Robert Sanford Brustein, a titan of the theatre world who launched two seminal institutions, the Yale Repertory Theatre and the American Repertory Theater, nurtured numerous careers and was honored with the National Medal of Arts, died on Oct. 29. He was 96.

The playwright steals — lines, plots, anything that works. The playwright uses historical events, fashioning his own take on the characters within those happenings. He finds whole scenes come to him in his dreams. He writes fluidly in iambic pentameter. He doesn’t mind getting bawdy. The playwright is?

William Shakespeare, sure. But there is another correct answer: Robert Brustein.