A Civil War Christmas

The Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of How I Learned to Drive, Paula Vogel, has crafted what The New York Times has declared “an ambitious, richly detailed and beautiful new seasonal offering.” Set on a chilly Christmas Eve during the latter days of the Civil War, A Civil War Christmas weaves a tapestry of fictional and historical characters, such as President and Mrs. Lincoln — together with holiday music, marches, hymns and spirituals of the period—to tell a story of companionship and communal hope arising from one of our nation’s darkest hours.

This volume features a conversation between the author and noted historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, commentary on the music of the Civil War and its singing soldiers and excerpts from historical journals such as that of Walt Whitman. A Civil War Christmas, declared “The Best Play of the Year” by the Hartford Courant, premiered in 2008 at Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven, CT under the direction of Tina Landau.

Paula Vogel's plays include How I Learned to Drive (winner of the Pulitzer Prize, OBIE, Drama Desk, and New York Drama Critics awards), The Long Christmas Ride Home, The Mineola Twins, The Baltimore Waltz, Hot 'N' Throbbing and Desdemona. She is chair of the playwriting department at the Yale School of Drama, and is playwright-in-residence at Yale Repertory Theatre.