Michael Y. Bennett

BOOKS (Monographs)

Between the Lines: A Philosophy of Theatre. Oxford University Press, 2024.

• Reviewed in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism and Eugene O’Neill Review

The Problems of Viewing Performance: Epistemology and Other Minds. Foreword by David Krasner. Routledge, 2021 [Paperback 2023].

• Reviewed in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism and Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism

Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Routledge, 2018. [Pb]

• Reviewed in American Literary Scholarship

Analytic Philosophy and the World of the Play. Foreword by Marvin Carlson. Afterword by James R. Hamilton. Routledge, 2017 [Paperback 2020].

• Reviewed in Theatre Journal and Philosophy and Literature

The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre and Literature of the Absurd. Cambridge University Press, 2015 [Hardcover & Paperback].

• Reviewed in The Modern Language Review; The Year’s Work in English Studies; and American Literary Scholarship

Narrating the Past through Theatre: Four Crucial Texts. Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.

Words, Space, and the Audience: The Theatrical Tension between Empiricism and Rationalism. Palgrave Macmillan, 2012 [Paperback 2016].

• Reviewed in Theatre Survey; Theatre History Studies; Journal of Philosophy: A Cross-Disciplinary Inquiry; and The Year’s Work in English Studies

Reassessing the Theatre of Absurd: Camus, Beckett, Ionesco, Genet, and Pinter. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011 [Paperback 2013].

• • • Reviewed in Journal of Modern Literature; Theatre Survey; Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism; Theatre Research International; Journal of Philosophy: A Cross-Disciplinary Inquiry; The Year’s Work in English Studies; CHOICE; and Text & Presentation

BOOKS (Edited Collections of Essays)

Editor. Albee’s World: 100 Years of America’s Playwright. Manchester University Press, under contract.

Editor. Wilde Politics: Oscar Wilde, Aesthetics, and his Political Thought. Manchester University Press, forthcoming.

Editor. Philosophy, Analytic Aesthetics, and Theater. Routledge, 2025. [Hb&Pb]

Editor. The Routledge Companion to Absurdist Literature. Routledge, 2024.

Editor. Philosophy and Oscar Wilde. Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. [Paperback 2025].

• Reviewed in SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500-1900;  ELT: English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920; The Wildean: A Journal of Oscar Wilde Studies; The OScholars; CHOICE; and The Heythrop Journal

Editor. Edward Albee and Absurdism. New Perspectives in Edward Albee Studies Book Series. Brill, 2017.

Editor. Oscar Wilde’s Society Plays. Palgrave Macmillan, 2015 [Paperback 2016].

• Reviewed in Nineteenth Century Theatre and Film; The OScholars; and The Year’s Work in English Studies

Editor, with Benjamin D. Carson. Eugene O’Neill’s One-Act Plays: New Critical Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2012 [Paperback 2014].

• Reviewed in Eugene O’Neill Review; CHOICE; American Literary Scholarship; and The Year’s Work in English Studies

Editor. Refiguring Oscar Wilde’s Salome. Rodopi, 2011. [Pb].

• Reviewed in New Theatre Quarterly; Upstage: A journal of turn-of-the-century theatre; Nineteeth Century Theatre and Film; and TheaterForschung (TheaterResearch)

 

ARTICLES IN PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS AND BOOKS

“What Theatre Can and Can’t Do: Playing Off Chatman.” Philosophy, Analytic Aesthetics, and Theatre. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. London: Routledge, 2025, 186-194.

“Introduction: Philosophy of Theatre in the 21st Century.” Philosophy, Analytic Aesthetics, and Theatre. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. London: Routledge, 2025, xiii-xvii.

“EDITOR’S NOTE: Micro- and Macro- Philosophical Approaches in the Theatrical and Performing Arts: Rethinking the “Analytic”/“Continental” Divide.” Theatre and Performance Notes and Counternotes 1.2 (2024): 230-239.

“Responses to DeGrazia.” Thornton Wilder Journal 4.2 (2023): 154-156.

“Introduction: Albee around the World.” Albee Abroad. ed. Esther Santana. Brill, 2023, 1-14.

“In Defense of Abstract Creationism: A Recombinatorial Approach.” Philosophy and Literature 45.2 (October 2021): 489-495.

“Edward Albee’s “A Certain Man Had Two [Kids]”: Tragic Parables, “The Prodigal Son,” and Albee’s The Goat.” Journal of American Drama and Theatre 34.1 (Fall 2021):  <https://jadtjournal.org/2021/12/10/edward-albees-a-certain-man-had-two-kids-tragic-parables-in-jesuss-the-prodigal-son-and-albees-the-goat> (Open Access).

