Playwriting with Purpose: A Guide and Workbook for New Playwrights

by Jacqueline Goldfinger, Octavio Solis (Foreword)

Playwriting with A Guide and Workbook for New Playwrights provides a holistic approach to playwriting from an award-winning playwright and instructor.

This book incorporates craft lessons by contemporary playwrights and provides concrete guidance for new and emerging playwrights. The author takes readers through the entire creative process, from creating characters and writing dialogue and silent moments to analyzing elements of well-made plays and creating an atmospheric environment. Each chapter is followed by writing prompts and pro tips that address unique facets of the conversation about the art and craft of playwriting. The book also includes information on the business of playwriting and a recommended reading list of published classic and contemporary plays, providing all the tools to successfully transform an idea into a script, and a script into a performance.

Playwriting with Purpose gives writers and students of playwriting hands-on lessons, artistic concepts, and business savvy to succeed in today’s theater industry.

188 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 16, 2021

About the author

Jacqueline Goldfinger is an award-winning playwright, dramaturg, and librettist who seeks out unique collaborations, working across disciplines to create singular works of theatre and opera. Her awards include the Yale Prize, Opera America Discovery Grant, Smith Prize, Sloan Grant, Independence Foundation Fellowship in the Arts, Tennessee Williams Fellowship, and Generations Award. She teaches workshops and seminars at college and university theatre programs across the U.S. including at University of California, Davis & San Diego, University of Pennsylvania, and Temple University.

Reviews

[BJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rather generic overview with minimal content on breaking through on getting published. The appendices are greater than 25% of the content and basically point you to other resources anyhow. I am giving it three stars because of the value factor. I spent 19 bucks for this content and feel that with the information that was provided, five dollars seems about fair.