Reviews

92 Links & lxtters 2, 1995 Reviews detailed reference to the realities of Dublin tenernent life, O'Casey's internationalist and socialist stance led him, particularly in &e Dublin trilogy, to question not nationalist politics per se, but rather the concept of the nation which had becorne hegemonic and which grossly ignored the plight of the workers. Other critical voices, such as J. Joyce's in Ubsses, S. O'Faolain's, P. Kavanagh's, F. O'Brien's, and that of The Bell, are also discussed. An objection to be rnade to Writing Ireland is that, despite the authors' highlighting the central role of the discourse of sexuality in the constitution of the Irish people-nation, there is an alrnost complete absence of the wornen's contribution to the cultural struggle the book rnasterfully explores. A similar cornplaint is made by K. Barry in a recent review of The FieId Day Anthology ofIrish Literature (1991), where he notes the ((lamentable dearth of scholarship about women's writing in Ireland)) ( The European English Messenger, (1992), 1, 3: 47). In Cairns and Richards's study, sorne wornen's names are merely dropped, none of them belonging to the contemporary scene, where they include B. Friel, S. Heaney, T. Murphy and T. Paulin among others, and only the canonical Lady Gregory and Maud Gonne are given more attention. To cornpensate for this, the reader will have to turn to other sources, such as P. Bournelha and T. Foley, In the Shadow of bis Language (1987); C.L. Innes, Women, Ireland and Literature (1989); and the anthologies A.A. Kelly (ed.), Pilkzrs of the Howe: An Anthology of Verse by Irish WornenJTom 1690 to the Present (1987); and A. Smyth (ed.), Wildish Things: An Anthology of New Irish Women ? Writing (1 989). Mireia Aragay i Sastre Departament de Filologia Anglesa i Alernanya Universitat de Barcelona G. AUSTIN, Feminist Theories for Dramatic Criticism. Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, 1990. 139 pages. Starting off frorn the belief that a ferninist approach to anything rneans paying attention to women as characters, writers, readers or audience rnembers, Feminist Theories for Dramatic Criticism is a lucid attempt at demonstrating the usefulness as critical tools for the analvsis of drama of ferninist theories drawn frorn four areas of study: literary criticism, anthropology, psychology, and film theory. As Austin points out, the field of dramatic criticisrn has been relatively slow to acknowledge the work of feminist theorists and to incorporate it, so that her book, combining a theoreticai and a practical side, stands both as a welcome synthesis of the work done in the four selected areas of studv, and as a dernons- , . tration of its possiblities when applied to drama. It is aiso a useful cornpanion piece to S.-E. Case's feminist revision of theatrical history, Feminist Theatre (Basinptoke and London: Macrnillan, 1988). In the opening chapter, the author is explicit about the aims and lirnitations of her project. Thus, she discusses the advantages and shortcornings of the three rnajor political branches of ferninism, liberal, cultural/radical and rnaterialist, and overtly identifies herself as a rnaterialist ferninist. She also states that her purpose is not to develop a monolithic theory of feminist dramatic criticisrn, or indeed any new theory, but rather to present a number of theories in the four fields of studv since the latest wave of feminist scholarship began (approximately in 1970) and to apply some of thern to specific plays drawn from conternporary American drama, both by playwrights in the traditional canon (Eugene O'Neill, Arthur Miller, Lillian Hellman and Sarn Reviews Links & Letters 2, 1995 93 Shepard) and by wornen who would not norrnally be placed there (Jane Bowles and Alice Childress). Austin advocates selective pluralisrn as regar& ferninist theories, as well as pointing out the problerns and advantages of drama as an object of ferninist study. One of the advantages, the fact that written plays provide the framework for productions that can bring out rnany of the issues feminisrn finds pressing, is well illustrated in chapters 2 and 3, which contain discussions of the ways in which O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh (1940) and Miller's Death ofa Salesman (1949) rnight be deconstructed in performance through ferninist intervention. This ties in with Austin's conviction, repeated at the beginning and end of her book and derived frorn Case's Feminism and Theatre and T. Dolan's The Feminist Spectator as ~rihc (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1988), that frorn a ferninist perspective the stage should not be considered as a rnirror of «real life)), but rather as an ernow frarne or labora- L 4 tory in which gender categories rnay be exposed and, hopefully, disrnantled and removed. As is rnade clear in the first chapter, Austin's stance is not prescriptive: her airn is not to say how <cgood» or abad» the plays are frorn the point of view of ferninisrn, but to show how using a ferninist theorv can illuminate the ~lavs. She devo- ' J tes considerable space in chapter 1 to a discussion of the issues raised by lesbian and black ferninist criticisrn, particularly to the challenge the latter poses to the white-dorninated field of ferninist theory. This points fonvard to chapter 5, where insights drawn frorn ferninist film theory are applied to both Shepard's The Tooth of Crime (1972) and, by way of contrast, to black playwright Alice Childress's Wine in the Wilderness (1969). Drawing on a number of feminist theorists, Austin also rnakes a distinction benveen first-, second. and third-stage ferninist work on drama, respectively defined as the task of exarnining