Sarah Kane

When Blasted was first produced at the Royal Court in 1995, it was hailed jointly as a masterpiece and a "disgusting piece of filth" (Daily Mail). Subsequently, that play, and the others that followed, have been produced all over the world. This anthology includes Kane's never-before-published Channel 4 screenplay, Skin.

In 1995 Sarah Kane's first full-length play, Blasted, opened. It became the cause célèbre of the theatrical year, making front-page headlines and outraging critics with its depiction of rape, torture and violence in civil war. "Sheer unadulterated brutalism" - Evening Standard

4.48 Psychosis was written throughout the autumn and winter of 1998-99 as Kane battled with one of her recurrent bouts of depression. On February 20, 1999, aged 28, the playwright committed suicide. On the page, the piece looks like a poem. No characters are named, and even their number is unspecified. It could be a journey through one person's mind,...

Set in an unnamed city from which voices and images spring, Crave charts the disintegration of a human mind under the pressures of love, loss and desire. "A hugely unnerving theatrical experience, shot through with the language of the Bible and a genuinely poetic richness" (Time Out) "A dramatic poem in the late-Beckett style, sometimes a chamber quartet for lost...

With an introduction by Graham Whybrow, literary manager of the Royal Court Theatre, this anthology collects the defining plays of the 1980s and 1990s in one volume. Top Girls: 'The best British play ever from a woman dramatist' (The Guardian) Hysteria: 'One of the most brilliantly original and entertaining new plays I have seen in years' (The Sunday Times) Blasted:...