Philip C. Kolin. Understanding Adrienne Kennedy.(Book review)

Publication: Comparative Drama

Publication Date: 22-JUN-06

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COPYRIGHT 2006 www.wmich.edu/compdr

Philip C. Kolin. Understanding Adrienne Kennedy. Columbia S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 2005. Pp. xii + 222. $34.95.

Seventy titles into its Understanding Contemporary American Literature series, the University of South Carolina Press is clearly fulfilling a need by giving students and "good nonacademic readers" some assistance in grappling with what series editor Matthew J. Bruccoli describes as "works that depart from the traditional forms and techniques of prose and poetry" (ix). The description certainly applies to the plays of the eminent African American dramatist Adrienne Kennedy.

Adrienne Kennedy's plays eschew Aristotelian narrative and literal meanings. Daunting in their imagery and provocative in their multiple signifiers, they can absorb any amount of critical dissection and still retain their mystery. The eight chapters of this book offer close readings of fifteen plays written between 1964 and 1996.

One revelation of Philip C. Kolin's study is...

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