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9781501180675

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"""August Wilson was one of the greatest playwrights in the history of the American stage. Despite his major critical acclaim, a sophisticated biography is long overdue. Patti Hartigan has filled this void with a deeply researched, impressively insightful biography that reveals in riveting detail why Wilson will be recalled as one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. A must read for students of theatre and African American literature.""--Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University ""August Wilson: A Life is an exquisitely researched biography fully equal to its legendary subject. With an insider's knowledge of the theater world, critic and arts reporter Patti Hartigan details on these rich, revealing pages not only the epic life of a complex, often misunderstood genius, but also the fascinating artistic, political and racial milieu in which he moved, showing us that as long as there is a truly American theater, there will be the plays and unparalleled presence of August Wilson.""--Charles Johnson, MacArthur Fellow and National Book Award-winning author of Middle Passage ""[An] absorbing, richly detailed biography. . . . The backstage drama on Wilson's biggest Broadway success comes to vivid life in Hartigan's book, along with Wilson's remarkable family history.""--Michael Phillips ""The Chicago Tribune"" ""[Hartigan's] book is an achievement: It's solid and well reported. . . . Hartigan is adept at keeping the lines straight.""--Dwight Garner ""The New York Times"" ""An invaluable and highly absorbing new biography. . . . Wilson's artistic story, throbbing with the ancestral memory Wilson felt in his blood, is profoundly inspiring in Hartigan's magnificent rendering.""--Charles McNulty ""The Los Angeles Times"" ""Masterful. . . . With painstaking research, stylistic verve, and an eye both admiring and exacting, Ms. Hartigan has pieced together the man behind the 20th Century Cycle, bringing Wilson to furious, complicated life. . . . An epic account.""--Isaac Butler ""The Wall Street Journal"" ""Patti Hartigan has beautifully captured August Wilson's 'wild heart' in this important work. It dives into the world of this seminal dramatist by showing us his process - and colossal talent - for illuminating the Black experience in America. Wilson admirers will rejoice."" --Wil Haygood, author of Colorization: One Hundred Years of Black Films in a White World and The Butler: A Witness to History ""Patti Hartigan's August Wilson: A Life traces the larger context of his achievement as thoroughly as it does his distinctive vision. . . . [Her] descriptions of his idiosyncratic, youthful self-creation are a delight.""--Imani Perry ""The Atlantic"""

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Patti Hartigan is an award-winning theater critic and arts reporter who spent many years on the staff of The Boston Globe. She divides her time between the Boston area and Charlottesville, Virginia.

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