American Political Plays: AN ANTHOLOGY [Hardcover]

Allan Havis (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 19, 2001

Richly deserving of wider exposure in the theater and the classroom, these sly, remarkable scripts touch on the forceful and salient issues of the 1990s, including the Gulf War, racial and sexual relations, crises unique to big cities, immigration and multiculturalism, art and censorship, revisionist history, academic freedom, and the transformation of the American presidency. "The American Play" by Suzan-Lori Parks features an Abraham Lincoln impersonator trapped in an outrageous, Beckett-like world, while Naomi Wallace's. "In the Heart of America" centers on a Palestinian American from Atlanta who is caught up in the Persian Gulf conflict. "Kokoro" by Velina Hasu Houston chillingly depicts the stark predicament of a Japanese mother caught between two impossible worlds; "Marisol" by Jos Rivera reveals the dark fairytale life of a young Latin woman in a wartorn, apocalyptic New York. "The Gift by Allan Havis" confronts overwhelming moral ambiguity in the farcical realm of university politics, while "Nixon's Nixon" by Russell Lees offers an adroit treatment of the fascinating, tortured Nixon/Kissinger relationship. The collection closes with Mac Wellman's "7 Blowjobs", a wicked send-up of the compromise politics that determined the fate of the National Endowment for the Arts. Taken together, these seven plays present an eclectic web of social thought and imagination that are uniquely American, offering the reader a splendid, honest study of a rich society in search of itself.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Havis calls these seven plays political because each of them reflects prevailing ideas and significant events of the 1990s. Naomi Wallace's "In the Heart of America" portrays an Arab American's dilemma when he is called upon to fight other Arabs in George Bush Sr.'s Persian Gulf War in 1990. She also explores racism and homophobia in the U.S. Army. Havis's own "The Gift," a play about academic politics, exposes a university president's homosexual relationship with a young student. Russell Lees's "Nixon's Nixon," is a riveting fictional conversation between Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger on August 7, 1994, just before Nixon's resignation from the Presidency. Other playwrights included are: Suzan-Lori Parks, Velina Hasu Houston, Jos‚ Rivera, and Mac Wellman. These seven plays are gripping and entertaining from start to finish. Highly recommended for academic collections and all public libraries. Bob Ivey, Univ. of Memphis
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Review

"These seven plays are gripping and entertaining from start to finish. Highly recommended." -- Library JournalADVANCE PRAISE:"This valuable anthology provides a rich, multifaceted, and highly representative look at the 1990s. Strong, individuated, and wide- ranging in tone, these radical plays will be of great interest to student playwrights, actors and directors, and cultural critics: to playwrights because of their usefulness as models; to actors and directors because of their challenging experimental form and content; and to critics because they reflect so many significant aspects of American society."-- Jody McAuliffe, editor of Plays, Movies, and Critics."Gripping and entertaining from start to finish." -- Library Journal.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: University of Illinois Press (October 19, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0252026942
• ISBN-13: 978-0252026942
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,204,347 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)