August Wilson penned his first play after seeing a man shot to death. Horton Foote began writing plays to create parts for himself as an actor. Edward Albee faced commercial pressures to modify his scripts-and resisted. After Wit, Margaret Edson swore off playwriting altogether and decided to keep her day job as a kindergarten teacher, instead. The Playwright's Muse presents never-before-published interviews with some of the greatest names of American drama-all recent winners of the Pulitzer Prize. In these scintillating exchanges with eleven leading dramatists, we learn about their inspirations and begin to grasp how the creative process works in the mind of a writer. We learn how their first plays took shape, how it felt to read their first reviews, and what keeps them writing for theater today. Introductory essays on each playwright's life and work, written by theater artists and scholars with strong professional relationships to their subjects, provide additional insight into the writers' contributions to contemporary theater.

About the Author

Joan Herrington is Director of Women's Theatre and Associate Professor of Theatre at Western Michigan University. She is author of I Ain't Sorry For Nothin' IDone: August Wilson's Process of Playwriting.

Reviews

" The Playwright's Muse is straightforward in structure, moving from playwright to playwright and coupling an intellectual essay on each with an interview. It is one of those books that one might assume to be primarily of interest to playwrights; but, on the contrary, Herrington's classy collection is a perfect bedside read for those who simply love the theater--and love learning how the lives of its artists affect its creation." -- Ben Winters, TheaterMania.com

Book Information
ISBN 9780815337805
Author Joan Herrington
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Inc
Weight(grams) 590g