The Other American Drama by Marc Robinson (review)

232 Book Reviews MARC ROBINSON The Other American Drama. New York: Cambridge University Press 1994· Pp. 216. $49·95· Marc Robinson's book is a collection of essays on Gertrude Stein, Tennessee Williams , Sam Shepard, Maria Irene Fornes, Adrienne Kennedy, and Richard Foreman, with an Afterword essay covering Wallace Shawn, David Greenspan, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Mac Wellman. The playwrights covered, according to Robinson, afe first and foremost playwrights interested in the written and spoken word, concerned with the impact of language on the nature of "character." Their highly individual quests for "identity" - for their characters and also indirectly but critically for themselves - result in dramatic pieces which challenge the patented formulas of traditional American theater , downplaying, sometimes even eliminating, plot and other linear mainstays in order to call attention to other more fundamental processes attendant upon the search for that elusive thing, "identity." Robinson acknowledges that the book "is meant neither as a survey of twentiethcentury American dramatists nor even as a comprehensive account of one strain of that history" (6). Rather, he asserts that "the highly personal nature of this enterprise accounts for its gaps," explaining that the book is the result of selecting "what I think are the most exciting theatrical energies in circulation during this century" (6). Indeed the book demonstrates the highly personal ways in which the chosen playwrights approach their art, and it utilizes in tum a highly personal approach in presenting these playwrights at work. This blending of content and style results in a text that reflects the "theatrical energies" of these playwrights as the material itself is presented, creating a refreshing enthusiasm not frequently found in scholarship today. In fact, this crucial facet of Robinson's book, while it will engage some, will likely alienate others. Some - whom Robinson would likely label the "self-serious" (8) - would criticize the book for its frequent "lack of clarification, unsatisfaction,lack of completeness" (195), but Robinson would argue that these qualities are precisely the qualities inherent in the playwrights he covers. (The above phrase in fact is Robinson's description of the playwrights .) This strategy of "lacking," however, should not be looked upon as a failing, at least not among the playwrights. It is a natural result of an uncompleted search, a reflection of a continued "work in progress" which has as its crucial strength a vividly recurring unfolding of thought and emotion, a playing with possibilities, a continuing "verging" (as Robinson describes Foreman's work), wherein forever-shifting "psychological and spiritual content [takes] precedence over external incident" (171). So Shepard's "fascination with inscrutability" (63), Fornes's assault on "orthodox psychological realism" (95), Kennedy's preoccupation with "the impulses and preoccupations that are most difficult to explain adequately in public language" (118), etc., are all materials difficult to explicate in a standard scholarly fashion. Like his subjects' work, Robinson's book is a work in progress. And while one may argue that we should simply wait until his and their works in progress are complete, Robinson would argue that the processes are themselves completions . These writers - and Robinson himself I would suggest - "have been in perpet- Book Reviews 233 ual search for the means of drawing a spectator's attention away from stories and onto moments of perception and speech" (178). Capturing those moments requires different strategies for both playwright and critic. The degree to which a reader accepts this point will affect the degree to which a reader will appreciate this book and the subjects it confronts. One frequently sees such elliptical approaches utilized by established practitioners and critics (Herbert Slao and Robert Brustein come quickly to mind), and their readership benefits from a corpus of antecedent work when approaching such strategists. We do not have that privilege with Robinson, but we can perhaps look forward to his voice in future enterprises. In sum, this book will please many, disappoint others, but engage everyone who chooses to spend time with it. WILLIAM W. DEMASTBS, LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY, BATON ROUGB JAMES ACHESON, ed. British and Irish Drama since 1960. New York: St. Martin's Press 1993· pp. 230. $40.00 The editor of this excellent volume of original essays on dramatists "who illustrate some...