Family Ties. An Introduction to Postwar American Drama

Family Ties: An Introduction to Postwar American Drama analyzes several important American playwrights of the past decades, focusing on the recurrent theme of the family in some of the most famous plays ever staged around the world. Traditional family relationships or reinventions of the family unit are illustrated by relying on the primary sources and discussing relevant critical opinions. At the same time this study investigates the ties established between playwrights whose commonality of perspective configures certain familial groupings. Thus the first chapter explores the works of the representatives of the realist family drama, Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller, while the second chapter looks at the experimental plays of Edward Albee and Sam Shepard, sharing the motif of the absent son. The last two chapters propose dissenting visions in the context of American drama as August Wilson and Suzan-Lori Parks offer African American perspectives, while Tony Kushner and Paula Vogel reconsider the mainstream idea of the family in their respective works. The volume is a useful instrument both for the readers who would like to discover major American plays and for those who are interested in new interpretations and the latest research in the field.