Biography of Edward Albee
Edward Albee burst onto the American theatrical scene in the late 1950s with a variety of plays that detailed the agonies and disillusionment of that decade and the transition from the calm Eisenhower to the turbulent 1960s. Albee became a serious dramatist dealing with serious but always relevant themes, primarily having to do with the predicament of humanity in a society with moral decay, as well as the conflict between reality and illusion. His work is considered to be unique, uncompromising, controversial, elliptical, and provocative.
Born on March 12, 1928, in Washington D.C., Edward Albee was a couple weeks old when he was adopted by Reed and Frances Albee. He was taken to live in Westchester, New York. His adoptive father owned a chain of vaudeville theaters there, which gave the young Edward an early exposure to theater personalities. It was said that he lived a comfortable childhood having servants, tutors, riding lessons, winters spent in Miami and having an enormous wardrobe in his room sized closet. He was not very happy however. His strong-minded mother and him shared different views. While she tried to mold him into a respectable member of the Larchmont, New York social scene, he strongly opposed and chose to associate with artists and intellectuals whom she found quite objectionable. He felt dejected when she kicked him out of the family mansion for homosexuality. From there he moved to Greenwich Village where he took up such jobs as an office boy, record salesmen, and a messenger for western union which was his favorite. "I didn't use my mind at all, and walking around the Upper West Side was good exercise."
School was not a favorite for Edward Albee. He was sent to sele...
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...0's and all of the 80's were perhaps Edward Albee's worst playwriting times. He received many bad reviews, did not yield a single play that could be considered a commercial hit, and was consumed by Alcoholism. Albee says the reason for this is, "There is not always a relationship between popularity and excellence. You just have to make the assumption you're doing good work and go on doing it." When Albee came out with Three Tall Women in 1994, it reclaimed him as one of Americas leading dramatists. It enjoyed a stunning sold-out success in New York and has been staged across the country and around the world. It received Best Play awards from both the New York Drama Critics and Outer Critics Circle and it earned Albee his third Pulitzer Prize. Edward Albee is currently still playwriting, teaching, directing, and is having plays produced around the world.
John Updike’s “A & P,” Richard Wright’s “The Man Who Was Almost a Man,” and James Joyce’s “Araby”
Reuben, Paul P. PAL: Perspectives in American Literature- A Research and Reference Guide. Chapter 10: James Baldwin (1924-1987). 3 November 2011. April 2012 .
Born on October 14, 1894, E. E. Cummings an American poet was born at home in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His mother had a great influence on his early interest in art and poetry. His father was a Unitarian clergyman and sociology professor at Harvard. He began his interest in writing poetry during his high school career as early as 1904 and he also began learning language such as Latin and Greek in the Cambridge Latin High School. During this time he also shortened his name from Edward Estlin to E. E (Constantakis).
...n American Literature. By Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 387-452. Print.
Born in New York City, Washington Irving decided to pursue a professional writer lifestyle. In his teenage
Some of the most aspiring and influential authors show to be American novelists. American novelists brought about a new style of writing, which became very popular. John Steinbeck shows this style of writing in his novel, East of Eden. This makes Steinbeck one of the most significant American novelists in the twentieth century. East of Eden contains many parts, which add detail and interest to the novel. Many of Steinbeck’s novels and other works remain and continue to be nationally acclaimed. Many elements exist in East of Eden that bring about the meaning and concept of the novel. The study of John Steinbeck and his book, East of Eden, will help the reader better understand the element of fiction and interpret the meaning of the work.
Griffith, John. "Jonathan Edwards." The Critical Perspective. Ed. Harold Bloom. Vol. 5. New York: Chelsea, 1987. 2573-79. Print. Rpt. of "Jonathan Edwards as a Literary Artist." Criticism (1973): 156-73.
Downer, Alan S. American Drama and Its Critics. Chicago, University of Chicago Press [1965]. pp. 218-239.
In 1954 Bradbury was honored with an award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters for his contribution to American literature. In 1956 he collaborated with John Huston to create the screenplay for 'Moby Dick'. In addition to fiction Bradbury wrote 'Zen and the Art of Writing' and also published such dramas as 'The Anthem Sprinters’, 'The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit, The Pedestrian’, and volumes of poetry including 'When Elephants Last in the Dooryard Bloomed', 'Where Robot Mice & Robot Men Run Around in Robot Towns', and 'The Haunted Computer and the Android Pope'.
James Tackach wrote that it should not come as a surprise that Baldwin would use stories or references from the Bible as a foundation for his literature (109). Baldwin was practically raised in the church. Born in the Harlem District of New York on August 2, 1924, he grew up poor with 8 siblings in a very religious home. Baldwin’s stepfather was a preacher and strict authoritarian which lead to a very tumultuous relationship (Champion 5). At the age of fourteen, Baldwin began preaching at a Pentecostal church, however, that did not last. He became disenchanted with the church and left. At eighteen he moved to New Jersey. Later in his life, he moved to Greenwich Village area of New York, which was known for its abundance of artists and writers. He later left the states because of the uprising of racism and settled in France until his death (Champion 5). At the age of 63, Baldwin died in Saint-Paul de Vence, France.
At first glance, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and Tony Kushner’s Angels in America appear to serve as two individual exercises in the absurd. Varying degrees of the fantastical and bizarre drives the respective stories, and their respective conclusions hardly serve as logical resolutions to the questions that both Beckett and Kushner’s characters pose throughout the individual productions. Rather than viewing this abandonment of reality as the destination of either play, it should be seen as a method used by both Beckett and Kushner to force the audience to reconsider their preconceived notions when understanding the deeper emotional subtext of the plays. By presenting common and relatable situations such as love, loss, and the ways in which humans deal with change and growth, in largely unrecognizable packaging, Kushner and Beckett are able to disarm their audience amidst the chaos of the on stage action. Once the viewer’s inclination to make assumptions is stripped by the fantastical elements of either production, both playwrights provide moments of emotional clarity that the audience is forced to distill, analyze, and ultimately, comprehend on an individual level.
Louisa May Alcott was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania on November 29, 1832. Louisa wasn’t like every other girl in her time in fact she was nothing her family and nineteenth century New England required her to be as a young girl. She stated “no boy could be my friend until I had beaten him in a race and no girl if she refused to climb trees, leap fences, and be a tomboy.” In all she was her own person or as she was taught to see it willful, selfish, and proud (Bronson Alcott). She was the second of four girls born to Amos Bronson Alcott and Abigail May. Her father was a transcendentalist, philosopher, and educational experimenter, and her mom stayed home and raised her and her sisters on practical Christianity.
Many playwrights drew from outside influences to compose their works. They would look the era they were living in, their personal lives, childhood experiences, and even ancient texts to acquire inspiration for their works and famous playwright, Eugene O’Neill, is no exception. Writing through two world wars, a great depression, and boom of the motion-picture industry, O’Neill certainly had much inspiration to choose from. Although not becoming nationally recognized until after his father’s death in 1920, O’Neill still managed to produce fifty completed works. Using influences from the 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, Eugene O’Neill demonstrated how he used the era he was living in to help compose his works.
Tony Kushner’s play, Angels in America, comments on a number of social issues of its time; ranging from political to societal. Additionally, it incorporates many concepts discussed in the Modern Condition courses. Thinkers such as Nietzsche, Borges, and DeBeauvoir are specifically represented in the play through the characters presented. Kushner uses his characters to convey the ideas of these thinkers in the context of the culture the play takes place in.
Albee, Edward. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Rev. ed. New York: Dramatists Play Service, 2005. Print.