Literary studies: plays and playwrights Books

Book Synopsis"The religious fraud Tartuffe has wormed his way into the affections and household of rich merchant, Orgon, with pantomime piety and counterfeit zeal. So comprehensively has he hoodwinked Orgon that he looks set to succeed in driving away the son, marrying the daughter, seducing the wife and imprisoning Orgon. Moliere's classic satire was denounced on its first performance as a sacrilegious outrage and banned from further public view. Only after petition to Louis XIV was the ban lifted, and the play's trenchant mockery of human frailties has ensured its popularity ever since."Trade Review"Much of the credit for the evening's success belongs to Bolt's superb translation.' Guardian 'Bolt's irreverent, colloquial translation, in neat, octosyllabic rhyming couplets, is blessed with a filthy wit' Daily Telegraph"

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Book SynopsisAdapted from Mervyn Peake's gothic trilogy. In one evening of physical theatre you enter a world of ritual and drama.

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Book Synopsis'In Iraq, a wedding is not a wedding unless shots get fired. It's like in England where a wedding is not a wedding unless someone pukes or tries to fuck one of the brides' maids. That's just the way it goes.'Against a backdrop of London and war-torn Baghdad, three friends grapple with their sexual, cultural and political identity. This is a surprising first play from Iraqi writer Hassan Abdulrazzak.

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Book SynopsisThis book presents a comprehensive introduction to Marlowe's "Doctor Faustus" - introducing its critical history, performance history, the current critical landscape and new directions in research on the play. "Doctor Faustus" is Christopher Marlowe's most popular play and is often seen as one of the overwhelming triumphs of the English Renaissance. It has had a rich and varied critical history often arousing violent critical controversy. This guide offers students an introduction to its critical and performance history, surveying notable stage productions from its initial performance in 1594 to the present and including TV, audio and cinematic versions. It includes a keynote chapter outlining major areas of current research on the play and four new critical essays. Finally, a guide to critical, web-based and production-related resources and an annotated biography provide a basis for further individual research. "Continuum Renaissance Drama" offers practical and accessible introductions to the critical and performative contexts of key Elizabethan and Jacobean plays. Each guide introduces the text's critical and performance history but also provides students with an invaluable insight into the landscape of current scholarly research through a keynote essay on the state of the art and newly commissioned essays of fresh research from different critical perspectives.Trade Review"This volume represents much of the star power in Marlowe Studies over recent decades, including three past presidents of the Marlowe Society of America along with two current officers. Readers may be assured that the scholarly assessments in this volume are well informed, judicious, insightful, and forward-looking." - Roslyn L. Knutson, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, USA; President, Marlowe Society of America"This wide-ranging book provides food for thought for readers of all levels: it helps orient the beginner with useful surveys of the critical territory and it caters to more advanced readers with stimulating scholarly essays on topics such as postcolonialism, print culture and the occult. Andrew Duxfield approaches Renaissance hermeticism in an admirably clear and user-friendly way; Georgia Brown imaginatively examines writing/printing as both a context for and a theme of the play; and Andrew Hartley's experience of directing Dr Faustus provides brilliant and pithy insights about the play's theatricality and applicability to audiences and readers today. There are extensive (and helpfully annotated) reading lists to guide all readers through the critical maze. Every chapter is full of useful information and observations. This is a valuable addition to the library of every school or university - and to the bookcase of every student." - Laurie Maguire, Professor of English, University of Oxford, UK"Doctor Faustus: A Critical Guide offers meticulously detailed and lucid overviews of the vexed textual, critical, and performance history of Marlowe's most widely read and performed play, devoting an entire chapter to recent trends in scholarship and interpretation. For these reasons, and because of its deliberate emphasis on the relatively neglected area of performance studies of Doctor Faustus, it is an exceptionally ambitious and valuable work." - Constance Brown Kuriyama, Professor of English, Texas Tech University, USA"Scholars of English literature introduce students to some features of the play written by British playwright Christopher Marlowe (1564-93) in 1588, the year of the Spanish Armada. They cover the critical backstory, the performance history, current critical research, Renaissance hermeticism, imperialism as devilry in a postcolonial reading, staging Faustus on campus, and the other black arts of printing and writing. A final chapter surveys resources." -Eithne O'Leyne, BOOK NEWS, Inc.This guide offers a clear picture of the critical landscape of past and current scholarly research on Doctor Faustus, both textual and performative... the volume is a useful resource for students and for scholars who are either just beginning their research or interested in surveying the various rudimentary critical scholarship of the day. -- Sixteenth Century Journal‘[This book] aiming to be useful to teachers and students, views the play from varied perspectives. Starting with a useful "Timeline," which begins with Marlowe's life and continues to the present, cataloguing significant stage and publication history, it includes an introduction and eight chapters.'—The Shakespeare NewsletterThe guide serves a dual purpose, offering on the one hand survey chapters detailing the critical and performance heritage, current critical trends, and available resources, and on the other, four 'New Directions' chapters which engage in original critical and contextual analysis of the play. Deats's introduction, as well as providing an overview of the volume's contents, offers the reader a grounding in the play's historical and literary sources and a broad account of the critical divide between orthodox moralistic and tragic heroic interpretations of the play. * Years Work in English Studies, vol 91, no 1, 2012 *Table of ContentsSeries Introduction; Timeline; Introduction, Sara Munson Deats (University of South Florida, USA); 1. The Critical Backstory, Bruce T. Brandt (South Dakota State University, USA); 2. The Performance History, David Bevington (University of Chicago, USA); 3. The State of the Art - Current Critical Research, Robert A. Logan (University of Hartford, USA); 4. New Directions: Doctor Faustus and Renaissance Hermeticism, Andrew Duxfield (Sheffield Hallam University, UK); 5. New Directions: Imperialism as Devilry: A Postcolonial Analysis of Doctor Faustus, Toni Francis (The College of the Bahamas); 6. New Directions: "What means this show?" Directing a Student Faustus, Andrew James Hartley (University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA); 7. New Directions: The Other Black Arts: Doctor Faustus and the Inky Words of Printing and Writing Georgia Brown (London, UK); 8. A Survey of Resources, Sarah K. Scott (Mount St. Mary's University, USA); Notes on Contributors; Index.

