Death Becomes Her

The NY Times examines the posthumous success of playwright Sarah Kane:

Moreover, Ms. Kane's tendency toward poetic imagery and form seems to translate well. As an example, she writes in "Psychosis": "They love me for that which destroys me, the sword in my dreams, the dust of my thoughts, the sickness that breeds in the folds of my mind." And that, too, has come to seem prophetic.

Ms. Kenyon said that those words were flowing out of a sudden bout of depression that Ms. Kane had neither expected nor prepared for. "She had no control over it," Ms. Kenyon said. "She said: 'You don't know what its like. It just comes back.' "

The circumstances of her death, of course, inevitably leave a sad question hanging over Ms. Kane's work: Is she produced now because she was good and bold and ahead of her time? Or is it her biography - and especially the circumstances of "4.48 Psychosis" - that has added to her allure and that of her play?

"She has become more popular over the last five years, but I wouldn't be comfortable with saying it's because she killed herself," Mr. Kane said, before adding: "I'd like to think it wasn't. She's a great writer. It would be doing her a disservice to say she's popular just because she committed suicide."

Ms. Kenyon added: "I think people have become more aware of her work, unfortunately, and I think she has been more produced since she died."