Literary studies: plays and playwrights Books

Book SynopsisSIR JONATHAN BATE is Professor of Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature, University of Warwick, UK, and the editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He has held visiting posts at Harvard, Yale and UCLA and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Fellow of the British Academy, an Honorary Fellow of St Catherine's College, Cambridge, and a Governor and Board member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. A prominent critic, award-winning biographer and broadcaster, he is the author of several books on Shakespeare, including The Genius of Shakespeare (Picador), which was praised by Sir Peter Hall, founder of the RSC, as 'the best modern book on Shakespeare.' In June 2006 he was awarded a CBE by HM The Queen 'for services to Higher Education'. ERIC RASMUSSEN is Professor of English at the University of Nevada, USA, and the Textual Editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He is co-editor of the Norton Anthology of English Renaissance Drama and has edited volumes in Table of ContentsIntroduction About the Text Key Facts The Tragedy of Macbeth Textual Notes Scene-by-scene Analysis Macbeth in Performance: The RSC and Beyond Four Centuries of Macbeth: An Overview At the RSC The Director's Cut: interviews with Rupert Goold, Gregory Doran and Trevor Nunn Shakespeare's Career in the Theatre Shakespeare's Works: A Chronology Further Reading and Viewing Acknowledgements and Picture Credits

Read more less

Book SynopsisOleanna is Mamet's most celebrated and performed play, exploring male-female conflicts. This Student Edition is annotated, with a chronology of David Mamet's life and work, a discussion of various interpretations and notes on individual words and phrases in the text as well as questions for study.Trade ReviewJohn and Carol go to it with hand-to hand combat that amounts to a primal struggle for power. As usual with Mamet, the vehicle for that combat is crackling, highly distilled dialogue unencumbered by literary frills or phony theatrical ones. Frank Rich, International Herald Tribune An ear for reproducing everyday language has long been David Mamet's hallmark and he has now employed it to skewer the dogmatic, puritannical streak which has become commonplace on and off the campus. With Oleanna he continues an exploration of male-female conflicts begun with Sexual Perversity in Chicago in 1974. Oleanna cogently demonstrates that when free thought and dialogue are imperilled, nobody wins. Michael Wise, Independent

Read more less

Book SynopsisYes, you can write a great screenplay. Let Syd Field show you how.“I based Like Water for Chocolate on what I learned in Syd's books. Before, I always felt structure imprisoned me, but what I learned was structure really freed me to focus on the story.”—Laura EsquivelTechnology is transforming the art and craft of screenwriting. How does the writer find new ways to tell a story with pictures, to create a truly outstanding film? Syd Field shows what works, why, and how in four extraordinary films: Thelma & Louise, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, The Silence of the Lambs, and Dances with Wolves.Learn how:Callie Khouri, in her first movie script, Thelma & Louise, rewrote the rules for good road movies and played against type to create a new American classic.James Cameron, writer/director of Terminator 2: Judgement Day, created a sequ

Read more less

Book SynopsisFor sixty years Elizabeth II has met each of her twelve prime ministers in a weekly audience at BuckinghamPalace, a meeting like no other in British public life. It is private. Both parties have an unspoken agreement never to repeat what is said.The Audience breaks this contract of silence. It imagines a series of pivotal meetings between the Downing Street incumbents and their queen. From Churchill to Cameron, each prime minister has used these private conversations as a sounding board and a confessional - sometimes intimate, sometimes explosive. From young mother to grandmother, these private audiences chart the arc of the second Elizabethan Age. Politicians come and go through the revolving door of electoral politics, while she remains constant, waiting to welcome her next prime minister.The Audience by Peter Morgan premiered at the Gielgud Theatre, London, in March 2013. It returned to the Apollo Theatre, London, in this revised version in A

Read more less

York Notes Advanced offers a fresh and accessible approach to English Literature. This market-leading series has been completely updated to meet the needs of today's A-level and undergraduate students. Written by established literature experts, York Notes Advanced introduces students to more sophisticated analysis, a range of critical perspectives and wider contexts.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe editor, James R Siemon is Professor of English Literature at Boston University.

