The Mound Builders (Masterplots II: Drama, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Lanford Wilson
- First Published: 1976
- Type of Plot: Existential
- Time of Work: The 1970’s
- Setting: Urbana and Blue Shoals, Illinois
- Principal Characters: Professor August Howe, Cynthia Howe, Kirsten, D. K. “Delia” Eriksen, Dr. Dan Loggins, Dr. Mary Jean Loggins, Chad Jasker
- Genres: Existential literature, Drama, Psychological drama, Allegory
- Subjects: Values, 1970’s, Love or romance, Marriage, Progress, Archaeology or archaeologists
- Locales: Blue Shoals, IL, Urbana, IL
The Play
The Mound Builders opens in August Howe’s study in Urbana, Illinois, on a February morning. August, an archaeology professor, begins to dictate a report on the previous summer’s failed expedition to Blue Shoals, in southern Illinois. As he dictates, slides depicting scenes from the expedition are projected onto a screen at the back of the stage. The slides show the lake that threatened to flood his team’s excavation, the old farmhouse where the team and their families lived, construction of a dam close to the house and their excavation, a bulldozer, and...
[The entire page is 3100 words long]
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