Try free for 30 days

  • Backwards & Forwards

  • A Technical Manual for Reading Plays
  • By: David Ball
  • Narrated by: Kevin Pierce
  • Length: 3 hrs and 17 mins
  • 5.0 out of 5 stars (2 ratings)

1 credit a month to use on any title, yours to keep (you’ll use your first credit on this title).
Stream or download thousands of included titles.
Access to exclusive deals and discounts.
$16.45 a month after 30 day trial. Cancel anytime.
Backwards & Forwards cover art

Backwards & Forwards

By: David Ball
Narrated by: Kevin Pierce
Try for $0.00

$16.45 per month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $17.99

Buy Now for $17.99

Pay using voucher balance (if applicable) then card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions Of Use and Privacy Notice and authorise Audible to charge your designated credit card or another available credit card on file.

Publisher's Summary

This guide to play reading for students and practitioners of both theater and literature complements, rather than contradicts or repeats, traditional methods of literary analysis of scripts.

Ball developed his method during his work as Literary Director at the Guthrie Theater, building his guide on the crafts playwrights of every period and style use to make their plays stage worthy. The audiobook is full of tools for students and practitioners to use as they investigate plot, character, theme, exposition, imagery, motivation/obstacle/conflict, theatricality, and the other crucial parts of the superstructure of a play. He includes guides for discovering what the playwright considers the play's most important elements, thus permitting interpretation based on the foundation of the play rather than its details.

Using Hamlet as illustration, Ball assures a familiar base for illustrating script-reading techniques as well as examples of the kinds of misinterpretation listeners can fall prey to by ignoring the craft of the playwright. Of immense utility to those who want to put plays on the stage (actors, directors, designers, production specialists) Backwards and Forwards is also a fine playwriting manual because the structures it describes are the primary tools of the playwright.

©1983 The Board of Trustees, Southern Illinois University (P)2013 Redwood Audiobooks

Critic Reviews

"In fewer than 100 pages, this marvelously instructive book shows how to unlock the secrets of plot, character, theme, exposition, imagery, motivation, conflict, theatricality and pacing... Our editor says he learned more about dramatic structure in the few hours he spent with this 96-page book than he has in his 20 years of theater experience." ( Stage Directions)
"Ball wrote [ Backwards and Forwards] to help people who put on plays understand how a play works... He argues that scripts represent a special kind of writing - because it is writing meant to be staged, not read - and thus requires special reading techniques; these techniques are what he offers." ( Dramatics)

What listeners say about Backwards & Forwards

Average Customer Ratings
Overall
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    2
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.