'[a] brilliant series...these mini paperbacks each give an insightful, focused overview of a key topic...start collecting now.' - Whatsonstage.com 'In this book Lionel Pilkington tracks with great clarity the complexity of Irish buffoonery, national theatricality and dissent.' - Fiona Shaw 'This is a valuable, concise book written by a fine scholar whose work is widely known and admired. It will prove an excellent addition to reading lists for courses in modern drama and Irish Studies.' - Stephen Myers Watt, Adjunct Professor of Theatre and Drama, Indiana University '...Palgrave Macmillan's excellent new outward-looking, eclectic Theatre& ... series.These short books, written by leading theatre academics, do much to reintroduce some of the brightest names in theatre academia to the general reader. Plus, the matrix of references to bigger books soon builds quite a comprehensive catch-up reading list for those of us who graduated more than a decade ago and are interested in where contemporary thinking is at...' - Guardian Theatre Blog, September 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/theatreblog/2009/sep/10/theatre-critics-academics-artists