Peter Shaffer is simultaneously one of the most popular and most critically-abused living British playwrights. Despite the extraordinary worldwide success of plays such as Equus and Amadeus, Shaffer is still widely ignored in contemporary dramatic debate. This book corrects this situation, providing an outline of the playwright's life and work, introducing in accessible terms a range of issues and arguments involved in Shaffer's drama, and incorporating discussion of every play in his canon from Five Finger Exercise to the controversial The Gift of the Gorgon.Readers interested in Post-War British Drama, and in this playwright's frequently dissenting position within it, will find their knowledge of Shaffer's work significantly expanded by the information and arguments presented in this book: in addition, their assessment of this dramatist and of his work will be radically revised by it.