interviews, Henley speaks of the plays, from her early crowd-pleasers, Crimes of the Heart and The Miss Firecracker Contest, to her more experimental plays, including The Debutante Ball and Control Freaks, to her brilliant and time-bending play, The Jacksonian. Henley is a master at writing about the duality of human experience—the beautiful and the grotesque, the cruel and the loving. This duality provokes in Henley both amazement and compassion. She discusses here not only her admiration for Chekhov and other influences, but also her process of bringing a play from notebooks of images and bits of dialogues through rumination, writing, and rewriting to rehearsals and previews. The interviews range from 1981, just before she won the Pulitzer Prize, to 2020 and cover nearly forty years of a creative life, which, as Henley remarks in the most recent interview, is “such a life worth living: to be in tune with the creative process.”

Contemporary Women Playwrights

Contemporary Women Playwrights PDF Author: Penny Farfan
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350316431
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 486

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Book Description
Breaking new ground in this century, this wide-ranging collection of essays is the first of its kind to address the work of contemporary international women playwrights. The book considers the work of established playwrights such as Caryl Churchill, Marie Clements, Lara Foot-Newton, Maria Irene Fornes, Sarah Kane, Lisa Kron, Young Jean Lee, Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori Parks, Djanet Sears, Caridad Svich, and Judith Thompson, but it also foregrounds important plays by many emerging writers. Divided into three sections-Histories, Conflicts, and Genres-the book explores such topics as the feminist history play, solo performance, transcultural dramaturgies, the identity play, the gendered terrain of war, and eco-drama, and encompasses work from the United States, Canada, Latin America, Oceania, South Africa, Egypt, and the United Kingdom. With contributions from leading international scholars and an introductory overview of the concerns and challenges facing women playwrights in this new century, Contemporary Women Playwrights explores the diversity and power of women's playwriting since 1990, highlighting key voices and examining crucial critical and theoretical developments within the field.