The first study of one of the most significant voices of modern international theater, one of Wales’s leading writers, and one of the most compelling and beautiful bodies of artistic work in the last 50 years, this book was written by an assistant and friend with an intimate and personal knowledge of Peter Gill’s processes and values. To Bodies Gone explores a career extraordinary in its consistency, developing the clear ideas set of early productions that reach extraordinary heights in the mature work. The principle theme is the aesthetic Gill introduced to theater, and which has remained the bedrock of his work, in its various manifestations and developments across several decades. Analyzing the phases of his career in broadly chronological order, this study places Gill in the wider context of the theater, providing a snapshot of theater in the second half of the 20th century and contributing new insights to the study of theater history. The book includes chapters on Gill’s early work and influences; his translations and adaptations; his directing career at the Royal Court, Riverside Studios, National Theatre, and NT Studio; plus his major plays—Small Change, Kick for Touch, In the Blue, Cardiff East, and The York Realist—and his 2014 set at the Versailles peace conference. The result is a major study full of insight into Gill and into British theater.
Barney Norris is an award-winning playwright, poet, and essayist. His plays include At First Sight, winner of the Drama Association of Wales One Act Play Competition, and Missing. He has published poetry in several magazines, including Borderlines, the Frogmore Papers, the Interpreter’s House, the SHOp, and the Westminster News; his fiction has been anthologized in Bedford Square 5; and his essays have been published by A Younger Theatre and Culture Wars.