irnages of wornen within the canon, that of expanding the canon by focusing on wornen writers, and that of exploding the canon by questioning underlying assurnptions of an entire field of study, including canon forrnation. As opposed to fiction and film, where serious firststage work began in the early 1970s (e.g., K. Millett's Sexual Politics (1 969); M. Rosen's Popcorn Venus (1973) and M. Haskell's From Reverente to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies (1974)), the exploration of first-stage topics in drarnatic criticisrn began later, in the early 1980s, and still has a long way to go. The groundwork involved in the second stage began in the rnid 1970s with the publication of the first anthologies of plays written by wornen, while third-stage work erner~ed in the late 1980s. and U began to modify sorne rnan-rnade tools, such as serniotics and deconstruction, for the ourooses of ferninist drarnatic criti- A 1 cisrn, as well as to dyvelop ferninist perspectives on traditional dramatic concerns Such as realisrn, narrative and mimesis. Feminist Theories for Dramatic Criticism combines the three stages. Austin is basi- " cally doing first-stage work when exarnining work by O'N~iill, Miller, Hellrnan and Shepard, second-stage when dealing with Bowles and Childress, and. albeit less centrally, third-gtage boih when discussing how sorne of the ferninist theories she draws on have undermined rnale-constructed systerns and when writing about aspects of the forrnation of the Arnerican drarnatic canon, such as the problem for wornkn that Death of a Salesman should have becorne the paradigrn for what «the serious Arnerican play» should be. Each of the four cha~ters after the I opening one is devoted to one of the four selected fields of studv -1iterarv criticisrn, anthropology, ps;chology, and film theorv- and al1 follow the sarne Dattern: I they begin with a succint survey of the work done in the field since the 1970s, 94 Links & Letters 2, 1995 Reviews then one single theorist is selected and JAMES ENGELL and DAVID PERKINS an account: is given of one central con- (eds) . Teaching Literature: What cept she has formulated, and finally that Is Needed Now. Boston: Harvard concept is applied to one or two plays. University Press, 1988. 198 pages. Thus, chapter two moves from a survey of the rich field of feminist literary criticism, to J. Fetterley's ((resisting reader», «In extending our invitation to contribute to this volurne, we did not seek to to an application of this concept to a readrepresent only a particular point of view ing 0f The Iceman Cometh cha~ter three and neither did we especially atternpt to follows suit with feminist anthropology, represent al1 that are now active within G. Rubin's ((trafic in women)), Death of the profession. The only criterion of this a Salesman and Hellman's Another Part kind was that the younger as well as the of the Forest (1946); in chapter 4 Austin older generations should be heard.~ (p. v) deals with feminist psychology and psychoanalysis, N. Chodorow's work on the Engell and Perkins make it clear enough mother-daughter bond, and Bowles's In at the very beginning of the preface: heterthe Summer Houce (1953); and in chapter ogeneity is going to be one of the most 5, the reader finds the tools of feminist recurrent features in this book, for it is film theory, particularly L. Mulvey's condescriptiveness -as opposed to prescripcept of ((woman as image, man as bearer tivenessthat lies at its very core. Maybe of the look» applied to Shepard's The the tittle might be said to be slightly over- Tooth of Crime and Childress's Wine in ambitious: Teaching Literature: What Is the Wihrness. Some of the analyses offer Neeáed Now seems to point at a thorough more insights than others, the use of film piece of work dealing with al1 the major theory being particularly illuminating. aspects in current Literature teaching, as Al1 in all, Feminist Theoriesfar Dramatic well as providing an exhaustive represen- Criticism is a solid introductory guide to tation of the major figures in this profesthe field of feminist dramatic criticism, sional field. Neither one nor the other are and as such can be recommended to entirely true: what we do have in our anyone interested in feminism, dramatic hands is a collection of strikingly persontheory and Arnerican drama. To univeral essays which represent a wide range of sity teachers too: Austin not only brings often clearly opposed views on different to light the relationship between theory aspects of the Literature issue. What we and the real world of dramatic producdo not by any means have is a huge piece tions, but also between theory and teac- of work in which al1 current views and hing by prompting the reader to use opinions are conscientiously represented. feminist theories in order to begin asking Nor is this the aim of the book. questions such as what are we teaching Even though heterogeneity is the most and why? What are the plays saying to outstanding aspect of the book, we should the students about wornen? Are there any not overlook the work's extremely coherother possible messages? The book conent organisation, which serves its purdudes with a comprehensive bibliography pose in allowing us to have access to an which will be of use to any reader who acceptable wide range of topics: we begin wants to delve more deeply into the issues by a brief, though at the sarne time serious raised in it. outline of the main difficulties experienced by freshmen students at the very Mireia Aragay i Sastre beginning of their academic life when Departament de Filologia Anglesa i encountering poetical texts and having to Alemanya. Universitat de Barcelona express their views about them. The