The Canon Is Stuck

Songs for the Struggling Artist

My library finally re-opened post-pandemic and I went in for a celebratory look around. Though it supposedly had been re-modeled, it seemed to look exactly the same. (Except now there seemed to be no way to access the card catalogue? WTF?) I took a look at the theatre section because, you know, Theatre Nerd, and was struck by how much the selection of plays resembled the selection of plays that were in the library when I was growing up. It struck me that the accepted literary canon of theatrical greatness has not really been updated since the 1950s. When I was growing up, the theatre section looked like Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams. And today, the theatre section looks like mostly Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams. This doesn’t mean that theatre folk only read Miller and Williams but I think it does mean that the culture as a whole still only considers Miller and Williams worth keeping in the collection. There may be a scattered addition from a contemporary writer – maybe if it’s a library that’s really trying to expand, you’ll see some August Wilson or Suzan Lori Parks or an Anna Deavere Smith. My library had an Annie Baker, even. But for the most part, in libraries and bookstores across America, the bulk of a theatre section will be Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams – maybe, on occasion, some Mamet, Albee, Simon or Durang – but most shelves will be the Miller and Williams collection. I’m curious about this.

To keep reading The Canon Is Stuck visit the Songs for the Struggling Artist blog.

This is Episode 426

Song: Love Me Tender

Image of the Queens Public Library play shelf by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠me, Emily Rainbow Davis

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