Liturgical dramas

Liturgical drama refers to medieval forms of dramatic performance that use stories from the Bible or Christian hagiography. The term was widely disseminated by well-known theater historians like Heinrich Alt (Theater und Kirche, 1846), E.K. Chambers (The Mediaeval Stage, 1903) and Karl Young. Young's two-volume monumental work about the medieval church was especially influential. It was published in 1933 and is still read today, even though his theories have been rejected for more than 40 years. Many college textbooks, among them the popular books by Oscar Brockett, propagated the theory of "liturgical drama" even into the 21st century.