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Book SynopsisAn accessible and entertaining journey through the life, times, and work of the Bard - Enigma. Master of language. The greatest comedian in history? The most famous writer in the world. But isn't he a little bit boring? This is an essential guide for anyone who has previously avoided the Bard, and is the perfect introduction for first time students or seasoned theatre lovers. The book contains a full commentary of all the plays by bestselling and reknowned writer Peter Ackroyd as well as full descriptions of the cast and the drama; not forgetting the best speeches, and the wit and wisdom from across the works. There is also an opportunity to explore the poems and a complete set of sonnets, as well as an investigation of who the dark lady might have been.Contains:The complete sonnets; the greatest speeches; the best lines.Perfect for students struggling through their first play or for theatre lovers anywhere.Entertaining, accessible, Shakespeare without the boring bits.

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Book SynopsisWhen Jon Fosse had his playwright début with And We Shall Never Part at the National Theatre in Bergen in 1994, he was already an established author of several novels, collections of poetry and children’s books. Since his breakthrough in 1996 with the world premiere of Someone Will Arrive at the Norwegian Theatre he has written over twenty more plays and has become the world’s most performed contemporary European playwright. Oberon Books publishes Nightsongs, The Girl on the Sofa and I Am the Wind, together with his other plays in five collections. Fosse was made a Chevalier of the Ordre national du Mérite of France in 2007 and received The International Ibsen Award in 2010. ‘Since the early 1990s, Jon Fosse’s plays have been produced in countless venues internationally, and have been translated into dozens of languages – winning awards, inspiring critical adulation, and intriguing and inspiring theatregoers throughout the world. Strangely, however, his work remains largely unknown to English-speaking audiences – an oversight that Leif Zern’s The Luminous Darkness will do much to redress. In twelve short chapters, the book explores Fosse’s career, offering a lucid and insightful argument that is enriched by Zern’s intimate knowledge of the plays in production. The result is an important and timely study of a playwright who demands and deserves our attention.’ - Patrick Lonergan, National University of Ireland GalwayTrade Review"""A study that should help put Fosse on the map in English-speaking countries."" - The Stage ""[Fosse's] lyrical writing, deep themes and abstract ideas haven't engaged British audiences. Yet. In anticipation that he will soon be on the scene, you might like to prepare. Leif Zern, a Swedish journalist, analyses Fosse's plays and poetry in this clear, manageable guide."" - What's On Stage "

