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Notable and Rediscovered Women Playwrights Throughout the Centuries (A Work in Progress)

Although there has been much progress in recognizing women who wrote plays in the past, there are hundreds more that have yet to be rediscovered or reclaimed. The work of reclamation is a large part of the ON HER SHOULDERS mission. 

The OHS Reading Series is intended to present selected plays to the public, to showcase the range of subject matter and writing styles that women have used through the last millennium, and the continuing relevance of their work to modern audiences. Presentations have included better-known but still under-produced writers, such as Rachel Crothers, Lorraine Hansberry and George Sand, as well as writers who were known in their own time (Frances Burney, Margaret Cavendish, Sor Juana Inés De La Cruz) but have been left out of the Western theatre narrative. And some of these writers, such as Marita Bonner, received their first public presentation through OHS.

PLAYS AND PLAYWRIGHTS FEATURED IN OHS EVENTS

10th - 11th Century

  • HROTSVITHA (930-1002); Dulcitus (ca 955)

  • HILDEGARD OF BINGEN (1098-1179); Ordo Virtutum

17th Century 

  • ANA CARO (1590-1646); Count Partinuplés (circa 1640; printed in 1653)

  • MARGARET CAVENDISH (1661-1717); The Convent of Pleasure (1668)

  • OLYMPE DE GOUGES (1748-1793); The Necessity Of Divorce (1790)

  • SOR JUANA INÉS DE LA CRUZ (1648-1695); The House of Desires (1683)

  • CATHERINE TROTTER (1679 - 1749); Fatal Friendship (1698)

18th Century

  • FRANCES BURNEY (1776–1828); The Woman Hater (1800)

  • SUSANNA CENTLIVRE (1667-1723); A Bold Stroke for a Wife (1718)

  • SUSANNA ROWSON (1762-1824); Slaves In Algiers (1794)

  • MERCY OTIS WARREN (1728-1814); The Group (1775)

19th Century

  • PAULINE HOPKINS (1859-1930); Peculiar Sam, or, The Underground Railroad (1879)

  • ESTELLE ANNA LEWIS(1824-1880); Sappho of Lesbos(1868)

  • MARTHA MORTON (1865-1925); A Fool of Fortune (1896)

  • ANNA CORA MOWATT (1819–1870); Fashion (1845)

  • HARRIET LOUISA CHILDE-PEMBERTON (1852-1922); Shattered Nerves (1899)

  • RACHILDE (1860-1953); Madame La Mort (1891), Pleasure (1893)

  • GEORGE SAND (1804 - 1876); Gabriel (1839)

20th Century

  • DJUNA BARNES (1892-1982); A Passion Play (1918), Kurzy of the Sea (1920), Little Drops of Rain (1922), The Dove (1926)

  • MARITA BONNER (1899–1971); The Pot Maker (1927), The Purple Flower(1928), Exit: An Illusion (1929)

  • ALICE CHILDRESS (1920–1994); Wine in the Wilderness (1969)

  • RACHEL CROTHERS (1878–1958); A Man’s World (1909)

  • TERESA DEEVY (1894-1963); Light Falling (1947), Within a Marble City (1948), Going Beyond Alma’s Glory(1949)

  • SHELAGH DELANEY (1938-2011); A Taste of Honey (1958)

  • EDITH ELLIS (1876-1960); Mary Jane's Pa (1912)

  • MARIA IRENE FORNES (1930-2019); The Office (1966)

  • GRISELDA GAMBARO (1928- ); El Campo (1967)

  • ALICE ERYA GERSTENBERG (1885-1972); Overtones (1913), Fourteen (1920)

  • SUSAN GLASPELL (1876–1948); The Verge (1921)

  • EVELYN GLOVER (1874?-1941?); Miss Appleyard’s Awakening (1911)

  • CICELY HAMILTON (1872-1852); Diana of Dobson’s (1908), How The Vote Was Won (1909) with Christoper St. John

  • LORRAINE HANSBERRY (1930–1965); Les Blancs (completed and produced posthumously in 1970)

  • BEATRICE HARRADEN (1864-1936); Lady Geraldine’s Speech (1909)

  • MARIE JENNEY HOWE (1870-1934); An Anti-Suffrage Monologue (1913)

  • ZORA NEALE HURSTON (1891-1960); Spunk (1935)

  • GEORGIA DOUGLASS JOHNSON (1880–1966); Plumes (1927), Safe (1929), Blue Eyed Black Boy (1930)

  • DAPHNE DU MAURIER (1907-1989); The Years Between (1946)

  • MAY MILLER (1899-1995); Stragglers in the Dust (1930), Nails and Thorns (1933)

  • MRS. HARLOW PHIBBS (1864-1932); Mother’s Meeting (1913)

  • BEAH RICHARDS (1920-2000); ONE IS A CROWD (1971)

  • ALICE L. ROSTETTER (1880-1961); The Widow's Veil (1919)

  • RITA CREIGHTON SMITH (1877-1962); The Rescue (1916)

  • EULALIE SPENCE (1894-1981); The Starter (1923), The Hunch (1927), Undertow (1927)

  • CHRISTOPHER ST. JOHN (1871-1960) How The Vote Was Won (1909), with Cicely Hamilton

  • EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY (1892-1950); Aria da Capo (1919)

  • MAURINE DALLAS WATKINS (1896-1969) Chicago (1926)

  • MAE WEST (1893-1980) Sex(1926)

    SPECIAL EVENT: RADICAL VOICES (Excerpts)

JANE ARDEN (1927-1982) Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven

CLAIRE LUCKHAM (1944-) Scum: Death, Destruction and Dirty Washing (1976 with The Monstrous Regiment)