Loose Screws ─ Nine New Plays from Poland

An unprecedented anthology of contemporary Polish drama, Loose Screws brings together nine previously un-translated plays by prominent playwrights who have emerged in rapidly changing postcommunist landscapes. The plays expose ways in which individual and social violence impinge upon one another, disrupt notions of a monolithic Polish identity, and try to find meaning within the post-9/11 global context.

This comprehensive collection offers an account of Polish history and politics though plays that range in subject from communism to mental illness, criminal and social violence, and working-class life and globalization. Serving as the cornerstone for the collection, Malgorzata Sikorska-Miszczuk’s Loose Screws examines the ways in which various psychopathologies play themselves out in the private and public spheres in postcommunist Poland. The anthology includes a substantive introduction that situates each play within its historical, political, and theatrical context.

Dominika Laster is a lecturer in theater studies and a postdoctoral fellow in interdisciplinary performance studies at Yale University.