Read more less

Book SynopsisL. W. Conolly is a leading authority on Shaw. He is Literary Advisor to the Shaw Estate, Vice-President of the International Shaw Society, a Corresponding Scholar of the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, and the author and editor of numerous essays and books on Shaw. Professor of English Literature at Trent University in Ontario, Dr Conolly is also a Senior Member of Robinson College, Cambridge, and is an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.Trade Review'Compact but comprehensive...Students and general readers will find it both accessible and enlightening, Shaw scholars will regard it as an excellent resource, and directors of future productions of Pygmalion will wish they could hire Leonard Conolly as their dramaturg.' Shaw: The Annual Bernard Shaw Studies (September 2009) 'The prosicuity of shaw's drama of the fortunes of the cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle continues to coruscate.' Sam Marlowe, The Times, 19.05.10 'Pygmalion is not just about accents or class. It is about the battle of the sexes, of control.' Quentin Letts, Daily Mail, 19.05.10 'This is Shaw's most serious and politically provocative comedy, an elegant attack on a society at war with itself.' John Peter, Sunday Times, 23.05.10 'It's no great stretch of the imagination to discern that the play's ingenious arguments about poverty, accent, education and identity hold good for multicultural Britain today.' Dominic Cavendish, Daily Telegraph, 26.05.10

Read more less

Book SynopsisGive me the daggers and I'll pin the blame/ On Duncan's grooms who both are also slain. /A little water clears us of this deed /Though a large scotch might also do the trick...' To celebrate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare''s death, this is the first of a new collection of the Bard''s greatest plays, digested to a few thousand words with invaluable side notes from John Sutherland. Funny and incredibly clever, these parodies are a joy for those who know their Shakespeare, perfect for the theatre goer needing a quick recap, and a massive relief for those just desperate to pass their English exam.Trade ReviewWhat finer way to mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death than a series of witty modern reworkings...Shakespeare reduced to 100 pages of pithy pentameter with smart side notes. * Evening Standard *Witty, fresh takes on Shakespeare * The Times *Hilarious – and all the better for those of us who know our Shakespeare back to front. -- Harriet WalterHilarious – and all the better for those of us who know our Shakespeare back to front. -- Harriet WalterShrewd interpretations of the Bard; funny footnotes too. -- Hugh Bonneville

Read more less

Book SynopsisTable of ContentsAct 1Act 2Act 3Act 4Act 5

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis volume features a wide range of plays that reimagine Shakespeare works from Borderlands perspectives. For several decades, Chicanx and Indigenous theatermakers have been repurposing Shakespeare's plays to reflect the histories and lived realities of the USMexico Borderlands and to create space to tell stories of and for La Frontera. Celebrating this rich tradition, The Bard in the Borderlands: An Anthology of Shakespeare Appropriations en La Frontera brings a wide range of Borderlands Shakespeare plays together for the first time in a multi-volume open-access scholarly edition. This anthology celebrates the dynamic, multilingual reworking of canon and place that defines Borderlands Shakespeare, and it situates these geographically and temporally diverse plays within the robust study of Shakespeare's global afterlives. The editors offer a critical framework for understanding the artistic and political traditions that shape these plays and the place of Shakespeare within the mulTrade Review"The Bard in the Borderlands: An Anthology of Shakespeare Appropriations en La Frontera, Volume 1 features a wide range of plays that deftly re-imagine Shakespeare works from Borderlands perspectives. Unique, ground-breaking, exceptional, thought-provoking, and inherently fascinating, The Bard in the Borderlands is a distinctive, ground-breaking, and unreservedly recommended as an addition to personal, professional, community, college, and university library Shakespeare studies collections. Of special appeal and value for readers with an interest in Hispanic American Dramas & Plays." * Midwest Book Review *Table of ContentsGeneral Introduction: Tracing the Traditions of Borderlands Shakespeare, by Katherine Gillen, Adrianna M. Santos, and Kathryn Vomero SantosIntroduction to Volume I, by Katherine Gillen, Adrianna M. Santos, and Kathryn Vomero SantosPlaytexts and Introductions1. The Language of Flowers by Edit Villarreal2. Kino and Teresa by James Lujan3. The Tragic Corrido of Romeo and Lupe by Seres Jaime Magaña4. Hamlet, El Príncipe de Denmark by Tara Moses5. Ofélio by Joshua Inocéncio6. ¡O Romeo! by Olga Sanchez SaltveitGlossaryBibliography

