May All Your Fences Have Gates: Essyas on the Drama of August Wilson

by Alan Nadel (Editor)

Overview

This stimulating collection of essays, the first comprehensive critical examination of the work of two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson, deals individually with his five major plays and also addresses issues crucial to Wilson's canon: the role of history, the relationship of African ritual to African American drama, gender relations in the African American community, music and cultural identity, the influence of Romare Bearden's collages, and the politics of drama. The collection includes essays by virtually all the scholars who have currently published on Wilson along with many established and newer scholars of drama and/or African American literature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781587291647
Publisher:	University of Iowa Press
Publication date:	11/01/1993
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	282
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Alan Nadel is the Bryan Chair of American literature and culture at the University of Kentucky, where he teaches literature and film. He is the editor of May All Your Fences Have Gates(Iowa, 1993) and the author of Invisible Criticism: Ralph Ellison and the American Canon (Iowa, 1991), Containment Culture: American Narratives, Postmodernism, and the Atomic Age, Flatlining on the Field of Dreams: Cultural Narratives in the Films of President Reagan's America, and Television in Black and White America: Race and National Identity.

Table of Contents

CONTENTS
Preface Nadel Alan
Introduction Nadel Alan
The History Lesson: Authenticity and Anachronism in August Wilson's Plays Flèche Anne
August Wilson's Burden: The Function of Neoclassical Jazz Werner Craig
Speaking of Ma Rainey / Talking about the Blues Adell Sandra
Filling the Time: Reading History in the Drama of August Wilson Timpane John
Boundaries, Logistics, and Identity: The Property of Metaphor in Fences and Joe Turner's Come and Gone Nadel Alan
Ghosts on the Piano: August Wilson and the Representation of Black American History Morales Michael
American History as “Loud Talking” in Two Trains Running Rocha Mark William
Romare Bearden, August Wilson, and the Traditions of African Performance Fishman Joan
The Ground on Which I Stand: August Wilson's Perspective on African American Women Shannon Sandra G.
August Wilson's Women Elam, Jr. Harry J.
August Wilson's Gender Lesson Kubitschek Missy Dehn
I Want a Black Director Wilson August
“The Crookeds with the Straights”: Fences, Race, and the Politics of Adaptation Awkward Michael
Annotated Bibliography of Works by and about August Wilson Shannon Sandra G.
Notes on Contributors
Index to the Plays