UofL Libraries: TA 571/HUM 561- Playscript Interpretation: Home

Play Databases and Indexes

Black Drama

Play Index

U of L Libraries Catalog- for Books, Play Scripts, Articles, and More

The catalog can be used to search for a variety of books on theatre related topics, including individual plays and anthologies. It is also a great source for critical and interpretative essays or background information. The catalog includes information in various formats including books, videos, and a selection of articles.

UofL Libraries Catalog

Searching the U of L Libraries Catalog (video tutorial)

Below is a short tutorial on searching within the library catalog.

" Books, How to Find

Lili P. Segal Memorial Theater Collection

The Lili P. Segal Memorial Theater Collection includes videos relating to the theater, the performing arts and theater history with a primary focus on videotaped productions of actual stage performances.

" Lili P. Segal Memorial Theater Collection

Choosing the Best Resource & Evaluating Information

It is important to evaluate information that you find in print and online sources, especially those found through commercial sites like Google. Using the appropriate search tools can help with this. See the following links for evaluating information sources and choosing appropriate tools/sources for scholarly research.

Selected Books

Post-Imperial Brecht by Loren Kruger; David Bradby (Contribution by)
ISBN: 0521817080
Publication Date: 2004-08-19
Post-Imperial Brecht challenges prevailing views of Brecht's theatre and politics. Most political theatre critics place Brecht between West and East in the Cold War, and a few have recently explored Brecht's impact as a Northern writer on the global South. Loren Kruger is the first to argue that Brecht's impact as a political dramatist, director and theoretical writer makes full sense only when seen in a post-imperial framework that links the East/West axis between US capitalism and Soviet communism with the North/South axis of postcolonial resistance to imperialism. This framework highlights Brecht's arguments with theorists like Benjamin, Bloch, and Lukacs. It also shows surprising connections between socialist East Germany, where Brecht's 1950s projects impressed the emerging Heiner Mller, and apartheid-era South Africa, where his work appeared on the apartheid as well as anti-apartheid stage.
The African American Theatrical Body by Soyica Diggs Colbert
ISBN: 9781107014381
Publication Date: 2011-10-06
Presenting an innovative approach to performance studies and literary history, Soyica Colbert argues for the centrality of black performance traditions to African American literature, including preaching, dancing, blues and gospel, and theatre itself, showing how these performance traditions create the 'performative ground' of African American literary texts. Across a century of literary production using the physical space of the theatre and the discursive space of the page, W. E. B. Du Bois, Zora Neale Hurston, James Baldwin, August Wilson and others deploy performances to re-situate black people in time and space. The study examines African American plays past and present, including A Raisin in the Sun, Blues for Mister Charlie and Joe Turner's Come and Gone, demonstrating how African American dramatists stage black performances in their plays as acts of recuperation and restoration, creating sites that have the potential to repair the damage caused by slavery and its aftermath.
The Age of Shakespeare by Frank Kermode
ISBN: 0679642447
Publication Date: 2004-02-03
Offers insight into the life of William Shakespeare and the writing of his plays through an analysis of the Elizabethan era, describing the religious and dynastic events that defined Tudor England.
August Wilson by Mary Ellen; Mary Ellen Snodgrass
ISBN: 0786419032
Publication Date: 2004-05-24
Award-winning African-American playwright August Wilson has created a cultural chronicle of black America through such works as Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Fences, Joe Turner's Come and Gone, The Piano Lesson, and Two Trains Running. The authentic ring of wit, anecdote, homily, and plaint has proved that a self-educated Pittsburgh ghetto native can grow into a revered conduit for a century of black achievement. He forces readers and audiences to examine the despair generated by poverty and racism, exploring African-American heritage and experiences over the course of the twentieth century. This literary companion provides the reader with a source of basic data and analysis on characters, dates, events, allusions, staging strategies, and themes from the work on one of America's finest playwrights.
Death and the King's Horseman by Wole Soyinka; Simon Gikandi (Editor)
ISBN: 0393977617
Publication Date: 2002-11-05
"Backgrounds and Sources" helps readers understand Death and the King's Horseman's traditional African contexts and the role of theater in African culture. Included are a map of Yoruba-land, discussions of Yoruban religious beliefs and cultural traditions, Soyinka on the various forms that theater has taken in African culture in order to survive, and Anthony Appiah on Soyinka's struggle with the problem of African identity in the creation of Death and the King's Horseman. Commentary on the play as both a theatrical production and a classroom text is provided by Gerald Moore, Tanure Ojaide, and Martin Rohmer."Criticism" collects nine major essays on the play and the difficulties it presents to readers. Contributors include D. S. Izevbaye, Eldred Durosimi Jones, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Biodun Jeyifo, Wole Soyinka, Joan Hepburn, Adebayo Williams, David Richards, and Olakunle George.A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.
Shakespeare Matters by Lloyd Davis (Editor)
ISBN: 087413790X
Publication Date: 2003-07-01
'Shakespeare Matters' is a collection of original essays which addresses three significant areas in contemporary Shakespeare studies: interpretations of the plays in their historical and social contexts; the varying roles of Shakespeare's work in educational practices and traditions; and performance conventions and textual issues from the sixteenth century to the present.

TA 571/HUM 561- Playscript Interpretation: Home