Fornes: Theater in the Present Tense (Theater: Theory/Text/Performance) - Tapa dura

The work of Maria Irene Fornes, author of such acclaimed plays as Fefu and Her Friends, Mud, and The Conduct of Life, has for over three decades earned the attention of theater-goers, scholars and critics. She has won eight Obie awards, has provoked considerable controversy, and has consistently challenged and delighted the reader and spectator with her idiosyncratic voice and her serious and yet profoundly playful approach to the theater and to the issues of humanity, gender politics, and art. Diane Lynn Moroff focuses on Fornes's major plays, providing illuminating readings of her unique and irreverent body of work. The book traces the career of this influential playwright, director, and teacher, including the reception of her plays, the range of critical responses (particularly those of feminist critics), and an introduction to Fornes's theatrical philosophies. It looks at such critical issues in Fornes's work as the representation of female subjectivity, theater as metaphor and context, art as ritual, and the role of the spectator. In a final chapter, Fornes's plays including Abingdon Square and her most recent work, What of the Night? are examined in the context of the sexualization of character, an ongoing theme for Fornes. Fornes: Theater in the Present Tense will appeal to scholars and students in theater studies and women's studies and to anyone interested or engaged in contemporary theater. Diane Lynn Moroff is Assistant Professor of English, Oglethorpe University.

This book is the first full-length study of Maria Irene Fornes' plays. It begins with an overview of Fornes' thirty years in theater, focusing on the reception of her plays, the range of critical response, and provides an introduction to Fornes' theatrical philosophies. Ensuing chapters explore the metatheatrical characteristics of Fornes' earlier work from the 1960s, the representation of female subjectivity, theater as metaphor and context, art as ritual, and the role of the spectator, primarily through critical analysis of her plays of the 1970s and 1980s. The book concludes with an examination of the sexualization of character in Fornes' most recent plays, a theme that pervades much of her work. Directors, actors, and students of contemporary theater, and specifically of women's theater, will find this book not only an informative critique of Fornes, but a sourcebook for accessible interpretations of her complex theatrical texts.