“Intrinsic-Extrinsic Properties in Theatre.” Philosophy and Literature 45.1 (April 2021): 34-38.

“Love and Lies in the Living Rooms Dramas of John Guare, Tennessee Williams, and Edward Albee.” Albee and Influence. eds. John M. Clum and Natka Bianchini. Leiden: Brill, 2021, 77-86.

“The Philosophy of Theater.” Oxford Bibliographies. ed. Eugene O’Brien. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020. <https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780190221911/obo-9780190221911-0095.xml?rskey=tvAHcI&result=62>

“Theatre of the Absurd.” Oxford Bibliographies. ed. Eugene O’Brien. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020. <https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780190221911/obo-9780190221911-0094.xml?rskey=bq4cky&result=81>

“Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, and Crises of the American Family: American Civilization and its Discontents.” Arthur Miller for the 21st Century: Contemporary Views of his Writings and Ideas. eds. Stephen Marino and David Palmer. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020, 65-73.

“Propositions in Theatre: Theatrical Utterances as Events.” Journal of Literary Semantics 47.2 (November 2018): 147-152.

“The Chorus ‘In between’: ‘Rep and Rev[ing]’ Athenian Drama in Suzan-Lori Parks’ Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom.” Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 32.1 (Fall 2017): 91-106.

“Wilde Thoughts on Philosophical Reference in An Ideal Husband: ‘An Ideal’ versus ‘The Ideal’ Husband.” Philosophy and Oscar Wilde. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 151-165.

“Introduction: A Wilde Mind: The Witty Aesthete and Serious Thinker, or the Witty Thinker and Serious Aesthete.” Philosophy and Oscar Wilde. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 1-5.

“Editor’s Introduction: Albee –ism(s).” Edward Albee and Absurdism. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. Leiden: Brill, 2017, 1-5.

“Carrying the Private in Public: Language and Performance in Susan Jahoda’s Flight Patterns.” Text and Performance Quarterly 36.2-3 (2016): 137-148.

“James Purdy as Playwright: A Retrospective Reading of A Day After the Fair and The Paradise Circus.” Journal of American Drama and Theatre 27.1 (Winter 2015): <http://jadtjournal.org/2015/03/06/james-purdy-as-playwright-a-retrospective-reading-of-a-day-after-the-fair-and-the-paradise-circus/> (Open Access)

“The Tragicomedies of Oscar Wilde: A Wilde Response to Melodrama.” Oscar Wilde’s Society Plays. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, 37-49.

“Introduction: The Importance of Laughing in Earnest.” Oscar Wilde’s Society Plays. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015, 1-12.

“Theatrical Names and Reference.” Palgrave Communications 1, Article number: 14005 (2015). ​doi:10.1057/palcomms.2014.5: <http://www.palgrave-journals.com/articles/palcomms20145> (Open Access)

“Dominance and the Triumph of the White Trickster Over the Black Picaro in Amiri Baraka’s Great Goodness of Life: A Coon Show.” Callaloo 36.2 (Spring 2013): 312-321.

“Camus’ Unbeknownst Legacy: Or, ‘I’m having an existential crisis!’ Don’t you really mean a Camusian crisis?” The Originality and Complexity of Albert Camus’s Writings, ed. Emmanuelle A. Vanborre. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, 53-62.

“Family Dynamics in O’Neill’s Drama: The Diseased Body in Long Day’s Journey into Night.” Critical Insights: Eugene O’Neill. ed. Steven F. Bloom. Pasadena: Salem Press, 2012, 189-204.

“Epistemological Crises in O’Neill’s S. S. Glencairn Plays,” Eugene O’Neill’s One-Act Plays: New Critical Perspectives. eds. Michael Y. Bennett and Benjamin D. Carson. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, 97-111.

“The Cartesian Beckett: The Mind-Body Split in Murphy and Happy Days.” ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes, and Reviews 25.2 (May 2012): 118-122.

“The Response to the Offstage Presence in Beckett’s ‘Act Without Words I’ and ‘Act Without Words II.’” Contemporary Irish Writing, Special Issue of ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes, and Reviews 25.1 (February 2012): 16-18.

“‘The Essential Doesn’t Change’: Essence Precedes Experience and Cartesian Rationalism in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot.” Notes on Contemporary Literature 42.1 (January 2012): 5-7.

“A Wilde Performance: Bunburying and ‘Bad Faith’ in Salome and The Importance of Being Earnest.” Refiguring Oscar Wilde’s Salome. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011, 167-181.

“Introduction: Salome as Anomaly?” Refiguring Oscar Wilde’s Salome. ed. Michael Y. Bennett. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011, vii-xii.

