Sarah Daniels author page

Sarah Daniels biography

Sarah Daniels (born November 1956) is a British playwright whose work has been staged at leading UK theatres since the early 1980s. Her first professionally produced play, Ripen Our Darkness, opened at the Royal Court Theatre Upstairs in 1981, followed by early works including Ma’s Flesh Is Grass (1981), The Devil’s Gateway (1983) and Masterpieces (1983).

Daniels’s breakthrough came with Neaptide, which premiered at the National Theatre (Cottesloe) in 1986 after winning the 1982 George Devine Award. It was billed at the time as the National Theatre’s first full-length play by a female playwright. Subsequent stage works include Byrthrite (1986), The Gut Girls (1988), Beside Herself (1990), Head-Rot Holiday (1992), The Madness of Esme and Shaz (1994), Dust (2003) and Flying Under Bridges (2005). Her plays have been produced at venues such as the Royal Court, the National Theatre, the Crucible Theatre, Battersea Arts Centre and the Albany Empire.

Alongside stage work, Daniels has written for television and radio, contributing to series including Grange Hill, EastEnders and Holby City, as well as original dramas for BBC Radio. Two collections of her plays have been published by Methuen/ Bloomsbury.

Running through Daniels’s writing are concerns with gender, power and social justice, often framed through intimate relationships and institutional settings. Her work from the 1980s onwards has been taught and revived in readings and productions, and remains part of contemporary discussions of late-twentieth-century British theatre.