Stagestruck

In *Stagestruck*, noted novelist and outspoken critic Sarah Schulman offers an account of her growing awareness of the startling similarities between her novel *People in Trouble* and the smash Broadway hit *Rent*. Written with a powerful and personal voice, Schulman’s book is part gossipy narrative, part behind-the-scenes glimpse into the New York theater culture, and part polemic on how mainstream artists co-opt the work of “marginal” artists to give an air of diversity and authenticity to their own work. Rising above the details of her own case, Schulman boldly uses her suspicions of copyright infringement as an opportunity to initiate a larger conversation on how AIDS and gay experience are being represented in American art and commerce. Closely recounting her discovery of the ways in which *Rent* took materials from her own novel, Schulman takes us on her riveting and infuriating journey through the power structures of New York theater and media, a journey she pursued to seek legal restitution and make her voice heard. Then, to provide a cultural context for the emergence of *Rent*—which Schulman experienced first-hand as a weekly theater critic for the New York Press at the t