Shelf Life
A highly-selective list of books worth keeping nearby on a handy bookshelf.
Craft/Writing/Theory
A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre, Ann Bogart
The Art of Dramatic Writing, Lajos Egri
Constructing a Play, Marian Gallaway
The Crafty Art of Playmaking, Alan Ayckbourn
Creating Unforgettable Characters, Linda Seger
The Elements of Playwriting, Louis E. Catron
New Playwriting Strategies: A Language-Based Approach to Playwriting,
Paul C. Castagno
The Playwright as Thinker, Eric Bentley
Playwriting: The Structure of Action, Sam Smiley
The Playwright's Workbook, Jean-Claude van Italie
Ridiculous Theatre: Scourge of Human Folly, Charles Ludlam
Theatre Language: A Study of Arden, Osborne, Pinter and Wesker,
John Russell Brown
The Theory of the Modern Stage: An Introduction to Modern Theatre
and Drama, edited by Eric Bentley
Three Uses of the Knife, David Mamet
Writing in Restaurants, David Mamet
Interviews
American Voices: Five Contemporary Playwrights in Essays and
Interviews, Esther Harriott
Connecting Flights, Robert Lepage in conversation with Rémy Charest
In Their Own Words: Contemporary American Playwrights, David Savran
The Playwright’s Voice: American Dramatists on Memory, Writing
and the Politics of Culture, David Savran
Playwrights at Work, (Paris Revew Interviews) edited by George Plimpton
Playwrights on Playwriting, edited by Toby Cole
Women Who Write Plays: Interviews with American Dramatists,
edited by Alexis Greene
Biography/Autobiography
Act One, Moss Hart
Cole Porter, William McBrien
Rewrites, Neil Simon
Memoirs, Tennessee Williams
Plays/Anthologies
Grove New American Theater, an anthology edited by Michael Feingold
I Am a Camera, John van Druten
Marat/Sade, Peter Weiss
Staging Gay Lives: An Anthology of Contemporary Gay Theater,
edited by John M. Clum
Torch Song Trilogy, Harvey Fierstein
