Inci Bilgin Tekin

This study explores intertextual and intergeneric relations with a specific focus on their interactions with contemporary literary theory. The volume engages with the works of Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Jean Rhys, and Djanet Sears. It examines crosscultural and Indigenous adaptations, postcolonial and feminist appropriations, and screen adaptations as central strands within current debates in adaptation studies.

This study aims at examining the contemporary stage adaptations of «Othello» by the four noteworthy contemporary playwrights Ann Marie MacDonald, Djanet Sears, Paula Vogel and Toni Morrison, while discussing their plays both within and outside the framework of Adaptation Studies. Drawing on postcolonial and feminist theories along with psychoanalytical theories and theories of adaptation, this book explores the adaptive levels, contexts and strategies of the four women playwrights in revising «Othello». The anxiety of canonization that the contemporary women playwrights experience, is also addressed as an issue parallel to their authorial relations with Shakespeare. In the hands of contemporary women playwrights, «Othello» thematically makes a call for new contemporary women’s perspectives and technically provides an everlasting space for further feminist adaptations, already becoming a signifier of the signification process itself.

Inci Bilgin Tekin's study offers a comparative perspective on two very challenging contemporary female playwrights, Liz Lochhead and Cherrie Moraga, and their Scottish and Chicanese adaptations of myths -- such as the Greek Medea and Oedipus or the Mayan Popul Vuh -- which address ethnic, racial, gender, and hierarchical oppression. Her book incorporates postcolonial and feminist readings of Lochhead's and Moraga's plays while it also explores different mythologies on the background. Bilgin Tekin not only introduces an original point of view on Liz Lochhead's and Cherrie Moraga's plays as adaptations or rewrites, but also calls attention to the non-canonized Scottish, Aztec, and Mayan mythologies. Following an innovative approach, she discusses the question in which ways Lochhead's and Moraga's adaptations of myths are challenges to the canon and further suggests a feminist version of Augusto Boal's "Theatre of the Oppressed". The study appeals to readers of mythology, drama, and comparative literature. Those interested in postcolonial and feminist theories will also gain valuable new insights.