Professor John Bull

Email:
j.s.bull@reading.ac.uk
Phone:
100
Job title:
Lecturer

Areas of interest

My research interests focus on modern and contemporary drama and performance, especially in Britain, and I have also published on late seventeenth and early eighteenth century British drama. My work mainly takes the form of published scholarship, but I have also directed classic and contemporary plays. In recent research I have been analysing the current status of political theatre in Britain, and I maintain contacts with many established and emerging theatre writers and practitioners whose work has intervened in contemporary social and political debates.

Postgraduate supervision

I welcome enquiries from postgraduate students who would like to work on such topics as contemporary British theatre, contemporary British theatre companies, and seventeenth and early eighteenth century British drama and performance. I currently supervise postgraduate work on Restoration and post-Restoration drama on the contemporary British stage. Projects I have supervised in the past include British theatre and images of the "new Europe".

Teaching

Introduction to Film and Theatre
British Theatre
Musical Theatre
Dissertation/Independent project supervision (BA and MA).

Professional bodies/affiliations

Editor of British and Irish Playwrights Since World War II, Bruccoli Clark Layman
Associate Editor (Modern Drama) for the Oxford Companion to English Literature (seventh edition)
Peer Assessor for the Arts & Humanities Research Council.

Selected publications

Books

Contemporary Drama in English, 2017, editor of collected papers from "Nations, Nationhood and Theatre" Conference organised by me at the University of Reading, 2016.

Bull, John and Graham Saunders (series editors), British Theatre Companies: From Fringe to Mainstream, 3 vols, London, Bloomsbury, 2016–17.

Bull, John (Ed. and two substantial chapters, pages 1–121), British Theatre Companies: From Fringe to Mainstream: Volume I: 1965-1979, London, Bloomsbury 2017).

Bull, John, British and Irish Dramatists Since World War II, 3 vols, New York, Bruccoli Clark Layman, 2000–2005.

Bull, John, Vanbrugh and Farquhar, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998.

Bull, John, Stage Right: Crisis and Recovery in British Contemporary Mainstream Theatre, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994.

Bull, John (ed.) Howard Brenton: Three Plays; A Sky Blue Life, How Beautiful with Badges, Measure for Measure, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989.

Bull, John. New British Political Dramatists, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1984 and reissued twice.

Barrell, John and John Bull (eds) The Penguin Book of English Pastoral Verse, Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1982: paperback.

Barrell, John and John Bull (eds.) The Penguin Book of English Pastoral Verse, London, Alan Lane, 1974: hardback.

Selected Articles and Chapters from 2000 only:

Bull, John, "Nation, nationhood and theatre" [introduction to special issue], Journal of Contemporary Drama in English, 6 (1), 2018: 1–14.

Bull, John,"Add-Aptation: Simon Stephens, Carrie Cracknell and Katie Mitchell's 'Dialogues' with the Classic Canon": in Journal of Contemporary Drama in English, 6 (2), 2018: 280–299.

Bull, John, "'We cannot all be masters, nor all masters/Cannot truly be follow'd': Joe Orton's Holiday Camp Bacchae - matters of class, genre and medium in The Erpingham Camp: in Studies in Theatre and Performance, 37 (2), 2017: 205–220.

Bull, John, "History repeating itself?: Text and image, theatre and performance: Howard Brenton and David Edgar's appropriation of the historical drama": in Studies in Theatre and Performance, 33 (2), 2013: 169–185.

Bull, John (2012) "Chinese whispers": in Studies in Theatre and Performance, 32 (2) 2012: 227–232.

Bull, John, "Arnold Wesker: the Trilogy Revisited": in (ed.) Pattie, David, Modern British Playwriting: the 1950s, London, Bloomsbury, 2012: 171–197.

Bull, John, "Anthony Neilson": in (ed.) Sierz,Aleks, Modern British Playwriting: the 1990s, London, Bloomsbury, 2012.

Bull, John, "Nowadays the house would be called a stately home": pastoral relocations in Tom Stoppard's Arcadia, Sillages critiques, 13, 2011.

Bull, John, "England People Very Nice: Intercultural Confusions at the National Theatre, London": in CDE Contemporary Drama in English (17). Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, Trier, 2010: 123–144.

Bull, John, "Spectacular reconstruction: innovation and appropriation in modern British Drama": in Redling, E. and Schnierer, P. P. (eds.) Non-Standard Forms of Contemporary Drama and Theatre. CDE Contemporary Drama in English (15). Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, Trier, 2008: 13–29.

Bull, John, "'Being taken no notice of in ten million homes': David Hare's adventures in television": in (ed.) Boon, Richard, The Cambridge Companion to David Hare, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007: 153–168.

Bull, John, "Telling Stories: the Point Blank Trilogy": in (ed.) Tomlin, Liz, Point Blank, Bristol, Intellect Press, 2007: 9–15.

Bull, John,"Left in Front: David Edgar's political theatre": in (ed.) Luckhurst, Mary, A Companion to Modern British and Irish Drama 1880-2005, Oxford, Blackwell, 2006, 441–453.

Bull, John, "Introduction: on interventionist and community theatre": in (ed.) Billingham, Peter, Radical Initiatives in Interventionist and Community Theatre, Exeter, Intellect, 2005: 5–19.

Bull, John, "Serjeant Musgrave dances to a different tune": John McGrath's adaptation of John Arden's Serjeant Musgrave's Dance: in: (eds.) Bradby, D. and S. Capon, Freedom's Pioneer: John McGrath's Work in Theatre, Film and Television, Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2005: 39–54.

Bull, John." The establishment of mainstream theatre, 1946-1979": in (ed.) Kershaw, Baz, Cambridge History of British Theatre: Volume III: Since 1895, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004: 326–348.

Bull, John, "'A deal of monstrous and forced action': Joe Orton and Ben Jonson": in (ed.) Woolland, Brian, Jonsonians: Living Traditions, London: Ashgate, 2003: 137–152.

Bull, John, "From Illyria to Arcadia: Uses of pastoral in modern English theatre": in TriQuarterly, 116, 2003, 57–72.

Bull, John, "What the butler did see: Joe Orton and Oscar Wilde": in (ed.) Coppa, F, Joe Orton: A Casebook, London & NY: Routledge, 2003: 45–60.

Bull, John, "Michael Frayn": in (ed.) Bull, J. British and Irish Dramatists Since World War II: Volume II, NY, Bruccoli Clark Layman, 2002: 167–178.

Bull, John, "Peter Nichols": in (ed.) Bull, John, British and Irish Dramatists Since World War II Volume II, NY: Bruccoli Clark Layman, 2002: 287–298.

Bull, John. "Tom Stoppard and Politics": in (ed.) Kelly, K, The Cambridge Companion to Tom Stoppard, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001: 136–153.

Bull, John, "Sir John Vanbrugh and George Farquhar in the Post-Restoration Age": in (ed.) Owen, Susan, A Companion to Restoration Drama, Oxford, Blackwell, 2001: 429–445.

Bull, John, "Looking Back at Godot": in (ed.) Shellard, Dominic, British Theatre in the 1950s, Sheffield, Sheffield Academic Press, 2000: 82–94.

Bull, John, "Mapping the Terrain: Troy Kennedy Martin's Edge of Darkness": in (eds.) Bignell, J., Lacey, S. and Macmurraugh-Kavanagh, M, British Television Drama: Past, Present and Future, Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000: 93–99.