From the mid-1830s until the end of the nineteenth century, hundreds of plays were written and staged in the Australian colonies. Australian Plays for the Colonial Stage contains the scripts of nine colonial plays - including a scurrilous satire, a pioneering romance, plays about bushrangers and Ned Kelly, a city murder-mystery and the first Australian stage classic, adapted from Marcus Clarke's novel, For the Term of His Natural Life. Each script has been carefully edited or reconstructed from unique manuscripts or rare colonial printed editions, giving full respect to their historical forms and usages. The plays have been given generous historical and textual introductions and are supplemented with explanatory notes on the many people, places, events and stories referred to.