Edith Craig and the Theatres of Art

This new biography explores the extraordinary life of Edith Craig (1869-1947), her prolific work in the theatre and her political endeavours for women's suffrage and socialism. At London's Lyceum Theatre in its heyday she worked alongside her mother, Ellen Terry, Henry Irving and Bram Stoker, and gained valuable experience. She was a key figure in creating innovative art theatre work. As director and founder of the Pioneer Players in 1911 she supported the production of women's suffrage drama, becoming a pioneer of theatre aimed at social reform. In 1915 she assumed a leading role with the Pioneer Players in bringing international art theatre to Britain and introducing London audiences to expressionist and feminist drama from Nikolai Evreinov to Susan Glaspell.

She captured the imagination of Virginia Woolf, inspiring the portrait of Miss LaTrobe in her 1941 novel Between the Acts, and influenced a generation of actors, such as Sybil Thorndike and Edith Evans. Frequently eclipsed in accounts of theatrical endeavour by her younger brother, Edward Gordon Craig, Edith Craig's contribution both to theatre and to the women's suffrage movement receives timely reappraisal in Katharine Cockin's meticulously researched and wide-ranging biography, released for the seventieth anniversary of Craig's death.

Acknowledgements
List of Illustrations
Introduction: More Dramatic Lives
Chapter One: Reflecting on the Long Shadow, or Ellen Terry Had a Daughter
Chapter Two: Lifelong Lessons for The Lyceum's Apprentice
Chapter Three: The New Woman, Experiments and the 'masque at the Scala'
Chapter Four: Women's Suffrage Drama and 'the fire of Prometheus'
Chapter Five: The Pioneer Years 1911-20
Chapter Six: Amateurs and Art: The Birth of the Nativity Play and the Little Theatre Movement
Chapter Seven: Pilgrims and Pageants in the Provinces
Chapter Eight: Dramatic Lives, or Edith Craig Had a Family
Endnotes
Appendix: Chronology and Selected Dates of Performance
Bibliography
Index

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