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Book SynopsisIn this new student introduction to a Greek tragedy, Isabelle Torrance looks at what makes Iphigenia among the Taurians a successful tragedy in ancient Greek terms, and how dramatic excitement is achieved through the exotic setting, the cast of characters, and the chorus. Assuming no knowledge of Greek, and with students in mind, the central themes of ethnicity and gender relations are examined to show how Euripides manipulates established stereotypes. The play was one of Aristotle’s favourites and his enthusiasm derived from the fact that, in spite of its ostensibly happy ending, the play presents the audience with an exquisitely constructed reversal of events: when Iphigenia recognizes that she has been about to sacrifice her long-lost brother, kin-murder is avoided and the plot turns into an escape drama. Other significant concerns of the play surround ritual and the gods, and these are discussed to highlight how the drama asks probing theological questions. Finally, the vast reception history of the play in a variety of genres, such as ancient comedy, Roman philosophy, European opera, and 20th century theatre, is sketched out from antiquity to the present day.Trade ReviewCondensing all this material in less than 130 pages and presenting it clearly without implications to facilitate understanding of even the most naive reader is a remarkable undertaking, and the result is certainly appreciable. * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *Table of ContentsPreface List of Illustrations 1. Setting, Action, Plot 2. Characters and Chorus 3. Ethnicity and Gender 4. Ritual and the Gods 5. Reception Glossary of Greek and Technical Terms Guide to Further Reading Selected Chronology Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisPart of the Bristol Classical Press series of Spanish texts, this is Buero Vallejo's play "El Tragaluz". The series is designed to meet the needs of the fast-growing A Level and undergraduate market for texts in the Spanish language. Each text comes with English notes and vocabulary, and with an introduction by an editor with an expert knowledge both of the work and of its literary and cultural context. Set in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, this play occupies an important place in Buero Vallejo's theatre incorporating earlier metaphysical preoccupations with a later historical and political dimension.

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Book Synopsis'Revenge is a kind of wild justice...' (Francis Bacon). Euripides' "Hecuba" is dominated by the vengeance which Hecuba takes on the faithless Polymestor, and explores in a complex and profound manner the potential for revenge as a subject for tragedy. The sacrifice of Polyxena is in counterpoint to the revenge action; the whole is set in the chaotic aftermath of the fall of Troy. The combination of plots creates one of Euripides' most effective dramas, full of pathos, suspense and excitement. This study of the play in English argues that it has been greatly undervalued by critics who have failed to appreciate the power of its rhetoric, the subtlety of its characterisation, and the beauty of its choral odes.

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Book SynopsisDavid Stuttard has directed his own translations and adaptations of Greek drama throughout the UK and in classical theatres in Turkey and Albania. His publications include An Introduction to Trojan Women (2005) and, AD 410, The Year That Shook Rome (2010).

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Book SynopsisShakespeare, like many of his contemporaries, was concerned with the question of the succession and the legitimacy of the monarch. From the early plays through the histories to Hamlet, Shakespeare's work is haunted by the problem of political legitimacy. Shakespeare and Reniassance Politics examines his works as political events and interventions, and explores the literature of the Renaissance and its relation to fundamental political issues.

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Book SynopsisThis accessible and interdisciplinary volume addresses a fundamental need in current education in language, literature and drama. Many of today's students lack the grammatical and linguistic skills to enable them to study Shakespearean and other Renaissance texts as closely as their courses require. This practical guide will help them to understand and use the structures and strategies of written and dramatic language. Eleven short essays on aspects of literary criticism and performance by an eminent team of contributors are followed by a more detailed exploration of the history of language use, grammar and spelling, plus a glossary of terms offering definitions, contexts and examples. Together these provide an informed and engaging historical understanding of dramatic language in the early modern period.

