August Wilson's Pittsburgh Cycle: Critical Perspectives on the Plays

August Wilson's Pittsburgh Cycle: Critical Perspectives on the Plays

by Sandra G. Shannon (Editor)
August Wilson's Pittsburgh Cycle: Critical Perspectives on the Plays

August Wilson's Pittsburgh Cycle: Critical Perspectives on the Plays

by Sandra G. Shannon (Editor)

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Overview

Providing a detailed study of American playwright August Wilson (1945-2005), this collection of new essays explores the development of the author's ethos across his twenty-five-year creative career—a process that transformed his life as he retraced the lives of his fellow "Africans in America." While Wilson's narratives of Pittsburgh and Chicago are microcosms of black life in America, they also reflect the psychological trauma of his disconnection with his biological father, his impassioned efforts to discover and reconnect with the blues, with Africa and with poet/activist Amiri Baraka, and his love for the vernacular of Pittsburgh.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780786478002
Publisher: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Publication date: 01/14/2016
Pages: 220
Product dimensions: 5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)
Age Range: 18 Years

About the Author

Sandra G. Shannon is a professor of African American Literature in the English department at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Two seminal books along with numerous chapters, and articles on Wilson have established her as a leading scholar in Wilson Studies. She was a key consultant for and contributor to the highly acclaimed PBS American Masters documentary, August Wilson: The Ground on Which I Stand (February 2015). She lives in Bowie, Maryland.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments v

Introduction 1

"The emancipated century": Remapping History, Reclaiming Memory in August Wilson's Dramatic Landscapes of the 20th Century Joyce Hope Scott 15

"A big bend there, a tree by the shore": Situated Identity in The Janitor Jacqueline Zeff 39

Two Trains Running: Bridging Diana Taylor's "rift" and Narrating Manning Marable's "living history" Sarah Saddler Paul Bryant-Jackson 49

World War II History/history: Essential Contexts in Seven Guitars Ellen Bonds 60

The Use of Stereotype and Archetype in Ma Rainey's Black Bottom Michael Downing 76

Gem of the Oceans Fugitive Movements Isaiah Matthew Wooden 88

Reclaiming the Mother: Women, Documents and the Condition of the Mother in Gem of the Ocean and Ma Rainey's Black Bottom Jesslyn Collins-Frohlich 101

A Century Lacking Progress: The Fractured Community in Gem of the Ocean and King Medley II Christopher B. Bell 117

"He gonna give me my ham": The Use of Food as a Symbol for Social Justice Psyche Williams-Forson 128

Resurrecting "phantom limb[s] of the dismembered slave and god": Unveiling the Africanisms in Gem of the Ocean Artisia Green 142

Epiphany and the "drama of souls" Owen Seda 164

Conjuring Africa in August Wilson's Plays Connie Rapoo 175

Re-Evaluating the Legacy of the Ten-Play Cycle Susan C.W. Abbotson 187

About the Contributors 203

Index 205

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