Laurence Senelick (born October 12, 1942) is an American scholar, educator, actor and director. He is the author, editor, or translator of many books.

Teaching

Senelick joined the Department of Drama at

Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. ...

in 1972, where he was later named Fletcher Professor of Oratory and served as Director of Graduate Studies for 30 years. He retired in 2019.

Scholarship

Senelick's scholarship has focused on popular entertainment, with research into music hall,

vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...

circus A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclis ...

and

pantomime Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and (to a lesser extent) in other English-speaking ...

. His work on Russian and Soviet theater was honored by the St. George Medal of the Russian Ministry of Culture. His writings also studied gender in performance, culminating in ''The Changing Room: Sex, Drag and Theatre'' (2000).

Theater

Senelick has directed productions for many groups, including the

Opera Company of Boston The Opera Company of Boston was an American opera company located in Boston, Massachusetts, that was active from the late 1950s through the 1980s. The company was founded by American conductor Sarah Caldwell in 1958 under the name Boston Opera Gr ...

Boston Baroque Boston Baroque is the oldest period instrument orchestra in North America. It was founded in 1973 by the American harpsichordist and conductor, Martin Pearlman, to present concerts of the Baroque and Classical repertoire on period instruments, dr ...

, the Loeb Drama Center, and the

Purcell Society {{primary sources, date=March 2015 The Purcell Society, founded in 1876 (principally by William Hayman Cummings) is an organization dedicated to making the complete musical works of Henry Purcell available. Between 1876 and 1965, scores of all the ...

. His productions include the US premieres of the

Seneca the Younger Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (; 65 AD), usually known mononymously as Seneca, was a Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, dramatist, and, in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature. Seneca was born in ...

Ted Hughes Edward James "Ted" Hughes (17 August 1930 – 28 October 1998) was an English poet, translator, and children's writer. Critics frequently rank him as one of the best poets of his generation and one of the twentieth century's greatest wri ...

' '' Oedipus'',

Robert David MacDonald Robert David MacDonald (27 August 1929 – 19 May 2004), known as David, was a Scottish playwright, translator and theatre director. Early life Robert David MacDonald was born in Elgin, in Morayshire, Scotland on 27 August 1929, the son of a ...

’s ''Summit Conference'', and Pedro Miguel Rozos’ ''Our Private Life''. As an actor, he performed Samuel Beckett’s ''Krapp’s Last Tape'' when he was 73. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Poets Theatre.

Awards

Senelick's work in the classroom has been honored with the Oscar Brockett Outstanding Teacher of Theatre in Higher Education Award of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education and the Betty Jean Jones Award of the American Theatre and Drama Society as Outstanding Teacher of American Theatre and Drama. His books have received prizes such as the Barnard Hewitt Award of the American Society for Theatre Research, the George Freedley Award of the Theatre Library Association, and the George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism. His research has been recognized by grants from the Guggenheim Foundation and he has been named a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

, the College of Fellows of the American Theatre, and the Berlin Institute for Advanced Studies

Personal life

Laurence Senelick's brother is the neurologist and author Dr. Richard Senelick. Senelick’s life partner was the novelist and screenwriter Michael McDowell; they were together for 30 years until McDowell’s death in 1999.

Selected bibliography

As author

* * * * * * * * * * *

As editor or translator

*Editor and translator (with Sergei Ostrovsky), *Editor and translator, *Editor, *Editor, *Editor, *Editor, *Editor, *Editor and translator, *Editor, *Editor and translator, *Editor and translator,

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Senelick, Laurence Tufts University faculty Northwestern University alumni Harvard University alumni Theatrologists Living people 1942 births