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Book SynopsisSuzanne Gossett offers a full and critical performance history, with an introduction showing how the play's performance history has paralled the criticism. It then gives an interpretation of this two-generation romance, with its successive male and female central characters, based on a reading 'through the family', and influenced by the feminist and new historicist criticism of the last two decades.The edition integrates cumulative research on Shakespeare's collaborative authorship and the transmission of the text without rewriting the play or ignoring years of emendations.

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Book SynopsisThe Renegado is one of the most shamelessly entertaining plays of its age, fetching its inspiration from a number of works by Cervantes, based on his own experiences as a captive in Algiers. Introducing the eroticized captivity narrative to the English stage, Massinger's tragicomedy combines it with the long-popular romance motif of a Christian hero's conquest of an exotic princess. But even as it indulges in romantic fantasy, The Renegado engages with contentious issues of national and international politics, offering a provocative response to the sectarian feuds dividing England in the 1620s, while exploiting wider European fears of the expansionist Muslim empire of the Ottomans. Through its treatment of religious confrontation and conversion, Massinger's play offers important insights into early modern constructions of the Islamic world, and emerges as a piece with unexpected resonances for our own time.Trade Review‘Fascinating reading' * Times Literary Supplement, June 2010, on the Arden Early Modern Drama series *

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Book SynopsisDespite the recent turn to affects and emotions in the humanities and despite the unceasing popularity of romantic and erotic love as a motif in fictional works of all genres, the subject has received surprisingly little attention in academic studies of contemporary drama. Love in Contemporary British Drama reflects the appeal of love as a topic and driving force in dramatic works with in-depth analyses of eight pivotal plays from the past three decades.Following an interdisciplinary and historical approach, the study collects and condenses theories of love from philosophy and sociology to derive persisting discourses and to examine their reoccurrence and transformation in contemporary plays. Special emphasis is put on narratives of love’s compensatory function and precariousness and on how modifications of these narratives epitomise the peculiarities of emotional life in the social and cultural context of the present.Based on the assumption that drama is especially inclined to draw on shared narratives for representations of love, the book demonstrates that love is both a window to remnants of the past in the present and a proper subject matter for drama in times in which the suitability of the dramatic form has been questioned.

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Book SynopsisThe Yiddish Theater Stage as a Temporary Home takes us through the fascinating life and career of the most important comic duo in Yiddish Theater, Shimen Dzigan and Isroel Shumacher. Spanning over the course of half a century – from the beginning of their work at the Ararat avant-garde Yiddish theater in Łodz, Poland to their Warsaw theatre – they produced bold, groundbreaking political satire. The book further discusses their wanderings through the Soviet Union during the Second World War and their attempt to revive Jewish culture in Poland after the Holocaust. It finally describes their time in Israel, first as guest performers and later as permanent residents. Despite the restrictions on Yiddish actors in Israel, the duo insisted on performing in their language and succeeded in translating the new Israeli reality into unique and timely satire. In the 1950s, they voiced a unique – among the Hebrew stages – political and cultural critique. Dzigan continued to perform on his own and with other Israeli artists until his death in 1980.

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Book SynopsisDespite its unabated popularity with audiences, slapstick has received rather little scholarly attention, mostly by scholars concentrating on the US theater and cinema traditions. Nonetheless, as a form of physical humor slapstick has a long history across various areas of cultural production. This volume approaches slapstick both as a genre of situational physical comedy and as a mode of communicating an affective situation captured in various cultural products. Contributors to the volume examine cinematic, literary, dramatic, musical, and photographic texts and performances. From medieval chivalric romance and nineteenth-century theater to contemporary photography, the contributors study treatments of slapstick across media, periods and geographic locations. The aim of a study of such wide scope is to demonstrate how slapstick emerged from a variety of complex interactions among different traditions and by extension, to illustrate that slapstick can be highly productive for interdisciplinary research.

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