First published in 1987, this 23rd volume in the Renaissance Imagination series had the objective of establishing the text of William Davenant's The Platonick Lovers that most closely represents the author's final vision for his work. Wendell W. Broom Jr documents the history of the publication of The Platonick Lovers and the manner in which the present text was produced. Copies of all relevant editions have been collated and curated to bring together the definitive authorial version of the text.

This compilation of Isaac Bickerstaff's plays was originally compiled and published in 1981, and the plays written in the 1760s-70s. Edited and with an introduction by Peter A. Tasch, the volume contains seven plays: The Captive; He Wou'd if He Cou'd; or, An Old Fool worse than Any; The Recruiting Serjeant; 'Tis Well it's no Worse; The Brickdust-Man and Milk-Maid; The Sultan, or A Peep into the Seraglio; and The Spoil'd Child.

Originally published in 1979, this volume includes the full text of James Marston's The Wonder of Women, alongside critical and textual notes. Previously to this volume, Sophonisba had appeared in print five times, once independently and four times in collections of Marston's plays; the first edition is a quarto printed in 1606 by John Windet.

Originally published in 1982, this book contains the Thomas Middleton and Williiam Rowley's full play, The Old Law, alongisde textual and critical notes.

Originally published in 1984, this book contains the full text of I, Sir John Oldcastle, alongside critical and textual notes, including an examination of the authors and the theatrical background and assessment. For such an obscure play, I Sir John Oldcastle has had a varied printing history and has been printed eighteen times since its original 1600 publication date. The text here is a modern-spelling version and archaic forms are only presered where rhyme or metre requires them, or when modernization obscres rather than clarifies the required sense of the word.

Originally collated and published in 1980, this volume contains the plays of Colley Cibber, edited and with an introduction by Rodney L. Hayley. The book contains The Lady's Last Stake, The Rival Fools, Ximena, The Non-Juror and The Refusal.

Published in 1993: The first modern scholarly edition of the author's play, not published until 1778. Sebastian reclaims his betrothed from Antonio; the Duchess avenges herself on the Duke for making her drink from her father; and Abberzanes and Francesca have an illicite affair. The witches are credible forces of evil.

The Routledge Anthology of Early Modern Drama is the first new collection of the drama of Shakespeare's contemporaries in over a century. This volume comprises seventeen accessible, thoroughly glossed, modernized play-texts, intermingling a wide range of unfamiliar works-including the anonymous Look About You, Massinger's The Picture, Heminge's The Fatal Contract, Heywood's The Four Prentices of London, and Greene's James IV-with more familiar works such as Marlowe's Doctor Faustus, Webster's The Duchess of Malfi, and Middleton's Women Beware Women. Each play is edited by a different leading scholar in the field of early modern studies, bringing specific expertise and context to the chosen play-text. With an unprecedented variety of plays, and critical introductions that focus on the diversity and strangeness of different early modern approaches to the artistic and commercial enterprise of play-making, The Routledge Anthology of Early Modern Drama will offer vital new perspectives on early modern drama for scholars, students, and performers alike.

This book presents lectures and notes upon Shakespeare and other dramatists, including poetry, the drama and Shakespeare; order of Shakespeare's plays; notes on Shakespeare's plays from English history; and notes on some of the plays of Shakespeare, Johnson, Beaumont and Fletcher.

Originally published in 1999, this book is a critical analysis of Renaissance theatre, including chapters on speaking theatres, performing theatre and redesigning Shakespeare.

Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek is known as a writer who works in response to contemporary crises and cultural phenomena. Perhaps none of her works display that quality as clearly as On the Royal Road. Three weeks after Donald Trump's election, Jelinek mailed her German editor the first draft of this play, which turns out to be a stunningly prescient response to Trump and what he represents. In this drama we discover that a "king," blinded by himself, who has made a fortune with real estate, golf courses and casinos, suddenly rules the United States, and the rest of the people of the world rub their eyes in disbelief until no one sees anything anymore. As topical as the evening news, yet with insight built on a lifetime of closely observing politics and culture, On the Royal Road brings into focus the phenomenon of right-wing populism, which spreads like a virus and has a lasting effect on global politics. Carefully perched somewhere between tragedy and grotesque, high-pitched and squeamish, Jelinek in this work questions her own position and forms of resistance.

Terence achieved in his brief twenty-six years a standard of stylistic perfection and artistic restraint that ranked him, along with Plautus, as the greatest of the Roman comic playwrights. He was, at the very least, a gifted translator and adaptor, having used Greek New Comedies as the basis for all six of his extant plays. How far his own contribution exceeded that of simple translation is difficult to say, but we know that the Latin, undeniably his, was so faultlessly styled that his work served as a textbook for scholars and grammarians for hundreds of years.

