The judges have announced their short list for the award of the STR Theatre Book Prize for books published in 2015. They have chosen (listed alphabetically by title):

1606 William Shakespeare and the Year of King Lear
by James Shapiro (Faber & Faber)

The Censorship of British Drama 1900-1968
by Steve Nicholson (University of Exeter Press)

Howard Barker’s Theatre
edited by James Reynolds and Andy W. Smith (Bloomsbury)

John Osborne
by Peter Whitebrook (Oberon)

Orson Welles: One Man Band
by Simon Callow (Jonathan Cape)

The winner will be announced on Friday 22nd April at a reception at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane when the judges will speak about the books and the awards will be presented by actress and author Dame Siân Phillips who was herself a judge for the prize in 2007.

The judges are

Sam Walters, theatre director, founder and until recently artistic director of the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond

Sarah Hemming, theatre critic for the Financial Times

Colin Chambers, Professor Emeritus Kingston University, formerly Literary Manager at the Royal Shakespeare Company and author among many books of the winner of the first Theatre Book Prize, awarded in 1997 for his The Life of Margaret Ramsay, Play Agent.

For more information about the STR Theatre Book Prize, please see the Theatre Book Prize page.