Synopses & Reviews
While the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki secured an American victory in the Pacific and hastened the end of World War II, it also ushered in an era of fear. When the Soviets developed an atomic bomb, the United States ceased to be the world's only nuclear power. Americans feared a nuclear attack by the Soviets, while the British worried about being drawn into a nuclear conflict for which they were utterly unprepared and particularly vulnerable. The threat of nuclear war left a lasting mark on the British and American imagination. Like other creative artists, playwrights began to grapple with the terrifying implications of a nuclear holocaust. This study reveals how English-speaking dramatists, both major and minor, reacted to the stunning events of the Atomic Age and the early thermonuclear era.
Moving from American to British responses, the book describes more than 25 plays and quotes a variety of reflections on the bombing of Japan, the evolution of the Cold War, the development of more and more refined atomic weapons, the proliferation of fallout shelters, and the occurrence of strategic crises, such as those in Suez, Berlin, and Cuba. The American plays are generally inferior to the British, with less experienced playwrights attacking a wide range of subject matter and experimenting with several dramatic styles. British plays more frequently protest the threatened imposition of an American-Soviet conflict upon their offshore island. The book concludes with a study of how Samuel Beckett's Endgame reflects a human dilemma distinctive to the Nuclear Age.
Review
[T]he volume admirably lives up to its title, covering precisely what it claims to. [T]his is a valuable tool for anyone doing research in nuclear war imagery in the arts, and is appropriate for larger research collections.Science Fiction Studies
Synopsis
Reveals the wide range of British and American dramatic responses to the early nuclear age.
Synopsis
While the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki secured an American victory in the Pacific and hastened the end of World War II, it also ushered in an era of fear. The first of its kind, this study shows how English-speaking dramatists, both major and minor, reacted to the stunning events of the Nuclear Age up to 1964; the attack on Japan, the evolution of the Cold War, the development of more and more deadly and refined atomic weapons, the emphasis on private fallout shelters, and strategic crises such as those in Suez, Berlin, and Cuba. Moving from American to British responses in the atomic and then the early thermonuclear era, the book describes more than 25 plays that deal with these events and quotes a variety of playwrights' reflections on them.
About the Author
CHARLES A. CARPENTER is Professor Emeritus of English at Binghamton University.
Table of Contents
Personal Prologue
Introduction
A Context of Provocations: The Early Nuclear Age
A "Dramatic Extravaganza" of the Projected Atomic