Read more less

Book SynopsisEuripides' Iphigeneia among the Taurians has been a popular and influential text from antiquity onwards. It is a suspenseful drama set on the Black Sea coast in what is now Crimea, which explores themes of family loyalty, Greeks and barbarians, and the nature of the gods. The plot combines an unrecognised meeting between Iphigeneia, now a priestess of Artemis among the Taurians, and her brother Orestes, who with his friend Pylades has been captured and brought to her for sacrifice, with an exciting escape attempt for all three, ultimately brought about by divine intervention. This edition includes a full Introduction to the literary and production aspects of the play, while the Commentary elucidates problems of language as well as interpretation. These combine to make the play fully accessible to intermediate-level undergraduates and graduate students wishing to read it in the original Greek.Trade Review'Any 'intermediate level undergraduate' who is tasked with studying IT should acquaint him/herself with K.'s edition, and consider him/herself very fortunate.' Colin Leach, Classics for AllTable of ContentsIntroduction; Sigla; ΕΥΡΙΠΙΔΟΥ ΙΦΙΓΕΝΕΙΑ Η ΕΝ ΤΑΥΡΟΙΣ; Commentary; Glossary; Abbreviations; Bibliography; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisOn a Japanese beach, teenage sisters Hanako and Reiko are caught up in a storm. Reiko survives while Hanako is lost to the sea. Their mother, however, can't shake the feeling her missing daughter is still alive, and soon family tragedy takes on a global political dimension.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe first comprehensive treatment in English of the rich and varied afterlife of classical drama across Latin America, this volume explores the myriad ways in which ancient Greek and Roman texts have been adapted, invoked and re-worked in notable modern theatrical works across North and South America and the Caribbean, while also paying particular attention to the national and local context of each play. A comprehensive introduction provides a critical overview of the varying issues and complexities that arise when studying the afterlife of the European classics in the theatrical stages across this diverse and vast region. Fourteen chapters, divided into three general geographical sub-regions (Southern Cone, Brazil and the Caribbean and North America) present a strong connection to an ancient dramatic source text as well as comment upon important socio-political crises in the modern history of Latin America. The diversity and expertise of the voices in this volume translate into a muTrade ReviewGreeks and Romans on the Latin American Stage is a fine addition to Bloomsbury’s Studies in Classical Reception collection … It shows that Latin America is a region that Anglophone scholarship can no longer afford to overlook, and throws down an impressive gauntlet for scholars in the field to begin wrestling with the reception of antiquity on the Latin American stage. * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *[A] volume that brings to light little-known adaptations from a variety of countries in the area addressing many of its present conflicts and recent past turmoil, is extremely valuable. Moreover, the fact that the book starts by highlighting the need to redefine certain terms taken for granted to examine reception in 'Latin America' and to acknowledge that this is not a homogeneous area but a highly diverse region that cannot be studied as a single unit, is certainly refreshing, reassuring, and a step in the right direction. * Classics for All *The editors provide an introduction fizzing with helpful social and historical contextualization for a readership less familiar with the issues and complexities surrounding these diverse ‘Latin’ American receptions. The methodological and theoretical discussion is recommended for anyone interested in twentieth-century and postcolonial receptions. * Greece & Rome *Table of ContentsAcknowledgements List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors 1. Staging the European Classical in ‘Latin’ America: An Introduction Rosa Andújar, King's College London, UK and Konstantinos Nikoloutsos, Saint Joseph’s University, USA I. Southern Cone 2. From Epic to Tragedy: Theatre and Politics in Juan Cruz Varela’s Dido Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos, Saint Joseph’s University, USA 3. Leopoldo Marechal’s Antígona Vélez: Rewriting Greek Tragedy as a Foundation Myth in Peronist Argentina Brenda López Saiz, University of Chile, Chile 4. Juan Radrigán’s Medea Mapuche: Recreating Euripides’ Revenge Tragedy in an Indigenous Chilean Context Irmtrud König, University of Chile, Chile 5. Philoctetes and Medea in Contemporary Chilean Theatre Carolina Brncic, University of Chile, Chile II. Brazil 6. A God Slept Here by Guilherme Figueiredo: A Radical Modernist Amphitruo from Brazil Rodrigo Tadeu Gonçalves, University of Paraná, Brazil 7. Guilherme Figueiredo, Amphitryon, and the Widow of Ephesus: Linking Plautus and Petronius Tiziana Ragno, University of Foggia, Italy 8. Electra’s Turn to the Dark Side: Nelson Rodrigues’ Senhora dos Afogados Anastasia Bakogianni, Massey University, New Zealand 9. Becoming Antigone: The Classics as a Model of Resistance in Jorge Andrade’s Pedreira das Almas Seth A. Jeppesen, Brigham Young University, USA III. The Caribbean and North America 10. Distorting the Lysistrata Paradigm in Puerto Rico: Francisco Arriví’s Club de Solteros Rosa Andújar, King's College London, UK 11. Challenging the Canon in the Dominican Republic: Lisístrata odia la política by Franklin Domínguez Katherine Ford, East Carolina University, USA 12. Aeschylus and the Cuban Counter-Revolution Jacques Bromberg, University of Pittsburgh, USA 13. The Contest between Créolité and Classics in Patrick Chamoiseau’s Stage Plays Justine McConnell, King's College London, UK 14. Dismantling the Anthropological Machine: Feliks Moriso-Lewa’s Antigòn and Luis Alfaro’s Electricidad Tom Hawkins, Ohio State University, USA 15. Antigone Undead: Tragedy and Biopolitics in Perla de la Rosa’s Antígona: las voces que incendian el desierto Jesse Weiner, Hamilton College, USA Notes Bibliography Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisStephens writes dramas set in uncaring, uncompromising worlds, whose characters speak in a language at once naturalistic and yet artificially pared-down and whose uncertain attempts to assert their own identities sometimes lead to gratuitous and brutal acts of violence. - Financial TimesA fifth collection of plays by one of Britain''s most prolific contemporary playwrights, Simon Stephens, charting his work from 2011-2016, ranging from London''s Royal Court Theatre, Manchester''s Royal Exchange and Broadway. Wastwater (2011) Metaphoric, allusive, and thoroughly disturbing in its evocation of suspicion and uncertainty, Wastwater is a thought-provoking play whose quiet intensity stays with you for days its effect is like that of a ugly stone dropped into a pool, which results in constant ripples of dirty water lapping at your subconscious (Aleks Sierz)Birdland (2014) Mega-fame and limitless cash can turn a man into a monster, and Simon Stephens''s new playTable of Contents1. Introduction 2. Wastwater; 3. Birdland; 4. Blindsided; 5. Song From Far Away; 6. Heisenberg

