"In this book the author discusses forty Greek plays written during the period of nationalization and Westernization of the Greeks roughly bounded by the War of Independence in the 1820s and the establishment of a republic in the 1970s. The playwrights are Evanthia Kairi, Dimitrios Hatziaslanis, Kalliroi Siganou-Parren, Costis Palamas, Nikos Kazantzakis, Angelos Sikelianos, Iakovos Kambanellis, Giorgos Skourtis, Costas Mourselas, Stratis Karras, Antonis Matesis, and Loula Anagnostaki.". "Special attention is paid to the dramas of Kairi, Siganou-Parren, and Anagnostaki, three women who articulated and reshaped the concept of Hellenism for their audiences. Their plays are compared to better known ones written by Greek and non-Greek male dramatists who were their contemporaries and who dealt with similar issues of intense nation building or national crises."--BOOK JACKET.