Folk Plays Of Eastern Carolina

BERNICE KELLY HARRIS

Publication: The University of North Carolina Press, 1940, Chapel Hill

First edition. 8vo. Inked inscription on the front fly leaf by Edward H. Koch to his son. Edward H. Koch was Founder and Director of The Carolina Playmakers and also edited and provided an Introduction for this volume. Cloth, titles in green on front cover and spine, xix [blank], plus 18 pages of photographic studies by Charles Farrell, frontispiece, introduction, illustrated from photographs, appendices. Illustrated with photographs by Charles Farrell. "Starting in the 1920s, a burst of play-writing and acting creativity began in Chapel Hill and spread across the state. Professor Frederick Koch came to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1918 for a special purpose: to get students there to write plays and act them out, not just to sit and watch. Koch called his student actors the Playmakers and their plays 'folk plays.' While 'folk' means 'people,' Koch didn't have just any kind of people in mind. He meant farmers and others who didn't live in big cities. He saw places like North Carolina (with lots of farms but not many towns) as gold mines of stories. He believed that people there lived as their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents had lived, sharing a common way of life that the rest of the world was forgetting. By writing about 'the folk,' Koch thought, his students could show what was being lost." Most Carolina folk plays can be called either a comedy or a tragedy, regardless of which, audiences could "come see themselves." Seven plays are presented and all are original productions of the famous Carolina Playmakers. Some minor foxing to a few pages, else fine in dust jacket lightly faded on the spine and with light wear to the bottom edge of the rear cover.

Inventory Number: 42026