The Society for Theatre Research is delighted to reveal the judges for the Theatre Book Prize 2025.

Representing theatre critics, academia and theatre professionals, historian Dr Lucy Munro, theatre critic Gary Naylor and performer and director Tricia Thorns will appoint a winner as part of a panel chaired by STR Committee Member Howard Loxton.

2025 will mark the 27^th STR Theatre Book Prize, which was established in 1998 to celebrate the Society’s Golden Jubilee. The aim of the Book Prize is to encourage the writing and publication of books on British-related theatre history and practice.

Recent winners include Out for Blood: A Cultural History of Carrie the Musical by Chris Adams (Bloomsbury);  An Actor’s Life in 12 Productions by Oliver Ford Davies (Book Guild); Stirring Up Sheffield: The Battle to Build the Crucible Theatre by Colin and Tedd George (Wordville) and Black British Women’s Theatre by Nicola Abrams (Palgrave Macmillan).

Submissions are now being accepted for books published in 2024, closing 20^th January 2025, with further details of how to nominate a book available below. The shortlist of 2024 titles for the 2025 Theatre Book Prize will be announced in early May and the winner in June 2025.

The Judges

This year’s judges are actress and director Tricia Thorns, best known for her revivals of plays written during and about World War I; Dr Lucy Munro, Professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at King’s College, London and author of books on Jacobean Theatre and Shakespeare’s own The King’s Men, and theatre critic Gary Naylor, who has written for Broadway World since 2008 and The Arts Desk since 2020.

They are chaired by Howard Loxton, who worked in theatre before a career as a writer and publisher and has reviewed theatre in print and online since 2000.

Submissions

To be eligible, titles must be about British or British-related theatre, be in English, first publications and carry the copyright date 2024. They may be on any form of theatrical performance and any aspect of production, history, architecture or management, whether presenting theatre of the past, recording contemporary theatre or looking forward to the future. Play texts and studies of drama as literature are excluded. Publishers should send copies directly to the judges as soon as available. Entry will close on 20^th January 2025. Publishers should contact theatrebookprize@str.org.uk for details of where to send books.