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ianbanks's review
4.0
First up, a niggle: the title is wrong. Apart from just over 70 pages, this hefty tome never leaves Europe, and it details the many, many centuries of Asian theatre with a couple of patronising chapters about how it has had an influence on Western theatre. Aside from a mention of a Roman playwright who was from Carthage and a Spanish playwright who was born in Argentina, Africa, South America and Australia don't even rate a mention. So to call this book "World Drama" is misleading and inaccurate.
That said, it does a damn good job at giving you a history of plays and theatre in Europe. I don't know how exhaustive it was but there were enough explanations and authorial inserts for me to get an idea that Mr Nicoll has more than a clue about what he is talking about. He provides some biographical details to give the reader an idea about circumstances and influences, a lot of details about how plays were staged at various times and the hows and whys of their changing and he joins a lot of dots to explain how we got the theatre that we do today (or at least, given that this was first published in 1949, the theatre we had by the end of the Second World War).
It manages to avoid being dry and dusty while still coming across as authoritative and knowledgeable about a wide swath of human history (albeit a fairly narrow and precise swath) without making the reader feel like an idiot. Plus, it has a 58-page index! How can you not love a book like that?
That said, it does a damn good job at giving you a history of plays and theatre in Europe. I don't know how exhaustive it was but there were enough explanations and authorial inserts for me to get an idea that Mr Nicoll has more than a clue about what he is talking about. He provides some biographical details to give the reader an idea about circumstances and influences, a lot of details about how plays were staged at various times and the hows and whys of their changing and he joins a lot of dots to explain how we got the theatre that we do today (or at least, given that this was first published in 1949, the theatre we had by the end of the Second World War).
It manages to avoid being dry and dusty while still coming across as authoritative and knowledgeable about a wide swath of human history (albeit a fairly narrow and precise swath) without making the reader feel like an idiot. Plus, it has a 58-page index! How can you not love a book like that?
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