Editing Alan Ayckbourn (section)

===Influence on plays===

Since the time Ayckbourn's plays became established in the West End, interviewers have raised the question of whether his work is autobiographical.<ref name=auto>P. Allen, 2001, p. 123</ref> There is no clear answer to this question. There has been only one biography, written by Paul Allen, which primarily covers his career in the theatre.<ref name=biography>P. Allen, 2001,</ref> Ayckbourn has frequently said he sees aspects of himself in all of his characters. In ''[[Bedroom Farce (play)|Bedroom Farce]]'' (1975), for example, he admitted to being, in some respects, all four of the men in the play.<ref>P. Allen, 2001, p. 155</ref> It has been suggested that, after Ayckbourn himself, the person who is used most often in his plays is his mother, particularly as Susan in ''[[Woman in Mind]]''<ref>P. Allen, 2001, p. 3</ref> (1985).

What is less clear is the extent to which events in Ayckbourn's life have influenced his writing. It is true that the theme of marriages in difficulty was heavily present throughout his plays in the early seventies, at about the time his own marriage was coming to an end. However, by that time, he had also witnessed the failure of his parents' relationships and those of some of his friends.<ref name=auto/> Which relationships, if any, he drew on for his plays, is unclear. In Paul Allen's biography, Ayckbourn is briefly compared with Dafydd and Guy in ''[[A Chorus of Disapproval (play)|A Chorus of Disapproval]]'' (1984). Both characters feel themselves to be in trouble and there was speculation that Ayckbourn himself might have felt the same way. At the time, he had reportedly become seriously involved with another actress, which threatened his relationship with Stoney.<ref>P. Allen, 2001, pp. 209–210</ref> It is unclear whether this had any effect on the writing; Paul Allen's view is that Ayckbourn did not use his personal experiences to write his plays.

It is possible that Ayckbourn wrote plays with himself and his own situation in mind but, as Ayckbourn is portrayed as a guarded and private man,<ref name=biography/> it is hard to imagine him exposing his own life in his plays to any great degree. In the biography, Paul Allen writes, with regard to a suggestion in ''[[Cosmopolitan (magazine)|Cosmopolitan]]'' that Ayckbourn's plays were becoming autobiographical: "If we take that to mean that his plays tell his own life story, he still hasn't started."<ref name=auto/>