The most comprehensive history of literature written in French ever produced in English.

This book assembles fifteen essays by different hands on dramatic literature written in French in the twentieth century. The great majority of the essays deal with plays published after 1939. Each chapter is an original study of aspects of the work of a given author that have been overlooked or inadequately treated in the scholarly literature to date. Most of the greatest French dramatists of the century are represented in the volume, although several of the authors studied are not primarily known for their contributions to dramatic literature, while the inclusion of a 'provincial' playwright and of two Québécois dramatists seeks to surprise readers by reminding them that Paris does not enjoy a total monopoly on French-speaking theatre. The book has as its primary aim to illustrate the vitality and the sheer variety of drama written in French during the century.

Essays on twentieth-century French playwrights who were largely influenced by non-French traditions, during the greatest age of French theater since the mid 1700s. French drama of the twentieth-century was cosmopolitan, experimental and eclectic and attempted to appeal to a wider audience than in the past. Dramatists came not only from Paris but from the provinces and the French states of the Caribbean as well as from Francophone countries such as Belgium.