Read more less

Book SynopsisI could fly to New York and back every day for seven years and still not leave a carbon footprint as big as if I have a child. Ten thousand tonnes of CO2. That's the weight of the Eiffel Tower. I'd be giving birth to the Eiffel Tower.'In a time of global anxiety, terrorism, erratic weather and political unrest, a young couple want a child but are running out of time. If they over think it, they'll never do it. But if they rush, it could be a disaster.They want to have a child for the right reasons. Except, what exactly are the right reasons? And what will be the first to destruct the planet or the relationship?Trade Review“Duncan Macmillan’s distinctive, off-kilter love story is brutally honest, funny, edgy and current. It gives voice to a generation for whom uncertainty is a way of life… bravely written, startlingly structured” * Guardian *Macmillan’s play is at once harrowing and blisteringly funny, bleak and redemptive...It combines hyper-real dialogue with a quirky form that expands and contracts time before our eyes, creating the almost physical sensation of being hurtled towards an uncertain future. The piece’s furious pace lives up to its title, leaving audience, and no doubt actors, feeling the need to pause for breath in a world that does not allow it. * What's On Stage *“Both uproariously funny … and unbearably poignant… an engaging and poignant piece" * Exeunt Magazine *Duncan Macmillan’s distinctive, off-kilter love story is brutally honest, funny, edgy and current. It gives voice to a generation for whom uncertainty is a way of life… bravely written, startlingly structured” -- Lyn Gardner * Guardian *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is the first collection from critically acclaimed playwright Duncan Macmillan, containing the plays Monster, Lungs, 2071, Every Brilliant Thing and People, Places and Things.Trade ReviewDuncan Macmillan’s cracking play is a timely and gripping dissection of parenting and responsibility… This is a play that tests your liberal instincts to the limits. * The Guardian, on Monster *An honest, original and pretty much irresistible tearjerker. * The New York Times ArtsBeat, on People, Places and Things *A woundingly intense two-hander. It is the most beautiful, quietly shattering play of the year. * The Express, on Lungs *If we look to theatre to increase our awareness of the human condition, the evening succeeds on all counts. [...] This talk, which deserves wide dissemination, is better than good: it is necessary. * The Guardian, on 2071 *Heart-wrenching, hilarious... one of the funniest plays you’ll ever see about depression – and possibly one of the funniest plays you’ll ever see, full stop. * The Guardian, on Every Brilliant Thing *The writing is exquisitely painful. At times it feels like Macmillan has taken one of those little spoons, the ones with the serrated edge, for grapefruit, and scooped something out of you. * The Stage, on People, Places and Things *It is a rigorous but impassioned cri de coeur [...] conveyed in a single voice, founded on a lifetime's experience of the workings of the planet, it has real power. * New Scientist, on 2071 *Duncan Macmillans cracking play is a timely and gripping dissection of parenting and responsibility This is a play that tests your liberal instincts to the limits. * The Guardian on Monster *If we look to theatre to increase our awareness of the human condition, the evening succeeds on all counts. This talk, which deserves wide dissemination, is better than good: it is necessary. * The Guardian on 2071 *It is a rigorous but impassioned cri de coeur [ ] conveyed in a single voice, founded on a lifetime's experience of the workings of the planet, it has real power. * New Scientist on 2071 *Heart-wrenching, hilarious... one of the funniest plays youll ever see about depression and possibly one of the funniest plays you'll ever see, full stop. * The Guardian on Every Brilliant Thing *Duncan Macmillan's cracking play is a timely and gripping dissection of parenting and responsibility. This is a play that tests your liberal instincts to the limits. * The Guardian on Monster *One of the most powerful and painfully funny plays I've ever seen. * New York Times on People, Places and Things *Table of Contents1. Monster 2. Lungs 3. 2071 4. Every Brilliant Thing 5. People, Places And Things

