The Compact Bedford Introduction to Drama

by Jacobus, Lee A.

• ISBN13: 9780312474898
• ISBN10: 031247489X
• Additional ISBN(s): 9780312436971
• Edition: 6th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-09-12
• Publisher: Bedford/St. Martin's
• More Book Details
• Purchase Benefits

Summary

The Compact Bedford Introduction to Dramapresents a well-balanced selection of plays, commentaries, and casebooks in a concise, affordable format. Its 29 chronologically arranged plays represent every major period from classic times to the present. With in-depth treatment of William Shakespeare, a strong representation of plays by women and American multicultural plays, and an exciting contemporary section loaded with prize winners,The Compact Bedford Introduction to Dramahas the plays you want to teach and features designed to help students think critically about all aspects of a play as a work of literature and as a performance.Giving students a rich understanding of the plays and the contexts from which they emerge, the anthology offers 33 commentaries, two casebooks, the most extensive collection of theater photographs available in a text of this kind, coverage of writing about drama, and a robust companion web site with help for students and instructors.

Author Biography

LEE A. JACOBUS is professor emeritus of English at the University of Connecticut and the author/editor of popular English textbooks, among them A World of Ideas: Essential Readings for College Writers, Sixth Edition (Bedford/St. Martin's, 2002); The Longman Anthology of American Drama; and Literature: An Introduction to Critical Reading. Professor Jacobus has written scholarly books on Paradise Lost, on the works of John Cleveland, and on the works of Shakespeare, including Shakespeare and the Dialectic of Certainty. He is also a playwright; two of his plays -- Fair Warning and Long Division -- were produced in New York by the American Theater of Actors; Dance Therapy , three one-act plays, was produced in New York at Where Eagles Dare Theatre.  He is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America.  Volcanic Jesus, his book of short stories, is set in Hawaii.

Table of Contents

Preface for Instructors

Introduction: Thinking about Drama

What Is Drama?

Drama and Ritual

Drama: The Illusion of Reality

Seeing a Play Onstage

        Theaters and Their Effect

Reading a Play

The Great Ages of Drama

        Greek Drama

        Roman Drama

        Medieval Drama 

        Renaissance Drama

        Late Seventeenth-and Eighteenth-Century Drama

        Nineteenth-Century Drama through the Turn of the Twentieth Century

        Drama in the Early and Mid-Twentieth Century

        Contemporary Drama

Genres of Drama

        Tragedy

        Comedy

        Tragicomedy

Elements of Drama

        Plot

        Characterization

        Setting

        Dialogue

        Music

        Movement

        Theme

Lady Gregory, The Rising of the Moon

Greek Drama

Origins of Greek Drama

        The Greeks and Their Gods

        The Greek Stage

        *The Greek Actor

Genres of Greek Drama

        Tragedy

        Satyr Plays

        Comedy

The Great Age of Greek Drama

Greek Drama Timeline

 

Sophocles, Oedipus Rex (Translated by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald)

        Oedipus Rex in Performance

Commentaries on Oedipus Rex

Aristotle, Poetics: Comedy and Epic and Tragedy

Sigmund Freud, The Oedipus Complex

Claude Lévi-Strauss, From The Structural Study of Myth

Aristophanes, Lysistrata (Translated by Dudley Fitts)

        Lysistrata in Performance

 

Roman Drama

Indigenous Sources

The Greek Influence

The Roman Stage

*The Roman Actor

Roman Drama Timeline

Roman Dramatists

        Plautus, Excerpt from The Twin Menaechmi (Act III)

        Terence, Excerpt from The Brothers (Act V)

        Seneca, Excerpt from Thyestes (Act V, Scene ii)

Medieval Drama

The Role of the Church

Miracle Plays

Mystery Plays

Morality Plays

The Medieval Stage

*The Medieval Actor

Medieval Drama Timeline

Hrosvitha, Dulcitius (Translated by K.M. Wilson)

        Dulcitius in Performance

Commentary on Hrosvitha

Sue-Ellen Case, Re-viewing Hrotsvit

Anonymous, Everyman (Edited by A.C. Cawley)

        Everyman in Performance

 

Renaissance Drama

Italian Drama

        The Italian Theater

        Commedia dell’Arte

Elizabethan Drama

       The Elizabethan Theater

       * The Elizabethan Actor

        The Elizabethan Audience

        Female Characters on the English Stage

        The Masque

Spanish Drama

Renaissance Drama Timeline

 

William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

        A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Performance

Commentaries on A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Linda Bamber, On A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Peter Brook, The Play is a Message…

Clive Barnes, Review of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

 

William Shakespeare, Othello

        Othello in Performance

Commentaries on Othello

Virginia Mason Vaughan, Macready’s Othello

Margaret Webster, Shakespeare without Tears

 

Ben Jonson, The Masque of Blackness

        The Masque of Blackness in Performance

Commentary on Jonson

Eldred Jones, Africa in English Masque and Pageantry

 

Late Seventeenth-and-Eighteenth Century Drama

The Restoration: Rebirth of Drama

Theater on the Continent: Neoclassicism

        French Comedy: Moliere

*Theater in England: The Restoration

        Restoration Comedy in England

        Eighteenth-Century Drama

* The Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Actor

Drama in Japan

Late Seventeenth-and Eighteenth-Century Drama Timeline

* Moliere, Tartuffe (Translated by Richard Wilbur)

        Tartuffe in Performance

Commentary on Moliere

* Mel Gussow, Review of ‘Tartuffe’

 

* Aphra Behn, The Rover; Or, The Banished Cavaliers

         The Rover; or, The Banished Cavaliers in Performance

Commentaries on Behn

* Elaine Hobby, Courtship and Marriage in The Rover

 

