History of Western Theatre: 17th Century to Now/Alphabetical list of playwrights (died 1855-1955)

This list of recent authors has been added for the benefit of readers in jurisdictions where the copyright expires a fixed period after the authors life, rather than date of publication or renewal.

Annotated by year of death

• Ade, George 1944
• Afford, Malcolm 1954
• Afinogenov, Alexander 1941
• Anderson, Arthur 1942
• Andreyev, Leonid 1919
• Arlt, Roberto
• Arniches, Carlos 1943
• Artaud, Antonin 1948
• Arthur, Joseph 1906
• Asche, Oscar 1936

• Bacon, Frank 1922
• Baker, George Melville 1890
• Balderston, John L. 1954
• Bangs, John Kendrick 1922
• Barrie, James Murray 1937
• Barry, Phillip 1949
• Baring, Maurice 1945
• Beach, Rex 1949
• Beith, John Hay 1952
• Belasco, David 1930
• Bennett, Arnold 1931
• Benelli, Sam 1949
• Besier, Rudolf 1942
• Binyon, Laurence 1943
• Birinski, Leo 1951
• Bjørnson, Bjørnstjerne 1910
• Black, Stephen 1931
• Brown, Abbie Farwell 1927
• Bulgakov, Mikhail 1940
• Burnard, Francis Cowley 1917
• Burrill, Mary P. 1946
• Byron, Henry James 1884

• Calderon, George 1915
• Caine, Sir Hall 1931
• Čapek, Karel 1938
• Chekov, Anton 1904
• Collette 1953
• Collison, Wilson 1941
• Colton, John 1946
• Cowl, Jane 1950

• Davis, Richard Harding 1916
• de Lorde, André 1942
• Dickens, Charles 1880
• Dixon, Thomas, Jr. 1946
• Dowson, Ernest 1900
• Drinkwater, John 1937
• Drury, William Price 1948
• Du Maurier, Guy 1915
• Duprez, Fred 1938

• Epstein, Philip G. 1952
• Ewing, Juliana Horatia 1885

• Feydeau, Georges 1921
• Fitch, Clyde 1909
• Flecker, James Elroy 1915
• Fort, Garrett 1945
• Frank, Bruno 1945
• Fulton, Maude 1950

• Gadkari, Ram Ganesh 1919
• Galsworthy, John 1933
• Gates, Eleanor 1950
• Gilbert, W. S. 1911
• Giraudoux, Jean 1944
• Glaspell, Susan 1948
• Glass, Montague 1934
• Goddard, Charles 1951
• Gorky, Maxim 1936
• Granville-Barker, Harley 1946
• Gregory, Lady Augusta 1933

• Hackett, Walter C. 1944
• Hasler, Karel 1941
• Hazelton, George Cochrane 1921
• Hauptmann, Gerhart 1946
• Hawtrey, Charles 1923
• Herne, James A.1901
• Hoffe, Monckton 1951
• Hopwood, Avery 1928
• Howard, Sidney Coe 1939
• Howells, William Dean 1920
• Hughes, Hatcher 1945
• Hunyady, Sándor 1942

• Ibsen, Henrik 1906

• Jackson, Frederick 1953
• James, Henry 1916
• Jones Henry Arthur 1929

• Kailasam, T. P. 1946
• Klein, Charles 1919

• Lavedan, Henri 1940
• Law, Arthur 1913
• Le Pera, Alfredo 1935
• Lewis, Sinclair 1951
• Locke, Edward 1945
• Lonsdale, Frederick 1954
• Lorca, Federico García 1936

• Magnus, Julian 1905
• Mack, Willard 1934
• MacSwiney, Terence 1920
• Maeterlinck, Maurice 1949
• Mayo, Margaret 1951
• Mayakovsky, Vladimir 1930
• McKinnel, Norman 1932
• Millay, Edna St. Vincent 1950
• Moffat, Graham 1951
• Moore, Thomas Sturge 1944
• Morton, Michael 1931
• Mühsam, Erich 1934

• Manners, J. Hartley 1928
• Mizner, Wilson 1933

• Oliphant, Ernest Henry Clark 1936
• O'Riordan, Conal Holmes O'Connell 1948
• O'Neill, Eugene 1953

• Parker, Louis N. 1944
• Pirandello, Luigi 1936
• Pinero, Arthur Wing 1934
• Prasad, Jaishankar 1937
• Przybyszewska, Stanisława 1935

• Raghava, Bellary 1946
• Rostand, Edmond 1918
• Robins, Elizabeth 1952
• Rudd, Steele 1935

• Sardou, Victorien 1907
• Schnitzler, Arthur 1931
• Shaw, George Bernard 1950
• Shawqi, Ahmed 1932
• Sheldon, Edward 1946
• Shiels, George 1949
• Sierra, Gregorio Martínez 1947
• Steell, Willis 1942
• Strindberg, August 1912
• Sudermann, Hermann 1928
• Summers, Montague 1948
• Sutro, Alfred 1933
• Swears, Herbert 1946
• Swinburne, Algernon Charles1909
• Synge, John Millington 1905

• Thomas, Augustus 1934
• Toller, Ernst 1939
• Turner, Walter J. 1946
• Tennyson, Alfred, Lord 1892
• Thomas, Brandon1918
• Thompson, Alexander. M 1948
• Turgenev, Ivan 1885

• Von Horváth, Ödön 1938

• Walsh, William Thomas 1949
• Walter, Eugene 1941
• Webster, Jean 1916
• Wedekind, Frank 1918
• Willard, John 1942
• Wilson, Harry Leon 1939
• Wilde, Percival 1953

• Yeats, W. B. 1939

• Zangwill, Israel 1926
• Zola, Emile 1902