Read more less

Book SynopsisListen to the dialogue: no other American dramatist has this feel for the ordinary talk of ordinary people, or the knowledge of what they do. This is more than a writer''s craft, it is a psychological and moral openness to humanity, an act not of imitating, but of sharing. Sunday TimesThis fourth anthology features Arthur Miller''s two early plays, The Golden Years, a historical tragedy about Montezuma''s destruction at the hands of Cortez, and The Man Who Had All the Luck, a fable about human freedom and individual responsibility, are brought together in this volume. It also features two of his contemporary shorter plays, I Can''t Remember Anything and Clara, first presented on a double bill as Danger! Memory. The latter focus on the importance and dangers of remembering the past, while the early plays, written at the time of the Second World War, mark the emergence of a drama in which public issues are rooted in private anxieties and c

Read more less

Book SynopsisWinner of New Diorama, Underbelly and Methuen Drama's Untapped Award 2022Finalist for Best Performance Piece at the Offies Awards 2024 Sometimes I'm afraid of this play.Malta: Catholic kitsch, golden sun, deep blue sea, Eurovision and a blanket ban on abortion.Propelled by three years of interviews with anonymous contributors and their own lived experience, actors and activists Marta and Davinia interrogate Malta's restrictions on the freedom of women.What does it mean for your home to boast the world's most progressive LGBTQIA+ rights, leading transgender laws and a population that is almost unanimously anti-choice?Blanket Ban is a rallying cry from award-winning Chalk Line Theatre. This edition was published to coincide with the production at Underbelly Cowgate, Edinburgh, in August 2022.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe story of the women who saved William Shakespeare from obscurity.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is The Scandal of the Century, the true story of the author Aphra Behn, who used a shocking love affair to create the first English novel . . .''Gloriously mind-boggling . . .This is a lively book, full of saucy millennial-type analogies'' SpectatorLondon, 1682. When Lady Henrietta Berkeley elopes with her sister's husband, her subsequent capture and the lawsuit that follows tears through Restoration England as the scandal of the century. But it also proves inspiration to one Aphra Behn already condemned as a scarlet woman of loose morals who pens a searing and outrageous bestseller based on Henrietta's shocking affair. The story of how and why Henrietta acted as she did, and how and why Behn came to write it becomes, in Lisa Hilton's hands, a stunning portrait of two women attempting to smash the shackles enslaving their sex.PRAISE FOR THE SCANDAL OF THE CENTURY''A landmark book, a sweeping, scintillatingly original, exciting and game changing exploration of writer, spy, power player, lover Aphra Behn. Thrilling, scholarly, powerfully researched, this is Aphra as she's never been seen before'' Kate Williams, historian and author of Rival Queens: The Betrayal of Mary, Queen of Scots''The Scandal of the Century allows Hilton to showcase her skill for both historical and detective work and compelling, evocative writing . . . compelling to read [and] refreshingly transparent . . . Her fresh ideas could open up exciting paths for future scholars' BBC History Magazine''An enjoyable read . . . challenging - but always entertaining'' Literary Review''Engaging, ingenious, lively . . . Hilton skilfully narrates background material of the Restoration'' TLS

Read more less

Book SynopsisNo Fear Shakespeare gives you the complete text of The Comedy of Errors on the left-hand page, side-by-side with an easy-to-understand translation on the right.

Read more less

Book SynopsisAge range 14+ Shakespeare everyone can understand - now in new DELUXE editions!

Read more less

Book SynopsisDesigned to introduce the student or general reader to a largely unfamiliar area of Elizabethan theatrical activity, Five Elizabethan progress entertainments focuses on a group of entertainments mounted for the monarch in the closing years of her reign. Richly annotated, and prefaced by a substantial introduction, the texts enable an understanding of the motives underlying not only the progress itself, but the choice of locations the monarch elected to visit and the personal and political preoccupations of those with whom she determined to stay. Selected for their diversity, the entertainments exhibit the tensions underlying some royal visits, the lavish expenditure entailed for the monarch’s hosts and the overlap in terms of both material and authorship between the progress entertainments and the more widely studied products of the sixteenth-century stage.Table of ContentsINTRODUCTION: THE ROYAL PROGRESS THE ENTERTAINMENT AT COWDRAYIntroductionText THE ENTERTAINMENT AT ELVETHAMIntroductionText THE ENTERTAINMENT AT BISHAMIntroductionText THE ENTERTAINMENT AT MITCHAM IntroductionTextAppendixTHE ENTERTAINMENT AT CHISWICKIntroductionTextINDEX

