Stats, stats, stats!
THANK YOU assiduous playwrights for all your entries! Here are the vital statistics since the 2nd annual competition began five months ago. Twenty plays have come in from two continents (North American and Oceania) and three countries (USA, Australia, and Canada). Here are the country breakouts:
USA 17 entrants
Australia 2 entrants
Canada 1 entrant
Of the American entries, 13 are from the east and 4 are from the west. There is a concentration of dramatists in New York (11 entrants). Go New York! Australia is also off to a good start, already exceeding last year’s entries. Canada finally woke. A long way to go to hit the 182 entries from 11 countries from last year.
The breakdown between male and female entrants stands at 15 men and 5 woman. While the balance may seem to tilt towards male writers, in a historical context, the numbers are quite progressive: prior to the twentieth century, I only know of one tragedy written by a woman. That play is The Tragedy of Mariam, the Fair Queen of Jewry, written by Elizabeth Cary in 1613. The times, they are a changing!
Last month the https://risktheatre.com/ website averaged 12 hits a day. The top five countries clicking were: US, Canada, Australia, UK, and China. Most clicks in a day was 196 back in June 2018 when the contest launched. Best month was March 2019 with 2372 hits—that was when we announced the 2019 winners. All time views stand at 14,374 and growing. So far, so good for this grassroots competition!
My book: THE RISK THEATRE MODEL OF TRAGEDY: GAMBLING, DRAMA, AND THE UNEXPECTED (ISBN 978-1-5255-3756-1) hit the bookshelves in February 2019. To date, it has sold 940 copies. THANK YOU to everyone for supporting the book—all proceeds help fund the competition. The book won in the Readers’ Favorite Awards and the CIPA EVVY Awards.
Please ask your local library to carry this unique title. To date, the book can be found at these fantastic libraries: Brown University, Pasadena Public, Fargo Public, South Texas College, University of Bristol, University of Victoria, Greater Victoria Public, Richmond Public, Smithers Public, University of Colorado (Denver), Denver Public, McMaster University, Buffalo and Erie County Public, Rochester Public, Wheaton College, South Cowichan Public, Vancouver Public, Hillside Public (Hyde Park, NY), Scarsdale Public (NY), Indianapolis Public, Okanagan College (Penticton), and the Russian State Library. Let’s get a few more libraries on board! Reviews of the book can be found here:
http://theelementsofwriting.com/wong/
https://www.forewordreviews.com/reviews/the-risk-theatre-model-of-tragedy/
There are the haters as well. Here’s a review that absolutely skewers risk theatre:
https://ormsbyreview.com/2019/11/28/670-goldfarb-wong-a-new-theory-of-tragedy/
Until next time, I’m Edwin Wong, and I’m doing Melpomene’s work.