African Women Playwrights

Kathy A. Perkins is a professor of theatre at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her publications include Black South African Women: An Anthology of Plays, Strange Fruit: Plays on Lynching by American Women, and several other anthologies of plays.

"[African Women Playwrights] brings together an essential collection of writings by international women."--Feminist Formations “I have long wished there were a collection of the work of African women playwrights. This unique and valuable volume makes a truly significant contribution to the field of both African theatre and black women’s writing. The plays are stimulating and very interesting, dealing with a range of pertinent issues.”--Jane Plastow, coeditor of Theatre and Empowerment: Community Drama on the World Stage “These plays are fascinating to read; the plots and characters are varied, interesting, and well developed. Moreover, as the only collection [in English] of plays written exclusively by African women, this collection will be immensely appealing to students and scholars of theatre, literature, cultural studies, African studies, and women’s studies, as well as general readers who are interested in learning about contemporary African plays and playwrights.”--Judith Stephens-Lorenz, editor of The Plays of Georgia Douglas Johnson: From the New Negro Renaissance to the Civil Rights Movement

• ix   FOREWORD   Amandina Lihamba[Dar es Salaam, Tanzania]xi   ACKNOWLEDGMENTS1   INTRODUCTION   Kathy A. Perkins12   THE DILEMMA OF A GHOST   Ama Ata Aidoo[Ghana]62   OVER MY DEAD BODY   Violet Barungi[Uganda]100   SHE NO LONGER WEEPS   Tsitsi Dangarembga[Zimbabwe]140   BETTER DAYS COME IN BITTER WAYS   Nathalie Etoke[Cameroon]150   HOMECOMING   Andiah Kisia (Chika Okigbo)[Kenya]170   VUKANI! (WAKE UP!)   Sindiwe Magona[South Africa]222   A COLOURED PLACE   Malika Ndlovu (Lueen Conning)[South Africa]248   EDEWEDE (THE DAWN OF A NEW DAY)   Julie Okoh[Nigeria]318   IN THE CONTINUUM   Dania Gurira and Nikkole Salter[Zimbabwe and the United States]363   SELECTED READINGS AND PLAYS367   CONTRIBUTORS