Read more less

Book SynopsisBeckett and media provides the first sustained examination of the relationship between Beckett and media technologies. The book analyses the rich variety of technical objects, semiotic arrangements, communication processes and forms of data processing that Beckett’s work so uniquely engages with, as well as those that – in historically changing configurations – determine the continuing performance, the audience reception, and the scholarly study of this work. Beckett and media draws on a variety of innovative theoretical approaches, such as media archaeology, in order to discuss Beckett’s intermedial oeuvre. As such, the book engages with Beckett as a media artist and examines the way his engagement with media technologies continues to speak to our cultural situation.Table of ContentsIntroduction – Balazs Rapcsak and Mark NixonPart I Literature and theatre1 In search of times gone by: Stimuli, signals and wireless telegraphy in Beckett's novel WattWolf Kittler2 Beckett's exhausted media Armin Schäfer3 Micro-drama / techno-trauma: Between theatre as cultural form and true media theatreWolfgang Ernst4 Electrifying theatre: Beckett ’ s media mysticism in and beyond Rough for Theatre IIBalazs Rapcsak5 Beckett, the proscenium, mediaMartin HarriesPart II Screens and airwaves6 Beckett ’ s intermedial bodies: Remediating theatre through radio Pim Verhulst7 Angles of immunity: Beckett's Film Philipp Schweighauser8 Beckett's affective telepoeticsUlrika Maude9 Understanding QuadJulian Murphet10 Black screens: Beckett and television technologiesJonathan BignellPart III Digital Beckett11 Directing Play in digital cultureNicholas Johnson12 Editing Beckett in digital media: Towards a digital Complete Works EditionDirk Van HulleIndex

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn NYRB Classics OriginalShakespeare, Nietzsche wrote, was Montaigne’s best reader—a typically brilliant Nietzschean insight, capturing the intimate relationship between Montaigne’s ever-changing record of the self and Shakespeare’s kaleidoscopic register of human character. And there is no doubt that Shakespeare read Montaigne—though how extensively remains a matter of debate—and that the translation he read him in was that of John Florio, a fascinating polymath, man-about-town, and dazzlingly inventive writer himself.Florio’s Montaigne is in fact one of the masterpieces of English prose, with a stylistic range and felicity and passages of deep lingering music that make it comparable to Sir Robert Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy and the works of Sir Thomas Browne. This new edition of this seminal work, edited by Stephen Greenblatt and Peter G. Platt, features an adroitly modernized text, an essay in which Greenblatt discusses both the resemblances and real tensions between Montaigne’s and Shakespeare’s visions of the world, and Platt’s introduction to the life and times of the extraordinary Florio. Altogether, this book provides a remarkable new experience of not just two but three great writers who ushered in the modern world.

Read more less

Book SynopsisCompleting the 8 volume Everyman Signet Shakespeare contains Shakespeare series, this final volume contains Shakespeare's four Last Plays - THE TEMPEST, PERICLES, THE WINTER'S TALE AND CYMBELINE. The beautifully produced, single-column text of the plays, with the Signet footnotes, is supplemented with bibliographies, a detailed chronology of Shakespear's life and times, and a substantial introduction in which Professor Tony Tanner discusses each play individually while setting each in context.

Read more less

Book SynopsisKing Henry VIII has one of the fullest theatrical histories of any play in the Shakespeare canon, yet has been consistently misrepresented, both in performance and in criticism. This edition offers a new perspective on this ironic, multi-layered, collaborative play, revealing it as a complex meditation on the progress of Reformation which sees English life since Henry VIII's day as a series of bewildering changes in national and personal allegiance and represents 'history' as the product of varied and contradictory testimony. McMullan makes a powerful claim for the rehabilitation of Henry VIII, providing the fullest performance history of any edition to date and reading the work not as a marginal 'late' Shakespeare play but as a play which is paradigmatic of the achievement of Renaissance drama as a whole.'This is a staggeringly brilliant, captivating edition that will undoubtedly occasion a huge surge of critical interest in this neglected play. For those of use who have never taken Henry VIII very seriously ' perhaps dismissing it as a late collaborative play of no consequence or as conservative propaganda ' McMullan's introduction is genuinely revelatory.' Eric Rasmussen, University of Nevada at Reno, Shakespeare Survey

Read more less

Book SynopsisCompared to Gaelic poetry, the history of Gaelic theatre has not been a particularly long one, with the first examples appearing in the eighteenth century. However, drama in Gaelic began to thrive in the twentieth century, and modern Gaelic drama has the power to break down barriers and to touch people across linguistic and cultural divides.This collection is a celebration of this often-overlooked genre, bringing together eight Gaelic plays from the start of the twentieth century to the present day. Accessible to non-Gaelic speakers, this book contains English translations as well as an introduction to the history of Gaelic theatre, and to the playwrights whose skill and commitment to their art deserves much wider recognition.ContentsRèiteach Mòraig (Morag's Betrothal) Iain M. MacLeòidAm Fear a Chaill a Ghàidhlig (The Man Who Lost His Gaelic) Iain MacCormaigCeann Cropic Fionnlagh MacLeòidTog Orm Mo Speal (Give Me My Scythe) Iain Mac a' GhobhainnÒrdugh na Saorsa (Order of Release) Tormod Calum DòmhnallachSequamur Dòmhnall S. Moireach (Gaelic by Catrìona Dunn)Scotties Muireann Kelly with Francis PoetBana-Ghaisgich (Heroines) Màiri Nic'IlleMhoire

