First Women Playwrights Conference

The First International Women Playwrights Conference took place in Buffalo, New York, from 14 to 23 October 1988. It was attended by over 200 playwrights (and a few non-playwrights) from 34 countries. That number included many eminent women – Renée (New Zealand), Alice Childress (USA), Bai Fengxi (China), Miriam Kainy (Israel), Zulu Sofola (Nigeria), Somalatha Subasinghe (Sri Lanka), Iren Kiss (Hungary) – plus women (mostly, because of the cost, American) whose plays are as yet unproduced or who are beginning to write. Much of the focus was on how much theatre work is being written by women, but which meets with obstructions to performance.