Taking Center Stage: Feminism in Contemporary U. S. Drama Book

Successor to the author's ground-breaking Feminist Drama (1979; hailed by CHOICE as "... an admirable example of the new feminist scholarship"), this new book describes the evolution of contemporary American feminist thought since that volume appeared and traces its themes in a cross-section of contemporary plays. Brown develops new and more encompassing definitions of feminism and feminist drama applicable to the wealth of theory and drama that has appeared since 1979. Giving voice to silenced women, glorifying those defined by the patriarchy as marginal, and propounding a feminist ethic based on respect for the environmental context and for the concrete, everyday world are among the central concerns of the new feminist drama. Plays by Jane Chambers, Caryl Churchill, Darrah Cloud, Kathleen Collins, Holly Hughes, Marsha Norman, David Rabe, Ntozake Shange, and Jane Wagner receive close textual analysis in the book.