Like other black dramatists of the last three decades--a period marked by an upsurge of plays by, about, and for black people--Lonne Elder articulates the sorrows, angers, and joys that characterize black life in America. Acknowledging that the frustrations of being denied full rights and privileges as citizens create strife--at times within the black community itself--Elder's work also shows that both individual fortitude and the group spirit always resurface in time to combat the internal and external forces which, if allowed to persist, would deaden the vitality of the black community.

An actor and an occasional critic, Elder has a small dramatic canon; however, the plays that he has written strongly emphasize his belief in the survival of a people traumatized both from without and from within. Elder began writing short stories and poetry early in his life, but gradually moved to writing plays and film scripts as...