Terence had a considerable impact on the Revival of Letters; his comedies were studied and were frequently adapted into new works by such men as Steele, Chapman, and, most famously, Molire. Indeed, had there been no Terence, it is doubtful that the Comedy of Manners could have arisen when it did, and all comic writing for the stage, from Moilre through the Restoration drama to the present day, would be diminished for lack of him. Appropriately, the language of this translation is from the Restoration. Graves has based his version on the one made in 1689 by Laurence Echard; he has corrected inaccuracies, eliminated defects and obscurities, but retained the period tone.

Including in this book are the major comedies: "The Fair Andrian," "The Mother-In-Law," "The Self-Tormentor," "The Eunuch," "The Tricks of Phormio" and "The Brothers." A close reading of Terence is a fine corrective to any idea that may still be current, about the glory that was Greece and grandeur that was Rome during the Hellenistic period. It is an assurance that in some respects at least, this age is not depraved at all.

"Robert Graves" (1895-1985) was a distinguished poet, novelist, essayist, critic, classicist and historian and produced over 140 different works. Although briefly, he also served as professor of poetry at the University of Oxford. Some of his most famous works include "I, Claudius," "Claudius the God," "The White Goddess," "Lawrence and the Arabs," and "The Greek Myths."

An urgent and explosive play that explores of the pressures on young people today in the wake of advancing technology. When a naked photograph of Scarlett goes viral, she becomes the centre of attention for all the wrong reasons. But while rumours run wild and everyone forms an opinion, Scarlett just stays silent... With roles for up to twenty-four young female actors (though it can also be performed by a smaller cast), the play is perfect for any schools, youth theatres or drama groups looking to tackle a contemporary subject in a theatrically exciting way. Specially commissioned by Birmingham Repertory Theatre, Theatre Royal Plymouth and West Yorkshire Playhouse, Evan Placey's play Girls Like That was developed through work with young people from the three theatres and first performed by their youth theatre companies in 2013. It was revived at the Unicorn Theatre, London, in November 2014. Girls Like That was named Best Play for Young Audiences at the Writers' Guild of Great Britain Awards 2015.

Mystery / Casting: 5m, 7f / Scenery: InteriorThe announcement in the local paper states time and place of a murder to occur in Miss Blacklock's Victorian house. The victim is not one of several occupants, temporary and permanent, but an unexpected and unknown visitor. What follows is a classic Christie puzzle of mixed motives, concealed identities, a second death, a determined Inspector grimly following the twists and turns, and Miss Marple on hand to provide the final solution at some risk to herself in a dramatic confrontation scene just before the final curtain. "Had the first night audience on the edge of their seats." Evening Post. "Re enter Agatha with another whodunit hit, another of her fiendishly ingenious murder mysteries." London Evening News.

First published in 1986.
This collection of essays focuses on the ways in which our society 'processes' Shakespeare and the purposes for which this seems to be done. The case is made by examining the work of four highly influential critics: A C Bradley, Walter Raleigh, T S Eliot and John Dover Wilson.
Terence Hawkes asks whether, beyond the readings to which the plays may be subjected, there lies any final, authoritative or essential meaning to which we can ultimately turn, concluding that jazz music offers the most fruitful model for twentieth-century criticism.

August Strindberg is one of the founders of the modern theater. George Bernard Shaw considered him "the only genuinely Shakespearian modern dramatist," Sean O'Casey called him "the greatest of them all." And to Eugene O'Neill he was "the greatest interpreter in the theater of the characteristic spiritual conflicts of our lives today." "Twelve Major Plays" includes the most famous and most characteristic Strindberg plays.

This selection is particularly interesting in its depiction of the great range of Strindberg's moods and styles, from naturalism to expressionism, from ironic comedy to bitter tragedy. It displays his great gift for symbolic, mystical verse as well as his command of dramatic prose. In issues of sex and gender, Strindberg anticipated the modern temperament in society and drama alike.

These translations gave American readers their first opportunity to know the true genius of Strindberg. Most previous versions in English had been based on existing German translations. Elizabeth Sprigge's unique achievement was to render the original Swedish texts into English that is at once fluent and accurate and that captures the full vigor and impact of the original plays.

In The Lamplighter award-winning poet and Scottish Makar Jackie Kay takes us on a journey into the dark heart of Britain’s legacy in the slave trade.

First produced as a play, on the page it reads as a profound and tragic multi-layered poem. We watch as four women and one man tell the story of their lives through slavery, from the fort, to the slave ship, through the middle passage, following life on the plantations, charting the growth of the British city and the industrial revolution. Constance has witnessed the sale of her own child; Mary has been beaten to an inch of her life; Black Harriot has been forced to sell her body; and our lead, the Lamplighter, was sold twice into slavery from the ports in Bristol. Their different voices sing together in a rousing chorus that speaks to the experiences of all those brutalised by slavery, and lifts in the end to a soaring and powerful conclusion.

