Created for Theater Appreciation courses that cover both history and elements, Theater: The Lively Art, 6/e remains a comprehensive introductory theater text: an introduction to the audiences experience of theater, an investigation of the elements of theater, and a study of the important developments in the history of theater.

Edwin Wilson was educated at Vanderbilt, the University of Edinburgh and Yale. At the Yale Drama School he received his Master of Fine Arts Degree as well as the first Doctor of Fine Arts Degree awarded by Yale.He has taught theater at Yale, Vanderbilt, Hunter College, Hofstra, and currently directs the Center for Advanced Study in the Theater Arts at the CUNY Graduate Center. He was the theater critic for the Wall Street Journal for twenty years. He is the author of The Theater Experience and co-author with Alvin Goldfarb of the Anthology of Living Theater and Theater: The Lively Art, 4th edition.Alvin Goldfarb is President of Western Illinois University. He has twenty-five years of distinguished service as Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs as well as Professor of Theatre at Illinois State University. Dr. Goldfarb is a member of the Illinois Arts Council and has won service awards from the Illinois Alliance for Arts Education and American College Theatre Festival. He holds a Ph.D. in Theatre History from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He is the co-author with Edwin Wilson of the Anthology of Living Theater and Theater: The Lively Art.