The five essays in this book reflect many years of the author's sustained academic engagement with dramatic forms and traditions. The opening essay traces the historical trajectory of modern drama in Europe from its bourgeois period through the period of the liberal dissent to the more recent periods of radical alternative. The subsequent essays deal with certain specific examples of that drama in India and the West, such as Shakespeare adaptations on the Parsi theatre stage, Habib Tanvir, and Samuel Beckett. The author places each of these in a historical perspective. This approach constitutes the theoretical underpinning of the book giving cohesion to this collection of diverse essays. Although they were individually published in various journals and books in their earlier versions, they have been substantially revived and updated by the author for this volume.

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