Anthony Jenkins – författare

In this book Anthony Jenkins examines seven Victorian playwrights who, despite their own ideals and prejudices and the theatre's conservatism, tried to come to terms with such momentous subjects as womanliness, honour and money. The opening chapter briefly describes the social transformation of theatre during the century and the increasing respectability of actors and playhouses. Subsequent chapters deal with the drama of Edward Bulwer, Tom Robertson, W. S. Gilbert, H. A. Jones, Arthur Pinero, Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw. Each of these dramatists sought to create a theatre of ideas according to his own vision of art and society. The plays are examined within the social and political context of the Reform Bill, the Revolution of 1848, the Great Exhibition, royal patronage, censorship and copyright, and, above all, the 'Woman Question'. Jenkins combines politics and theatrical history with literary criticism to shed provocative light on the struggle to relate the London theatre to the realities of Victorian England.

Addressed to the enthusiastic theatregoer as well as to students of contemporary theatre, this new edition includes a fresh chapter on Hapgood. Anthony Jenkins is an actor and director as well as a teacher of drama, and this refreshing perspective informs his writing. He is interested in how Stoppard's plays work in the theatre (and on radio and television), and describes the playwright's use of stage space and action, interior emotions, the pauses in the dialogue, as well as the dialogue itself. Recently, critics have pointed to the political emphasis of the later plays. To Jenkins, Stoppard's career is all of a piece and is best described chronologically. The whole dramatic output, with the exception of the adaptations and film-scripts, is examined in detail: three short stories and the novel Lord Malquist and Mr Moon are considered as essential to an appreciation of Stoppard's theatrical imagination; comments on the radio and television plays interweave and support discussion of the major plays from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to The Real Thing and Hapgood.

In this book Anthony Jenkins examines seven Victorian playwrights who, despite their own ideals and prejudices and the theatre's conservatism, tried to come to terms with such momentous subjects as womanliness, honour and money. The opening chapter briefly describes the social transformation of theatre during the century and the increasing respectability of actors and playhouses. Subsequent chapters deal with the drama of Edward Bulwer, Tom Robertson, W. S. Gilbert, H. A. Jones, Arthur Pinero, Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw. Each of these dramatists sought to create a theatre of ideas according to his own vision of art and society. The plays are examined within the social and political context of the Reform Bill, the Revolution of 1848, the Great Exhibition, royal patronage, censorship and copyright, and, above all, the 'Woman Question'. Jenkins combines politics and theatrical history with literary criticism to shed provocative light on the struggle to relate the London theatre to the realities of Victorian England.