The 'modern drama' arose within the late-nineteenth-century cultural and political ferment of Europe, and theatre artists continued through the twentieth century to develop dramatic and theatrical forms. English-language dramatists, in addition to seminal European playwrights, have conducted their own formal experiments as they have continued to explore the relationship between the human condition and modernity. In this course, a variety of modernist experiments will be described in relation to specific historical contexts.

Upon completion of this course, 1. Students will be able to describe and explain the central tenets of modern drama; 2. Students will be able to explain the development of modern drama in the late nineteenth century and how it reflects the key political, cultural and social issues of the age, and, 3. Students will be able to show how these developments continued into the twentieth century and especially the influence of key events like the two world wars, the Holocaust and the atomic age; 4. Students will be able to explain the different types of dramatic schools – naturalism, realism, expressionism, symbolism, absurdism – and more recent modes of production in the twenty-first century.