Chikamatsu Monzaemon, The Love Suicides at Sonezaki

        The Love Suicides at Sonezaki in Performance

Commentary on Chikamatsu Monzaemon

Donald H. Shiveley, The Development of Theater Buildings

 

Nineteenth-Century Drama through the Turn of the Twentieth Century

The Nineteenth Century Theater

* The Nineteenth-Century Actor

Romantic Drama

Melodrama

The Well-Made Play

The Rise of Realism

Nineteenth-Century Drama Timeline

 

Henrik Ibsen, A Doll House (Translated by Rolf Fjelde)

        A Doll House in Performance

Commentaries on A Doll House

Henrik Ibsen, Notes for the Modern Tragedy

Muriel C. Bradbrook, A Doll’s House: Ibsen the Moralist

 

August Strindberg, Miss Julie (Translated by Harry G. Carlson)

        Miss Julie in Performance

Commentary on Strindberg

August Strindberg, From the Preface to Miss Julie

* A STYLISTIC CASEBOOK

American Melodrama

        Anna Cora Mowatt, Fashion (Act V)

        George L. Aiken, Uncle Tom’s Cabin (Act VI)

        Bronson Howard, Shenandoah (Act III)

        Dion Boucicault, Notes on Acting

        Gary A. Richardson, Melodrama as National History

        Michael R. Booth, A Defense of Nineteenth-Century Drama

 

Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for Serious People

        The Importance of Being Earnest in Performance

Commentary on Wilde

* Joseph Donohue, Interview with Sir Peter Hall, director of The Importance of Being Earnest

 

Anton Chekhov, The Cherry Orchard

        The Cherry Orchard in Performance

Commentaries on Chekhov

Anton Chekhov, From Letters of Anton Chekhov

Peter Brook, On Chekhov

Drama in the Early and Mid-Twentieth Century

The Heritage of Realism

Realism and Myth

Myth and Culture

Poetic Realism

Social Realism

Realism and Expressionism

Antirealism

Epic Theater

Absurdist Drama

* The Early and Mid-Twentieth Century Stage

* The Early and Mid-Twentieth Century Actor

Early and Mid-Twentieth Century Drama Timeline

 

Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author (Translated by Edward Storer)

         Six Characters in Search of an Author in Performance

 

Eugene O’Neill, Desire Under the Elms

        Desire Under the Elms in Performance

Commentary on O’Neill

* Louise Kennedy, "‘He knows that it's OK not to know’: Director János Szász approaches ‘Desire’ with an open mind"

 

Bertolt Brecht, Mother Courage and Her Children: A Chronicle of the Thirty Years’ War (Translated by John Willett)

        Mother Courage in Performance

Commentaries on Brecht

Bertolt Brecht, The Alienation Effect

Bertolt Brecht, Notes for Mother Courage, Scene 12

 

Tennessee Williams, The Glass Menagerie

        The Glass Menagerie in Performance

Commentaries on The Glass Menagerie

Lewis Nichols, Review of The Glass Menagerie

Donald Spoto, Laurette Taylor in The Glass Menagerie

Benjamin Nelson, Problems in The Glass Menagerie

 

Arthur Miller, Death of a Salesman: Certain Private Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem

        Death of a Salesman in Performance

Commentaries on Miller

Arthur Miller, In Memoriam

Arthur Miller, Tragedy and the Common Man

 

*A PRODUCTION CASEBOOK

Death of a Salesman

        Jo Mielziner, Designing a Play: Death of a Salesman

        Brenda Murphy, Death of a Salesman: The Design Process

        Brenda Murphy, Racial Consciousness in Casting Death of a Salesman

        Elia Kazan, Directing Death of a Salesman

        Arthur Miller, Casting Death of a Salesman

        June Schlueter and James K. Flanagan, Memorable Willy

        Catherine Diamond, Death of a Salesman in Taipei

 

* Samuel Beckett, Krapp’s Last Tape

        Krapp’s Last Tape in Performance

Commentaries on Beckett

* Martin Esslin, The Theater of the Absurd

* Ruby Cohn, Beckett Directing

 

Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun

        A Raisin in the Sun in Performance

 

Contemporary Drama

Experimentation

        Theater of Cruelty

        Environmental Theater

        "Poor Theater"

        Theater of Images

        Gay and Lesbian Theater and Other * Ensembles

        Experiments with Theater Space

Experimentation within the Tradition

* The Contemporary Theater

* The Contemporary Actor

Contemporary Drama Timeline

 

Athol Fugard, "Master Harold" … and the boys

        Master Harold …and the boys in Performance

Commentaries on Fugard

Heinrich von Staden, Interview with Athol Fugard

Athol Fugard, From Notebooks 1960-1977

 

August Wilson, Fences

        Fences in Performance

Commentary on Fences

* Joan Herrington, The Development of Fences

 

* Tony Kushner, Angels in America: Millennium Approaches

        Angels in America: Millennium Approaches in Performance

Commentary on Kushner

*Andrea Bernstein, Interview with Tony Kushner

 

*Caryl Churchill, Far Away

        Far Away in Performance

* Sarah Ruhl, The Clean House

        The Clean House in Performance

 

* Suzan-Lori Parks, selections from 365 Days/365 Plays

        365 Days in Performance

 

Appendices

Writing about Drama

Why Write about Drama?

Conventions in Writing Criticism about Drama

Approaches to Criticism

        Reader Response

        Close Reading

From Prewriting to Final Draft: A Sample Essay on The Rising of the Moon

How to Write a Review

        What Is the Purpose of a Review?

        What You Need to Write a Good Review

        Preparing to Review a Classic Play

        Preparing to Review a New Play

        Guidelines for Writing Reviews

        Sample Review

Glossary of Dramatic Terms

* new to this edition