Prologue

Abstract

When I agreed to write the prologue to this edited volume, I agreed without quite understanding what a prologue is or does. Of course, many books have prologues. Plays often have prologues. And prologues always come at the beginning. But what does a prologue do? The following Oxford Concise English Dictionary definition gives us two ways to think about prologue—as an introduction to, and as an action:

Prologue: noun

1. An introductory section or scene in a literary, dramatic, or musical work

2. An event or action leading to another

ORIGIN Greek prologos, from pro- ‘before’ + logos ‘saying’