Playwriting category: 893 books

Will Dunne first brought the workshop experience down to the desk level with The Dramatic Writer’s Companion, offering practical exercises to help playwrights and screenwriters work through the problems that arise in developing their scripts. Now writers looking to further enhance their storytelling...

In My Mothers Front Porch, four siblings celebrate their mothers life while struggling to deal with her declining years. Staying Connected offers an older persons frustrated yelp against technology mayhem. In 8th Grade Reunion, childhood friends discover who they are 35 years later. Brooklyn Rx follows...

A boy wakes up in a field somewhere in London. He's a door-to-door salesman: a pedlar boy. An encounter with an old acquaintance sends him into a frenzied questioning of everything: his life, his world, where he's coming from and where he's going to. peddling received its world premiere at...

It was very much my intention not to state the name of any particular place in the script as I thought that the telling of the story of the Angel Babies is in itself about believing in who you are, and also about facing up to your fears. The Angel Babies is also set loosely in accordance with the...

Writing Plays is the invaluable and comprehensive guide to anyone who wants to write plays and get them performed. It covers the basics of the theatre, creating and working with characters, writing realistic speech and dialogue, constructing compelling plots and creating a great ending. There...

Written specifically for GCSE students by academics in the field, the Methuen Drama GCSE Guides conveniently gather indispensable resources and tips for successful understanding and writing all in one place, preparing students to approach their exams with confidence. Key features include a...

Anna Deavere Smith, the award-winning playwright and actor, has spent a lifetime listening—really listening—to the people around her. As a child in the segregated Baltimore of the early 1960s, Smith absorbed the words of her parents, teachers, neighbors—even train conductors—and realized that...

Set in Brooklyn, this gripping mystery begins when attractive, level-headed Sylvia Gellburg suddenly loses her ability to walk. The only clue to her mysterious ailment lies in her obsession with news accounts from Germany.

A treasure-trove of scene-writing wisdom from award-winning author and teacher Sandra Scofield To write a good scene, you have to know the following: • Every scene has an EVENT • Every scene has a FUNCTION in the narrative • Every scene has a STRUCTURE: a beginning, middle, and end • Every...

J.B. Priestley is considered by many to be an old-fashioned playwright whose work is locked in a pre-war world of provincialism and whose ideas are way past their sell-by date. In Time and the Rose Garden, internationally recognised author Anthony Peake re-assesses the plays and novels of this fascinating...

John Galsworthy first published in 1897 with a collection of short stories entitled “The Four Winds”. For the next 7 years he published these and all works under his pen name John Sinjohn. It was only upon the death of his father and the publication of “The Island Pharisees” in 1904 that he...

The Importance of Being Earnest is a play by Oscar Wilde, a comedy of manners on the seriousness of society in either three or four acts (depending on edition) inspired by W. S. Gilbert's Engaged. It was first performed for the public on February 14, 1895 at the St. James's Theatre in London....

Lady Windermere's Fan: A Play About a Good Woman is a four act comedy by Oscar Wilde, first produced 22 February 1892 at the St James Theatre in London. The play was first published in 1893. Like many of Wilde's comedies, it is a biting satire on the morals of Victorian society, particularly...

An Ideal Husband is an 1895 comedic stage play by Oscar Wilde which revolves around blackmail and political corruption, and touches on the themes of public and private honour. The action is set in London, in "the present", and takes place over the course of three days. "Sooner or later," Wilde notes,...