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Reviews103 the Folio is a deliberate revision, and that modern composite editions obscure the changes which Shakespeare intended. JOHN WASSON Washington State University Critical Essays on Edward Albee, ed. Philip C. Kolin and J. Madison Davis. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1986. Pp. ix + 222. $35.00. Conversations with Edward Albee, ed. Philip C. Kolin. Jackson and London : University Press of Mississippi, 1988. Pp. xxix + 223. $26.95; paperbound, $15.95. Playwright Edward Albee, now more than sixty years old, may still have some surprises in store for us, but the basic shape of his career is established. The critical perspective and the ready access to important material provided in the two books under review are therefore entirely welcome. Critical Essays on Edward Albee, edited by Philip C. Kolin and J. Madison Davis, reprints or excerpts sixteen reviews and twenty essays covering most of Albee's major work. The essays are divided into two groups: the first, entitled "Albee and the World Theatre," seeks to place Albee in terms of traditions and influences (especially the Theater of the Absurd), while the other, entitled simply "Criticism," contains treatments of individual plays or of patterns that inform several plays. Eight of the essays comment substantially on Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and, taken together, they illustrate the play's richness through the variety of interpretation they offer. Highlights among the essays include: Brian Way's careful demonstration of Albee's use of, and departure from, the Theater of the Absurd; Bernard F. Dukore's intriguing suggestion that Euripides' Medea is an important classical precedent for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; and M. Gilbert Porter's deft unraveling of the tangled relationships of A Delicate Balance. In addition to the reprinted essays, several items were written specifically for this volume: Matthew C. Roudané conducts a short interview with Albee; Lea Carol Owen lists, annotates, and indexes seventy-five Albee interviews; and, most importantly, Kolin and Davis provide in their "Introduction" an extremely useful survey of the current state of Albee criticism. Since this volume appeared in 1986, there have been booklength bibliographies on Albee by Richard Tyce and Scott Giantvalley; Kolin and Davis' "Introduction," however, remains a useful starting point for research because it is sensibly selected, it is organized by play, and it identifies the major critical trends on each of Albee's works. Conversations with Edward Albee, edited by Kolin, is a useful companion to the preceding volume. In it Kolin reprints or transcribes twenty-seven interviews with Albee from 1961 to 1986, including a number of broadcast interviews not in print anywhere else. Although we hear rather too often about stupid critics and lazy audiences in these interviews, Albee yields some important revelations. He confirms the interpretation that Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? has an "affirmative conclusion" (p. 153); he disagrees with the common critical opinion that A Delicate 104Comparative Drama Balance is about the "demands and responsibilities of friendship" (p. 180); he postulates an idea of "catharsis" that possibly gives an important clue to the emotional impact of his plays (p. 99); and he repeatedly offers an intriguing analogy between writing plays and composing music. Kolin supplies an excellent index so that teachers and critics can readily find Albee's comments on various topics and on each of his plays. PHILIP J. EGAN Western Michigan University International Bibliography oí Theatre The fourth volume of the International Bibliography of Theatre (1985) has been published. As in the case of each of the previous volumes of the IBT, the 1985 volume is considerably enlarged over its predecessor. The 1985 issue contains 1,100 pages with 5,000 references to books and periodical articles and 27,000 subject index entries from twenty theatrically active countries. The IBT now indexes 950 international journals, while the Taxonomy of Theatre has become an important document for theater instruction. The 1985 volume is priced at $145, and the complete set of four volumes is offered at $355. The set is a basic research tool for work in theater and drama, and belongs in every major library. Orders should be directed to the Theatre Research Data Center, Brooklyn College, City University of New York, Brooklyn...

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