“Trajectories: mapping rhizomes.” Journal of Philosophy: A Cross-Disciplinary Inquiry 6.15 -(Spring 2011): 56-64.

“The Circle of Unmeaning: Beckett’s ‘Come and Go.’” Notes on Contemporary Literature: 40.4 (November 2010): 7-10.

“The Minoritarian Linguist in Translation: Homebody/Kabul’s Answer to Deleuze and Guattari.” Boundaries of Publication: Posthumography, Special Issue of Rhizomes 20 (Summer 2010): <http://www.rhizomes.net/issue20/bennett.html> (Open Access).

“Sartre’s ‘The Wall’ and Beckett’s Waiting for Godot: Existential and Non-Existential Nothingness.” Notes on Contemporary Literature 39.5 (November 2009): 2-3.

“Clowning Around in James Purdy’s The Paradise Circus.” Notes on Contemporary Literature 38.3 (May 2008): 7-10.

“Brecht in the Wilde: Salome‘s Liminal Spaces and the Storyteller.” Journal of Theatre and Drama 7/8 (2001/2002): 145-158. [Published 2005]

“Recipe for The [Historical] Public Sphere: The Borgesian Catalogue.” Variaciones Borges 16 (October 2003): 131-156.

REVIEW-ESSAYS

“Away from the Absurd?: The Critical Response to Beckett at 100.” Linda Ben-Zvi; Angela Moorjani (eds.): Beckett at 100. Revolving it All (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008); Christopher Murray (ed.): Samuel Beckett. 100 Years. Centenary Essays (Dublin: New Island, 2006); Brigitte Le Juez: Beckett Before Beckett (London: Souvenir, 2008); S. E. Gontarski; Anthony Uhlmann (eds.) Beckett After Beckett (Gainsville: University Press of Florida, 2006); Ronan McDonald: The Cambridge Introduction to Samuel Beckett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006). Kritikon Litterarum 36.3/4 (December 2009): 230-238.

PERFORMANCE REVIEWS

Performance Review of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, by Edward Albee. A Steppenwolf Theatre Production. Dir. Pam MacKinnon. The Booth Theatre. New York. Theatre Journal, 65.3 (October 2013): 416-417.

Performance Review of Long Day’s Journey into Night, by Eugene O’Neill. Dir. Joe Dowling. Guthrie Theater. Minneapolis. Eugene O’Neill Review 34.2 (2013): 273-275.

Performance Review of Spring Awakening: A Sin of Omission, by Frank Wedekind. Adapted by Toby Berkovici and Emily Denison. Dir. Toby Bercovici. Looking Glass Theatre. New York. Theatre Journal 63.2 (May 2011): 269-270.

Performance Review of Waiting for Godot, by Samuel Beckett. Dir. Anthony Page. Studio 54. New York. Theatre Journal 62.1 (March 2010):  110-111.

Performance Review of Salome: The Reading, by Oscar Wilde. Dir. Estelle Parson. Ethel Barrymore Theatre. New York. Theatre Journal 56.2 (May 2004): 305-306.

BOOK REVIEWS

Review of David Kornhaber. Theatre & Knowledge. (New York: Red Globe Press, 2020). Theatre Research International 45.3 (2020): 367-368.

Review of David Krasner. A History of Modern Drama: Volume II: 1960-2000. (Chicester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2016). Modern Drama 61.3 (Fall 2018): 471-473.

Review of Philip E. Smith II, ed. Oscar Wilde’s Historical Criticism Notebook. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). The OScholars. November 2017. <https://oscholars.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/bennett-on-smith.docx> (Open Access)

Review of Daniel Sack. After Live: Possibility, Potentiality, and the Future of Performance (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2015). Kritikon Litterarum 44.1-2 (2017): 133–136.

Review of Penny Farfan and Lesley Ferris, eds. Contemporary Women Playwrights: Into the Twenty-First Century (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). Text & Presentation (2014): 217-220.

Review of Anna McMullan and S. E. Wilmer, eds. Reflections on Beckett: A Centenary Celebration (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2009). Modern Drama 53.3 (Fall 2010): 417-419.

Review of Stephen Bottoms, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Edward Albee (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005). Theatre Journal 60.1 (March 2008): 151-152.

Review of Tracy C. Davis and Thomas Postlewait, eds. Theatricality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). Kritikon Litterarum 34.3/4 (2007): 182-186.

Review of Shannon Jackson. Professing Performance: Theatre in the Academy from Philology to Performativity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). Kritikon Litterarum 32.3/4 (2005): 154-157.

Review of Austin Sarat, Lawrence Douglas, and Martha Merrill Umphrey, eds. The Place of Law (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003). The Drama Review T185, 49.1 (Spring 2005): 171-173.