David Rabe achieved national recognition in 1971 when two of his plays, The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel and Sticks and Bones, opened in New York within six months of each other. Productions of The ...
Read more
David Rabe is often referred to as a Vietnam playwright, largely because his reputation was established on the basis of work he wrote in the years immediately following his tour of duty in Vietnam. Wh...
Read more
In the following review, Brown views Recital of the Dog as an allegory about crime and punishment.
In the introduction to the first publication of his award-winning plays, The Basic Training of Pavlo ...
Read more
In the following review, Filkins maintains that “despite a flaw or two, Recital of the Dog is a novel as well-crafted as it is brutal, as obsessive as it is superbly controlled.”
“...
Read more
In the following review, Austin provides a mixed assessment of Those the River Keeps.
Mafia ruthlessness and machismo have provided material for a numbing array of plays, movies, and books. The mob ho...
Read more
In the following review, Hutchings cites parallels between Recital of the Dog and Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.
Not since the Ancient Mariner wantonly shot the alba...
Read more
In the following essay, Andreach discusses The Orphan as a modern dramatization of Aeschylus's Oresteia trilogy.
While composing an afterword for the 1993 publication of his four Vietnam plays ...
Read more
In the following essay, Demastes and Vanden Heuvel contend that the works of Rabe and Sam Shepard embody a new direction in American theater, one that incorporates realism and absurdism to subvert &#x...
Read more
In the following review, Daniels provides a favorable assessment of A Question of Mercy.
David Rabe's gripping new drama, A Question of Mercy, confronts the timely topic of assisted suicide. Wi...
Read more
In the following interview, Rabe discusses his dramatic adaptation of A Question of Mercy.
[Coen]: What led you to dramatize the essay by Richard Selzer?
[Rabe]: The piece was originally published in ...
Read more
In the following essay, Barbera details the dramatic techniques used by Rabe to express what W. B. Yeats called the “emotion of multitude.”
In a single-paragraph essay on drama, “...
Read more
In the following essay, Zinman suggests that the characters in Rabe's plays are similar to cardboard cutouts and comic-strip characters in the vein of Roy Lichtenstein's paintings.
There...
Read more
In the following interview, conducted on February 10, 1998, Rabe discusses his creative process, his use of symbolism, and aspects of individual plays.
Coming from America's heartland (Dubuque,...
Read more
In the following essay, Colakis compares the use of the House of Atreus myth in Rabe's The Orphan and Joyce Carol Oates's novel Angel of Light.
Even in the last two decades, when Greek m...
Read more
In the following essay, Fenn asserts that The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel exemplifies the defining characteristics of the genre of the Vietnam war drama and places the play within the context of Ra...
Read more
In the following essay, Wade provides a feminist interpretation of In the Boom Boom Room, focusing on the equivocal implications of the closing scene of the play.
Although few would argue that In the ...
Read more
In the following interview conducted in 1990, Rabe discusses his influences and interests, including language and ancient folk legends.
[Those the River Keeps is Rabe's first new play in more t...
Read more
In the following essay, Cooper provides a critical analysis of Sticks and Bones.
For David Rabe, the Vietnam war has been a source of artistic inspiration and creativity. His political and social cons...
Read more
In the following essay, Andreach compares Rabe's The Orphan with the original Greek work that inspired him to write it.
While composing an afterword for the 1993 publication of his four Vietnam...
Read more
In the following essay, Wade discusses Rabe's use of a nude female dancer at the end of In the Boom Boom Room and its significance both to the play and to varied members of the audience.
The cl...
Read more
In the following essay, Kolin describes Streamers as a coming-of-age story.
The last play in his Vietnam trilogy,1 David Rabe's Streamers (1976) explores an archetypical theme—the rite o...
Read more
In the following essay, Brady discusses Rabe's use of racism and other prejudices in his plays, focusing on Streamers.
In his 1973 “Introduction” to the volume comprised of the tw...
Read more
In the following review, Upchurch critiques a production of A Question of Mercy performed at the Intiman Theatre in Seattle, Washington.
A David Rabe play is like a supple dance done with sharp instru...
Read more
In the following excerpt, Brustein considers Rabe's use of the family to reflect societal problems.
More often than not, American mainstream dramatists continue to explore the causes behind the...
Read more
In the following essay, Werner describes Rabe's attempts to overcome alienation in the American experience with a new form of expression.
Ishmael, dreaming in the crow's nest but fearful...
Read more
In the following essay, Hertzbach examines Rabe's use of violence in his plays.
The title and central metaphor of David Rabe's most recently produced play, Streamers (1976), provides a r...
Read more
In the following essay, Kolin recounts Rabe's high school career and the production of his first play, now lost.
Acknowledged as one of the most important playwrights in contemporary America, D...
Read more
In the following essay, Christie discusses the feeling of instability at the heart of Rabe's plays.
David Rabe is a playwright of anomalies. His art consistently explores problematic cultural m...
Read more
In the following essay, McDonough examines Rabe's depiction of men in his plays.
Although he originally established himself as a playwright of Vietnam plays, Rabe's central concern does ...
Read more
In the following essay, Adler compares Sticks and Bones with King Lear.
Near the end of Sticks and Bones, the middle play of David Rabe's Vietnam trilogy, the son David, returning home from the...
Read more
In the following essay, Bernstein examines and discusses criticism of Sticks and Bones and shows how the play combines realism and absurdism.
A Review of the Criticism
David Rabe's Sticks and B...
Read more
David (William) Rabe