Read more less

Book SynopsisAnthony Burgess was an energetic writer and composer, whose work for the stage is widely admired. In Two Plays, we see him tackling major monuments of French and Russian theatre: The Miser by Molière and Chatsky by Alexander Griboyedov. Miser, Miser! is a bold reworking of Molière’s classic comedy of 1668. Harpagon the miser is hoarding a pile of gold, which he has buried in his garden. As he tries to sell off his daughter, catch himself a beautiful young bride and outwit his scheming household of clever servants, the comedy of errors intensifies. Although the original French play is written in prose, Burgess remakes it in a mixture of verse and prose, in the style of his famous adaptation of Cyrano de Bergerac. This translation, discovered in the author’s archive, is the work of a writer at the height of his powers, reinventing Molière for modern audiences. Chatsky, subtitled ‘The Importance of Being Stupid’ is another verse comedy. The theme is that of the intellectual hero who rebels against the smug, philistine society in which he finds himself. First performed in 1833, Griboyedov’s play was so heavily cut by Russian censors that it was barely recognisable. The play is a virtuoso vehicle for male actors, and the source of many famous quotations. It is also notoriously difficult to translate. In Chatsky, Burgess remakes a classic Russian play in the spirit of Oscar Wilde. It is a great feast of language and invective. The complete texts of both plays are published here for the first time. Two Plays confirms Anthony Burgess’s reputation as a gifted writer for the stage, and as a translator of great wit and sophistication. MISER, MISER! CASTING: 7 men, 3 women CHATSKY CASTING: 9 men, 7 women

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisShakespeare's merry wives are Mistress Ford and Mistress Page of the town of Windsor. The two pull-down tricks on Mistress Ford's desirous spouse and a meeting knight, Sir John Falstaff. Happy spouses, desirous husbands, and ruthless knights were normal in a sort of play called citizen comedy or city comedy. In such plays, subjects, courteous fellows, or knights utilize social prevalence to tempt residents' wives. The Windsor spouses, however, don't follow that example. All things considered, Falstaff's proposal of himself as darling rouses their torture of him. Falstaff answers with the very etymological office that Shakespeare gives him in the set of experiences plays in which he shows up, making him the legend of the play for some crowds.

Read more less

a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhen, in 2000, the National Theatre published its poll of the hundred best plays of the 20th century, David Hare had written five of them. Yet he was born in 1947 into an anonymous suburban street in Hastings. It is a world he believes to be as completely vanished as Victorian England.Now in his first panoramic work of memoir, ending as Margaret Thatcher comes to power in 1979, David Hare describes his childhood, his Anglo-Catholic education and his painful apprenticeship to the trade of dramatist. He sets the progress of his own life against the history of a time in which faith in hierarchy, deference, religion, the empire and finally politics all withered away. Only belief in private virtue remains.In his customarily dazzling prose and with great warmth and humour, David Hare explores how so radical a shift could have occurred, and how it is reflected in his own lifelong engagement with two disparate art forms - film and theatre. In The Blue Touch Paper David Hare describes a life of trial and error: both how he became a writer and the high price he and those around him paid for that decision.

Read more less

Book SynopsisAlan Bennett''s beloved, best-known play, with a beautiful typographic cover. The best moments in reading are when you come across something a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things that you'd thought special, particular to you. And here it is, set down by someone else, a person you've never met, maybe even someone long dead.As an unruly bunch of bright, funny sixth-form boys pursue sex, sport and a place at university, adolescent anarchy and staffroom rivalry provoke insistent questions about history and education.The History Boys premiered at the National Theatre, London, 2004, winning Evening Standard, Critics' Circle, Olivier and South Bank Awards. On Broadway, it received numerous awards, including six Tonys.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisA masterpiece of Russian drama, now in a student editionTrade ReviewIt is the element of might-have-been in Chekhov's characters that makes their sense of waste so tragic ... I know of no more moving climax in world drama. * Guardian *Michael Frayn has left his signature upon our contemporary enjoyment of Chekhov...this Uncle Vanya possesses all the scrupulous, subtly idiomatic life we have come to expect from his hand, allied with - and this is the true mark of Frayn - a fine sense of Chekhovian complexity. * Spectator *

