{"product_id":"adrienne-kennedy-collected-plays-other-writings-loa-372-9781598537512","title":"Adrienne Kennedy: Collected Plays \u0026 Other Writings (Loa #372)","description":"\u003cb\u003eLibrary of America presents the definitive edition of an essential figure in Black and American theater, spanning from the 1960s to the 2010s and including several works published for the first time\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAdrienne Kennedy has been a force on the American stage since the premiere of her groundbreaking, Obie Award-winning \u003cb\u003eFunnyhouse of a Negro\u003c\/b\u003e in 1964. Politically engaged, formally daring, and making provocative use of material from contemporary history and popular culture, Kennedy's haunting stage works dramatize and project interior realities that are often marked by disappointment and trauma, madness and terror. Her understanding of the inner lives of African American women expresses a powerfully insightful feminism that has come to influence generations of playwrights and writers. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eNow, the Library of America presents, for the first time, a collected edition of Kennedy's extraordinary and wide-ranging writings, spanning six decades and including ten unpublished works. Here are the early surrealistic one-acts \u003cb\u003eA Lesson in Dead Language\u003c\/b\u003e and \u003cb\u003eA Rat's Mass\u003c\/b\u003e; works like \u003cb\u003eA Movie Star Has to Star in Black and White\u003c\/b\u003e and \u003cb\u003eFilm Festival: The Day Jean Seberg Died\u003c\/b\u003e that reveal Kennedy's longstanding fascination with Hollywood and film culture; and \u003cb\u003eOhio State Murders\u003c\/b\u003e, one of several plays featuring her protagonist Suzanne Alexander and the first of her plays to be staged--belatedly, in 2022--on Broadway. \u003cb\u003eSleep Deprivation Chamber\u003c\/b\u003e is a searing indictment of racially motivated police violence based on real-life incidents involving her son, who co-wrote the play. Also included here are Kennedy's adaptations of works by Euripides, Flaubert, and John Lennon, all brilliantly reimagined. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eOutside of playwriting Kennedy has made her mark as a fiction writer and memoirist, providing a rich portrait of her life and experience especially in her book \u003cb\u003ePeople Who Led to My Plays\u003c\/b\u003e but also in works from her later life such as the essay \"Almost Eighty.\" Taken together, the work gathered in \u003ci\u003eCollected Plays \u0026amp; Other Writings\u003c\/i\u003e is a celebration of Kennedy's indispensable achievement on the stage and on the page alike.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Library of America\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 09\/12\/2023\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781598537512\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 995\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.25lbs","brand":"Adrienne Kennedy","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43049622929589,"sku":"9781598537512","price":38.25,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/files\/img_c1a397ba-24d0-46a4-b08f-56e5b7ecddfc.jpg?v=1689691888","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/adrienne-kennedy-collected-plays-other-writings-loa-372-9781598537512","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}