CONTENTS -- Preface -- Introduction -- The History Lesson: Authenticity and Anachronism in August Wilson's Plays -- August Wilson's Burden: The Function of Neoclassical Jazz -- Speaking of Ma Rainey / Talking about the Blues -- Filling the Time: Reading History in the Drama of August Wilson -- Boundaries, Logistics, and Identity: The Property of Metaphor in Fences and Joe Turner? Come and Gone -- Ghosts on the Piano: August Wilson and the Representation of Black American History -- American History as "Loud Talking" in Two Trains Running -- Romare Bearden, August Wilson, and the Traditions of African Performance -- The Ground on Which I Stand: August Wilson's Perspective on African American Women -- August Wilson's Women -- August Wilson's Gender Lesson -- I Want a Black Director -- "The Crookeds with the Straights": Fences, Race, and the Politics of Adaptation -- Annotated Bibliography of Works by and about August Wilson -- Notes on Contributors -- Index to the Plays.