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn its towering central characters, vast geographical and historical sweep, and its variety of style and mood, Anthony and Cleopatra is perhaps the most ambitious of Shakespeare''s designs. Yet the degree and nature of its success remain surprisingly contentious, and performances of the play have seldom matched the extravagant expectations of its admirers. Michael Neill''s wide-ranging introduction from a number of angles, including those of gender and race. He examines the sources and discusses the theatrical challenge presented by Shakespeare''s technique, with its extraordinary tensions between rhetoric and action. A full stage history further illustrates its theatrical fortunes; both here and in the extensive commentary this edition illuminates the play''s theatrical dimensions as well as the rich complexity of its poetic language. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable Trade Review'Stanley Wells' OUP Complete Works of Shakespeare is now eight years old and has spawned a new Oxford Shakespeare which appears now in splendidly affordable volumes in that nonpareil of libraries of good reading The World's Classics.' The Oxford Times

Read more less

Book SynopsisLove''s Labour''s Lost, now recognized as one of the most delightful and stageworthy of Shakespeare''s comedies, came into its own both on the stage and in critical esteem only during the 1930s and 1940s, after three hundred years of neglect by the theatre and undervaluation and misuse by critics. The Introduction to this new edition pays particular attention to this process of rehabilitation. The text, based on the quarto of 1598 and taking full account of the extensive scholarly study that text has received over recent years, rests on the hypothesis that the quarto goes back, probably by way of `lost'' quarto, to an authorial manuscript representing the play in a state prior to `fair copy''. If this is so, the quarto takes on a special significance because through it we can watch Shakespeare in the act of composition, improvising, changing his mind, and revising as his play develops under his hand. The editor offers a number of new readings of difficult and disputed passages, togetheTrade Review`Hibbard lucidly expounds the intricately patterned structure of his play ... and he dispatches the largely distracting question of its 'topicality' with heartening promptness.' English Studies, Volume 72, Number 6, December 1991`This Oxford text of Love's Labour's Lost is lucidly informative, scrupulous but concise,. and in general a model of restrained and level-headed editing.' Cedric Watts, University of Sussex, Review of English Studies, Vol. 43, 8/92'Stanley Wells' OUP Complete Works of Shakespeare is now eight years old and has spawned a new Oxford Shakespeare which appears now in splendidly affordable volumes in that nonpareil of libraries of good reading The World's Classics.' The Oxford TimesTable of ContentsList of illustrations; Introduction; The Play; The Date and `Sources'; The Text; Editorial Procedures; Abbreviations and references; Love's Labour's Lost; Appendix A: Two `False Starts'; Appendix B: Alterations to lineation; Appendix C: The music for `The Hit It'; Appendix D: The name of Armado's page; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisFord wrote darkly about sexual and political passion, thwarted ambition, and incest. This selection also shows his ability to portray the poignancy of love as well as write entertaining comedy and create convincing roles for women. Setting Ford's earliest surviving independently-written play, The Lover's Melancholy; alongside his three best-known works, this edition includes an introduction with sections on each play, addressing gender issues, modernrelevance, and staging possibilities. Includes: The Lover's Melancholy; The Broken Heart; `Tis Pity She's a Whore; Perkin Warbeck.Table of ContentsThe Lover's Melancholy ; The Broken Heart ; 'Tis Pity She's a Whore ; Perkin Warbeck

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Modern Husband * The Clandestine Marriage * She Stoops to Conquer * Wild OatsThis edition brings together four eighteenth-century comedies that illustrate the full variety of the century''s drama. Fielding''s The Modern Husband , written before the 1737 Licensing Act that restricted political and social comment, depicts wife-pandering and widespread social corruption. In Garrick and Colman''s The Clandestine Marriage two lovers marry in defiance of parental wishes and rue the consequences. She Stoops to Conquer explores the comic and not-so-comic consequences of mistaken identity, and in Wild Oats, the ''strolling player'' Rover is a beacon of hope at a time of unrest.Part of the Oxford English Drama series, this edition has modern-spelling texts, critical introduction, wide-ranging annotation and an informative bibliography. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Table of ContentsIntroduction ; Select Bibliography ; THE MODERN HUSBAND ; THE CLANDESTINE MARRIAGE ; SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER ; WILD OATS ; Explanatory Notes ; Glossary

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe theme of the great Shakespearean tragedies is the fall from grace of a great man due to a flaw in his nature. Whether it is the ruthless ambition of Macbeth or the folly of Lear, the irresolution of Hamlet or the suspicion of Othello, the cause of the tragedy - even when it is the murder of a king - is trifling compared to the calamity that it unleashes. Despite his flawed nature, however, the tragic hero has a nobility that emphasizes the greatness of man. From this paradox the audience is brought to a greater understanding of - and sympathy with - suffering. The four tragedies in this collection are accompanied by notes and an introduction to each text, making this edition of particular value to students and theatre-goers.

Read more less

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe acclaimed Pelican Shakespeare series, now repackaged in award-winning modern covers to inspire Shakespearians of all ages.

Read more less