Backwards and Forwards: A Technical Manual for Reading Plays

As someone who's done a masters in screenwriting and now in the middle of a PhD, I've read many of the screenwriting manuals out there and this is one of the best. It's a quick but pithy read. Much of what is recommended in this book (in 1983) is simply repeated by many others over the following two decades, but they do it less succinctly. Although targeted at playwrights, most of the content is equally applicable to screenwriting. The basic premise of the book, to work backwards rather than forwards through your script when rethinking/rewriting it, seems simple but is very powerful advice. No apprentice screenwriter sholud be without this in their library.

I enjoyed this book very much! It's one of the greatest I've ever read regarding directing. I suggest it to all my friends that already are or wannabe directors.

This is the second best book for playwrights (in conjunction with the latest Jeffries book)!

A clear, useful reminder of what is indispensable in the structure of scenes and acts in a play.

I have loved this book since I first read it as a drama student and now as a voice teacher I use its methodology of 'dominos' to learning lines. And it's a godsend. I have recommended the wisdom of David Ball's formula of reading/breaking down a play to my students so they have inherited a process that will serve them for their careers. Each year I re-read it for some fresh new perspective that I may have missed. Its simplicity never fails to inspire me.

anyone into theatre should read this!

I wish I could give a review of the actual book, but the kindle edition is unreadable. I would ask for a refund but the window has already passed.

Succinct, useful and full of examples. Although it's very much a directorial approach, it is essential for the actor. For students who are bored with plays as literature, this restores plays to playing. It's brief yet leaves out little. Seems expensive for its brevity, however.

Arrived prompty and in the quality it was advertised as. No problems.

David Ball's Backwards & Forwards is the single most important book you need to understand any dramatic work. While it is a 'must-read' for any student of theater and is widely taught, it really has immense value for anyone who enjoys any dramatic narrative and even has value for writers or readers of any sort. Like David himself with whom I had the great pleasure of studying, the text is straightforward and clever. He pads nothing, gets right to the point and boy, does he hit the mark.