Modern Canadian Plays

Modern Canadian Plays is the core text for university-level Canadian drama courses around the world. Now in its fifth edition, with the previous edition published in 2002, the two-volume Modern Canadian Plays drama series anthologizes major Canadian plays written and performed since 1967. The second volume presents a range of exciting Canadian plays from the late 1980s through the first decade of the twenty-first ­century. These plays respond directly or indirectly to the events of our time; work effectively on the stage, on the page, and in the classroom; and are contextualized with accompanying history, biography, and criticism.

Polygraph (1988) by Robert Lepage and Marie Brassard
7 Stories (1989) by Morris Panych
Never Swim Alone (1991) by Daniel MacIvor
The Glace Bay Miners’ Museum (1995) by Wendy Lill
Counter Offence (1996) by Rahul Varma
Problem Child (1997) by George F. Walker
Harlem Duet (1997) by Djanet Sears
Street of Blood (1998) by Ronnie Burkett
The Shape of a Girl (2001) by Joan MacLeod
Tempting Providence (2002) by Robert Chafe
Scorched (2003) by Wajdi Mouawad
The Adventures of Ali & Ali and the aXes of Evil (2005) by Marcus Youssef, Guillermo Verdecchia, and Camyar Chai
Age of Arousal (2007) by Linda Griffiths
BIOBOXES: Artifacting Human Experience (2007) by Theatre Replacement
The Edward Curtis Project: A Modern Picture Story (2010) by Marie Clements
Kim’s Convenience (2011) by Ins Choi

Professor of English and Theatre at the University of British Columbia and a professional actor, Jerry Wasserman has written and lectured widely on Canadian theatre, dramatic literature, theatre history, modern fiction, and blues music; publicly interviewed writers and theatre artists ranging from Margaret Atwood to Stephen Sondheim; and served for over fifteen years as a drama critic on CBC Radio. He is currently theatre critic for The Province newspaper and editor of Vancouverplays.com, an informative Web site that provides up-to-date listings and reviews of local theatre performances. Wasserman grew up in New York and attained an M.A. in English from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. from Cornell, specializing in twentieth-century literature and drama. He started teaching at UBC in 1972; though his initial research focus was on fiction, his work in the theatre as an actor soon led him to teach mainly drama courses, eventually creating a course in Canadian drama.

In addition to his scholarly accomplishments, Wasserman continues to maintain a busy career as an actor. A seasoned veteran on the Vancouver theatre scene, he has also made over two hundred appearances on film and television.