Stirring, impassioned and deeply affecting, The Lamplighter remains as essential today as the day it was first performed. This is an essential work by one of our most beloved writers.

Jew is only the name we give to that stranger. Each man has his Jew; it is the other. And the Jews have their Jews. Arthur Miller's largely forgotten masterpiece, Incident at Vichy is a prescient examination of the evil that exists in us all, inspired by a real-life incident in France in which a Gentile gave a Jew his identity pass during a check, which would have resulted in the Jew otherwise being sent to a concentration camp. This Methuen Drama Student Edition of the play includes commentary and notes by Joshua Polster, Emerson College, US, which investigate the politics of the play in the context of the African-American civil rights movement happening at the time; the Vietnam War; The House Committee on Un-American Activities; and the murder of Kitty Genovese, as well as exploring Miller's own relationships that were central to the play including with psychoanalyst Dr Rudolf Loewenstein, his wife Inge Morath and his friend Elia Kazan.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, the Drama Desk Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Lucille Lortel Award, and the Oppenheimer Award

Edson's powerfully imaginedm Pulitzer Prize-winning play examines life itself through her exploration of one of existence's unifying experiences—mortality—while also probing the vital importance of human relationships. What we as her audience take away from this remarkable drama is a keener sense that, while death is real and unavoidable, our lives are ours to cherish or throw away—a lesson that can be both uplifting and redemptive. As the playwright herself puts it, "The play is not about doctors or even about cancer. It's about kindness, but it shows arrogance. It's about compassion, but it shows insensitivity."

In Wit, Edson delves into timeless questions with no final answers: How should we live our lives knowing that we will die? Is the way we live our lives and interact with others more important than what we achieve materially, professionally, or intellectually? How does language figure into our lives? Can science and art help us conquer death, or our fear of it? What will seem most important to each of us about life as that life comes to an end? The immediacy of the presentation, and the clarity and elegance of Edson's writing, make this sophisticated and multilayered play real and accessible to all readers and students.

Notes on Wit from the Holtzbrinck Teachers Guide

As the play begins, Vivian Bearing, a renowned professor of English who has spent years studying and teaching the intricate, difficult Holy Sonnets of the seventeenth-century poet John Donne, is diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer. Confident of her ability to stay in control of events, she brings to her illness the same intensely rational and painstakingly methodical approach that has guided her stellar academic career. But as her disease and its excruciatingly painful treatment inexorably progress, she begins to question the single-minded values and standards that have always directed her, finally coming to understand firsthand the aspects of life that make it worth living.

"Oedipus Tyrannos is the first Greek play many readers encounter, and this version is their ideal gateway. Emily Wilson's verse line is effortlessly graceful, whether in taut, tense dialogue exchanges or in the lyrical choral odes." -JAMES ROMM, Bard College

When Creon refuses to bury the body of Antigone's unruly brother, Antigone's anger quickly turns to defiance. Creon condemns her to a torturous death: she's to be buried alive. Acclaimed playwright Roy Williams takes Sophocles' play and, by placing it into a contemporary setting, brings this classic tale vividly to life. A timeless story about loyalty and truth, about how we make meaning out of life and death, and what in the end really does matter. Roy Williams's adaptation of Antigone received its world premiere at Derby Theatre, in a co-production between Pilot Theatre, Derby Theatre and Theatre Royal, Stratford East, before going on a national tour. This new, edited edition is published for the first time in Methuen Drama's Plays for Young People series, aimed at 16-18 year olds.

Slowly I learnt the ways of humans: how to ruin, how to hate, how to debase, how to humiliate. And at the feet of my master I learnt the highest of human skills, the skill no other creature owns: I finally learnt how to lie. Childlike in his innocence but grotesque in form, Frankenstein's bewildered creature is cast out into a hostile universe by his horror-struck maker. Meeting with cruelty wherever he goes, the friendless Creature, increasingly desperate and vengeful, determines to track down his creator and strike a terrifying deal. Urgent concerns of scientific responsibility, parental neglect, cognitive development and the nature of good and evil are embedded within this thrilling and deeply disturbing classic gothic tale. Frankenstein, based on the novel by Mary Shelley, premiered at the National Theatre, London, in February 2011.

Best known for "Enquiry Concerning Political Justice" (1793) and "Caleb Williams" (1794), William Godwin (1756-1836) is one of the most important figures of the Romantic period. This book offers academics the chance to build a complete picture of Godwin as a writer and political figure.