“Natural disasters, political upheavals, economic chaos, civil strife, and other tragic occurrences often made it difficult for writers working from their home countries to supply material in a timely fashion” writes the editor in his preface. Other difficulties were problems of translation, transliteration, citing names and taxonomy. With 27 countries featured, 323 biographical entries, and a time span from ancient to modern, one has to admire the achievement of editor Leiter, his advisory board, and their 90 plus contributors in this stylish work from Greenwood. There is a wry comment in the preface that “Books in English either partly or entirely about many subjects discussed here do not exist”. Clearly another major difficulty! The editor pays tribute to two earlier works: The Cambridge Guide to Asian Theatre (Brandon, 1993) which gives an A‐Z treatment by country, but is not an encyclopedia and its “two‐page index of artists and genres” is weak; and Volume 5 of The World Encyclopedia of Contemporary Theatre (Rubin 1998). This has a wider geographical coverage, but its focus is on contemporary theatre only. The two‐volume Encyclopedia of Asian Theatre, reviewed here, covers both traditional and contemporary theatre.
This encyclopaedia is arranged alphabetically and has four main categories of entry: country/region; biography (the largest category); theatrical genres/forms; and general topics. Geographical coverage is South Asia, South East Asia, and the Far East, from Pakistan and India to the Koreas, China and Japan, and including Tibet, Indonesia and Thailand. The largest category is that for actors, directors and other people related to Asian theatre, 323 of them. A total of 190 theatrical genres and forms feature; and there are thirty general topics, many of which are sub‐divided by country or region. Topics included in this section are Actors and Acting, Directors and Directing, Religion in Theatre, Role Types, Censorship, Masks, Puppet Theatre, and Women in Asian Theatre. Dance and music are not covered except when they relate to theatre, and Asian theatre as manifest in other parts of the world, are beyond the scope of this work.
The entries vary in length from a paragraph to 12 pages and include cross‐references and, in some cases, a note of Further Readings. There is a scattering of black and white photographs. To take a sample of entries from “R”, we have Raina, Maharaj Krishna, a Hindi language actor and director of stage and screen born in Kashmir; Rama II, King of Siam who reigned 1809‐1824, also known as King Nangklao, who is credited with creating the Thai classical dance‐drama, lakon; his descendant, Rama IV, who was immortalized in Broadway's The King and I; Randai, a folk theatre of the Minangkabau people of West Sumatra, a dynamic mixture of martial arts, dance, music and acting; a lengthy article on Religion in Theatre, sub‐divided by ten countries; and Ramlila, a North Indian ritual‐based Hindi folk theatre derived from the Ramayana.
The end of volume Selected Bibliography covers books, chapters in books and dissertations (but not journal or magazine articles). Arranged by country, it includes general historical and critical works, and plays in translation. Even without the journal articles, the coverage is impressive and specialist libraries will find this bibliography of great value in its own right. It is arranged by country, and under China, for example, which includes Hong Kong, Mongolia, Taiwan and Tibet, there are 99 titles given with publisher details. The index, too, is impressive, covering 53 double‐columned pages, providing detailed access to the contents. Prefatory matter includes both an alphabetical and a classified listing of the entries.
This is a work of considerable scholarship and covers a rich selection of people, genres, and knowledge from the exotic world of Asian theatre, much of it little known outside their local regions. It will be of great value to libraries covering the performing arts and Asian studies.
