English Drama, 1900–1950: A Guide to Information Sources by E. H. Mikhail (review)

370 Comparative Drama made to edit the second Antonio play by itself, though he suggests why both should be considered together (pp. 30-32). Surely these two com­ paratively short pieces could have been included in a volume no longer than some of the more hefty single Revels editions (F. H. Mares’ Alchemist and J. R. Brown’s Duchess of Malfi are each about one hundred pages longer than this book); and there is already precedent for such doubling in the series (H. J. Oliver’s Dido and Massacre at Paris). Much of Gair’s Introduction would serve both plays equally; and the comparative value of this new Revels volume would inevitably have been increased if what was done here so handsomely for one half of Marston’s odd couple had been done for the other as well. ROBERT C. JONES The Ohio State University E. H. Mikhail. English Drama, 1900-1950: A Guide to Information Sources. (Vol. 11 in the American Literature, English Literature, and World Literature in English Information Guide Series.) Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1977. Pp. xiii + 328. $18.00. In his guide to this important period of English drama, Professor Mikhail has sought to streamline research. The work brings together information which in the New CBEL is distributed over two volumes, and updates this information through 1973. A full complement of in­ dexes, among them a detailed subject index, is meant to provide easy access to the Guide’s 2504 entries. Despite these convenient features, the Guide may not serve its users all that well. It covers fewer dramatists than does the New CBEL and silently omits one—Samuel Beckett—there (and elsewhere) considered both “English” and major. A quick survey indicates that English Drama, 1900-1950 admits only three figures—Edward William Garnett, Wini­ fred M. Letts [Mrs. W. H. Verschoyle], and Conal Holmes O’Connell O’Riordan—excluded from the larger work. Treatment of individual dramatists in the two bibliographies is not comparable, for the Guide lists neither primary works nor (usually) secondary works devoted to a single author. Rather, it confines itself to listing bibliographies of primary and secondary works for each author—in Chapter five, “Indi­ vidual Dramatists”— and to indicating studies reported in other chapters of the Guide that contain information about individual figures. Professor Mikhail is right in thinking that the Guide “will be particu­ larly useful to those doing research on specific theatre movements or topics” (p. xi), but coverage of these is not always fuller than in the New CBEL. A student of “censorship,” for example, will find entries in the Guide that do not appear in Volume IV of the New CBEL; con­ versely, he/she will find entries there that are missing here. However, treatment of certain other areas, among them Irish drama, seems very thorough. Of course, the Guide’s rather firm distinction between drama Reviews 371 and the stage tends to keep its general coverage of dramatic activity in the period from being as wide (and often as deep) as that of the New CBEL. What disturbs me most about the Guide is not its somewhat limited coverage but the arrangement of its contents. Only in Chapter five have entries been organized (under dramatists’ names). In Chapters one through four, they stretch in unbroken lists whose only order is alpha­ betical by author or compiler. The lack of internal division in Chapters one (“Bibliographies”) and two (“Reference Works”) is inconvenient at best. At worst, it may confuse inexperienced researchers, whose prob­ lems will only be aggravated by the vague and noncommittal annotations which seem to predominate here and in Chapter five. The 783 and 884 respective entries of Chapters three (“Critical Books and Essays”) and four (“Periodical Articles”) are likely to distress even the most skillful researchers. These chapters do not permit browsing, except of the most random kind, and are accessible only through the indexes, which—like most—are fallible. In fact, the arrangement of the Guide increases one’s appreciation of the New CBEL, where (in most cases) the list of a writer’s primary works is followed by a chronological list of scholarship and criticism, and where major topics receive systematic...