As high school teachers, we spend most of our drama units on Shakespeare or the standard classics such as Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, or Our Town. While there is nothing wrong with ANY OF THESE CHOICES, here are three plays that we don’t teach as often but make fantastic selections for high school students.
The Love Suicides at Amijima by Chikamatsu Monzaemon
This play is considered one of the most famous works of Japanese literature. It is a star-crossed love story, a double suicide tale, that was performed (and still is) as Japanese puppet theatre. The puppet play tells the story of a prostitute and a married man who have fallen in love but cannot be together in life, so they decide to commit suicide to be together in death. These double suicide stories were popular during the 1700s as “love suicides” were common during that time.
What students will like about this tragedy is the comparison they can make to Romeo and Juliet. Juxtaposing the two plays allows students to compare and contrast the elements/ techniques of the stories and opens up a conversation about life, death, and love.
After reading the play, students can create their own puppet shows and reenact the main events from the play. Students will appreciate the story in that it is shorter and more approachable in translated language than that of Shakespeare’s work. They will also be engaged in debating the concept of a “love suicide” and the implications it has on family, friends, and society.
No Exit by Jean Paul Sartre
Have you seen the hit show The Good Place starring Ted Danson and Kristen Bell? This is the play that inspired the tv show. It tells the story of three damned souls who are all brought together in the afterlife in what they think is Hell and are trapped in the same room. While fully expecting to be tortured for what they did during their lives on Earth, they begin to realize (just like in the tv show) that they were put together to make each other miserable in an ironic twist of fate… that “hell is other people.”
Students will be engaged with this storyline— especially if you pair it with episodes of The Good Place, which is available on Netflix. After reading the play, students can discuss important key, philosophical concepts present in the play such as:
What does it mean to be a good person? Can a person be good?
What does it mean to be a bad person? Can a person be bad?
What is existentialism and how is it depicted in the play?
How are the following topics presented in the play:
Time?
Death?
Existence?
Freedom?
Individuality?
What do you make of this version of “hell”? Does it seem really “hellish”?
I am a HUGE fan of the tv show because I love a philosophical lens— and high school students do, too! They are sure to be engaged with thought-provoking debate on life’s big questions.
for colored girls who have considered suicide/ when the rainbow is enuf by Ntozake Shange
This play is unlike any others. It’s called a “choreopoem,” meaning that it is made up of poems that are choreographed and set to music. The play consists of 20 separate poems that tell the struggles and stories of seven African-American women who are identified by colors: “lady in red,” “lady in orange,” “lady in blue,” etc. Through the poetic verse, Shange attempts to capture the rhythm of how the characters speak and confronts some very serious issues such as rape, abortion, suicide, etc.
I like this poem for high school students because it confronts important issues head-on in a creative and captivating manner. From a practical perspective, I like that the poems can be taught in isolation, breaking the play down into smaller chunks in order to make it easier to comprehend and analyze. This is a fantastic play to pair with personal narrative writing as it invites students to be vulnerable to write about the experiences (good and bad) that have shaped their lives.
I also think it’s an important piece in that it brings diversity to the literary canon by representing the voices of women and also being written by a female author— who, by the way, was the second African-American woman to have a play go to Broadway (after Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun).
What other plays would you add to this list? Leave us a comment. We’d love to hear from you!
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About the Author
Meredith is the founder and creator of TeachWriting.org and Bespoke ELA. She has taught high school English for 10+ years in Dallas, Chicago, and New York City and holds a M.A. in Literature from Northwestern University. She has always had a connection to the written word-- through songwriting, screenplay writing, and essay writing-- and she enjoys the process of teaching students how to express their ideas. Meredith enjoys life with her husband, daughter, and sweet pups.