Edgar manages to invert the subordinate function of generally accepted objective indicators of membership of a particular national group--language, religion, common history, and territory--into the essential mode of imperative distinction shaping the unique national identity. In other words, it is the fresco and the value assigned to it that…

The work of British playwright Sarah Daniels is some of the most politically provocative on the contemporary British stage. The uproar over Daniels' work comes not only because she argues for social change, but also because she offers models for building a new order. Two plays, with their comedy and their radical separatist politics, are…