Henry Schvey

Henry I. Schvey is an American academic with expertise in modern American drama, theatre, literature and the arts, and expressionism. Schvey is professor of drama and comparative literature and affiliate faculty in the American cultural studies program at Washington University in St. Louis.

Schvey was chair of the performing arts department at Washington University from 1987 to 2007 and the Director of the American Literature Program at Leiden University in the Netherlands from 1984 to 1987. He has authored books, essays, and review articles on topics related to American drama and literature, including works of playwrights like William Shakespeare, Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, and David Mamet. In addition to his academic work, Schvey has directed numerous theatrical productions and has been involved in various cultural and academic initiatives.

Early life and education Schvey was born in New York City. He attended Hunter College Elementary School and the Horace Mann School for Boys.

Schvey majored in comparative literature at University of Wisconsin–Madison where he graduated, with honors, in 1969. He graduated with an MA in West European Studies from Indiana University in 1971.

Schvey completed a Ph.D. in comparative literature at Indiana University Bloomington in 1977.

Career Schvey began his academic career at Leiden University in 1974 as an assistant professor in the English department. He was promoted to the position of associate professor in 1980. In 1986, Schvey was visiting professor of English and drama at Webster University.

Between 1987 and 2007, Schvey served as the chair of the performing arts department at Washington University. Between 1988 and 1989, Schvey served on the editorial board for American Drama. In 2001 and 2002, he was a Fellow in the Inaugural Playwriting Initiative at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

In 2007, Washington University celebrated the achievements of Henry Schvey, who served as the chair of the Washington University Performing Arts Department for 19 years before stepping down from the position. Schvey has given lectures and produced a substantial body of work in the fields of contemporary European, British, and American theater. The Poison Tree: A Memoir. St. Louis: Walrus Books, 2016. ISBN 1940442168 New Essays on American Drama, eds. Henry I. Schvey and Gilbert Debusscher. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Editions Rodopi, B.V., 1989. ISBN 978-9051831078 Oskar Kokoschka: the Painter as Playwright. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1982. ISBN 0814317022

Book chapters

The Place I Was Made For’: Tennessee Williams in New Orleans.” In New Orleans: A Literary History, ed. T.R. Johnson. Cambridge University Press, 2019, 225–241. ISBN 1108498191 Tennessee Williams and European Expressionism,” in Tennessee Williams and Europe: Intercultural Encounters, Transatlantic Exchanges, ed. John S. Bak. Amsterdam: Editions Rodopi, B.V., 2014, 65–88. ISBN 978-90-420-3873-8 Getting the Colored Lights Going’: Expressionism and A Streetcar Named Desire,” in Essays on A Streetcar Named Desire, ed. Brenda Murphy (Pasadena and Hackensack: Salem Press, 2010), 58–79. Power Plays: David Mamet's Theatre of Manipulation,” in David Mamet: A Casebook, ed. Leslie Kane (New York and London: Garland Publishing, 1992), 87–108. D.H. Lawrence and Expressionism,” in D.H. Lawrence: New Studies, ed. Christopher Heywood (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987), 124–37. John Arden: From Paradox to Propaganda,” Contemporary British Drama, eds. Hedwig Bock and Albert Wertheim (New York and Munich: Max Hueber Verlag, 1981), 47–70. The Importance of Past Time in the Plays of Lanford Wilson,” in Contemporary American Drama, eds. Hedwig Bock and Albert Wertheim (New York and Munich: Max Hueber Verlag, 1981), 225- 40.* The Playwright's Eye: Oskar Kokoschka's Morder Hoffnung der Frauen,” Proceedings of the International Comparative Literature Association, ed. Ulrich Weisstein (Innsbruck: University of Innsbruck Press), 1981.

Journal articles

After the Fox: The Influence of D.H. Lawrence upon Tennessee Williams. The Tennessee Williams Annual Review, spring 2018, 115–144. The Tragic Poetics of Tennessee Williams, Etudes Anglaises: Special Tennessee Williams Centenary Issue, eds. Elisabeth Angel-Perez and Marie Pecorari 64/1 2011, 74–85. Review of Eugene O’Neill, Beyond the Horizon and Tennessee Williams, Spring Storm. Theatre Journal (March, 2011), 111–15. Hamlet as Teenager: A Rebel with a Cause, Belles Lettres Vol. IX, No.1 (September/December, 2008), 27–29. A Traveling Salesman in Beijing: Global Cultures Translated Through Theatre, Tamkang Review 38.2 (June 2008), 79–88. Father-Son Relationships in the Plays of Sam Shepard, in Sam Shepard, ed. Harold Bloom (New York: Chelsea House, 2003), rpt. from Modern Drama, Vol. XXXVI, No. 1, 1993, 12–26. The Master and His Double: Eugene O’Neill and Sam Shepard, in Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism, Vol. V, No. 2, Sp. 1991, 49–60. David Mamet: Games of Manipulation and Power, New Theatre Quarterly, Vol. IV, No. 13, Feb. 1988, 77–88. At the Deathbed: Edward Albee's All Over, Modern Drama, Vol. XXX, No. 3, 1987, 352–63. “The Grinning Reaper: Death and Dying in Contemporary American Drama,” Dutch Quarterly Review of Anglo-American Letters, 1984/1, 47–61. Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar: Bildungsroman or Case History?” Dutch Quarterly Review of Anglo- American Letters, 1978, 18–37. Oskar Kokoschka's ‘The Dreaming Youths,’ Books Abroad, Vol. 49, No. 3, Summer 1975, 484–85.