Peter Schaffer

The career of British dramatist Peter Shaffer has been filled with anomalies. This foremost of contemporary playwrights began his writing career crafting solid but unexceptional mystery novels. Yet very soon he launched a life of writing spectacular, theatrical pieces. This book examines the development of such a writer--one whose dramatic underpinnings remain naturalistic but whose techniques verge on the avant-garde.Gianakaris traces the development of the author's realism from its purest expression in the early Five Finger Exercise, through complex adaptations in Royal Hunt of the Sun and Equus and its reassertion in Shaffer's recent comedy Lettice and Lovage. Amadeus receives special attention in this study, because Shaffer's thematic concerns seem most fully realized there.Consideration is also given to Shaffer's ability to write both profound drama centered on metaphysical issues and dazzling comedy of the first order. Peter Shaffer ends by speaking of the author's latest directions.