Teenager Alan, fought over by a religious mother and an atheist father, finds release in horses, until he is driven to blind them with a spike. Why? While treating the boy, a psychiatrist discovers his own life is paradoxically in the witness box.

An explosive play that took critics and audiences by storm, "Equus" is Peter Shaffer's exploration of the way modern society has destroyed our ability to feel passion. Alan Strang is a disturbed youth whose dangerous obsession with horses leads him to commit an unspeakable act of violence. As psychiatrist Martin Dysart struggles to understand the motivation for Alan's brutality, he is increasingly drawn into Alan's web and eventually forced to question his own sanity. "Equus" is a timeless classic and a cornerstone of contemporary drama that delves into the darkest recesses of human existence.

Edward Damson, famous English playwright, has died violently at his remote Aegean home. His son, whom he has never acknowledged, American academic Philip Damson, has had a lifelong obsession with the father he never knew and he begs permission from his stepmother, Helen, to write Edward's biography. She agrees reluctantly on the proviso that he tells the whole story - a story, she warns, he will find painful...5 women, 4 men

Lettice Duffet, an expert on Elizabethan cuisine and medieval weaponry, is an indefatigable but daffy enthusiast of history and the theatre. As a tour guide at Fustian House, one of the least stately of London's stately homes, she theatrically embellishes its historical past, ultimately coming up on the radar of Lotte Schon, an inspector from the Preservation Trust. Neither impressed or entertained by Lettice's freewheeling history lessons, Schon fires her. Not one however, to go without a fight, Lettice engages the stoic, conventionial Lotte in battle to the death of all that is sacred to the Empire and the crown.

0riginating at the National Theatre of Great Britain, Amadeus was the recipient of both the Evening Standard Drama Award and the Theatre Critics Award. In the United States, the play won the coveted Tony Award and went on to become a critically acclaimed major motion picture winning eight Oscars, including Best Picture.

Now, this extraordinary work about the life of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is available with a new preface by Peter Shaffer and a new introduction by the director of the 1998 Broadway revival, Sir Peter Hall. Amadeus is a must-have for classical music buffs, theatre lovers, and aficionados of historical fiction.

Charles and Belinda are an ill-assorted couple yet they were once in love. Insanely jealous, Charles engages a private eye, Julian, to follow her round London. Julian can only report that she is attached to someone. When the three meet it transpires that Belinda has fallen for Julian. Deciding to mend a marriage, rather than break it, Julian banishes Belinda to her wanderings but this time to be followed by Charles.

Bob is a born loser: plain and shy he is no match for Ted whose facile charm impresses "the birds". Bob thinks he has found a different kind of girl and invites her to dinner. Ted bustles about, further reducing Bob's store of confidence. Doreen arrives. Her quiet poise is revealed as foolishness and she finds classical music as tedious as Bob's conversation.1 woman, 2 men

Drama / 3m, 2f / Comp. Int. The first stage success from the author of Equus and Amadeus, this taut family drama centers on a young German student who, coming to England to tutor the daughter of well-to-do family is drawn into the various individual dramas of these fractured, isolated people. "A powerful and absorbing drama." - New York Post

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is a genius, the most brilliant musician the world will ever see. But the court of eighteenth-century Vienna doesn't recognize his talents - only Antonio Salieri, the Court Composer, does, and he is tortured by what he hears. Seething with rage at the genius of this flippant buffoon and suddenly aware of his own mediocrity, Salieri declares war and sets out to destroy the man he sees as God's instrument on earth. Peter Shaffer's award-winning play is a rich, exuberant portrayal of a God-like man among mortals, and lives destroyed by envy.

This is the story of the conquest of Peru, the defeat by 167 men of a highly organised, communistic empire of over ten million people. It is also the story of two men, Francisco Pizarro, the embittered, defiant commander of the invading Spanish forces, and Atahuallpa, the young king, Sun god-upon-earth, ruler of a vast empire. Between the two, both illegitimate usurpers, there grows a deep and understanding friendship.

0riginating at the National Theatre of Great Britain, "Amadeus" was the recipient of both the Evening Standard Drama Award and the Theatre Critics Award. In the United States, the play won the coveted Tony Award and went on to become a critically acclaimed major motion picture winning eight Oscars, including Best Picture.

Now, this extraordinary work about the life of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is available with a new preface by Peter Shaffer and a new introduction by the director of the 1998 Broadway revival, Sir Peter Hall. "Amadeus" is a must-have for classical music buffs, theatre lovers, and aficionados of historical fiction.

History / Casting: 22m, 2f, extras / Scenery: Cyc, drops, inset

The Spanish expedition under Pizzaro to the land of the Incas told in dazzling spectacle and moral chiaroscuro. After general absolution for any crimes they may commit against the pagan Incas, the conquerors set forth upon the sea. The Inca god is a sun god, ruler of the riches and people of Peru and thought to be immortal. But the Spaniards have come in conquest rather than in reverence. There is misunderstanding, confusion, and slaughter: the Spaniards kill 3000 unarmed Incas and take the sun god captive. The ransom is 9000 pounds of gold. The avaricious Spaniards mutiny, try the sun god in kangaroo court and garrote him. He does not revive the Incas behold their dead god.

"High intelligence and bold, imaginative reach ... soaring passages that recall the stage to its lofty enterprise, and a theme of enduring significance." -N.Y. Times

"Greatest play of our generation." - Daily Mail

Drama / 3m, 2f / Comp. Int. The first stage success from the author of Equus and Amadeus, this taut family drama centers on a young German student who, coming to England to tutor the daughter of well-to-do family is drawn into the various individual dramas of these fractured, isolated people. "A powerful and absorbing drama." - New York Post

Two pop singers, Frank and Tom, visit Sophie, a fortune-teller, for consultation. Frank says Tom is trying to lure away his girl; Tom says Frank's attitude rests on lies. Tom leaves Frank and reveals to Sophie the secret of his true relationship with his friend. Sophie herself reveals that her supposed high connections are lies. Lies surround the seedy trio.1 woman, 2 men

Self-consciously staging itself in the psychotherapy sessions of a disturbed young man, Peter Shaffer's Equus is a shocking exploration of the limits of faith, of the intersecting worlds of the sacred and profane, and of the paltry value of a 'mundane' life, published in Penguin Modern Classics. When a deranged boy, Alan Strang, blinds six horses with a metal spike he is sentenced to psychiatric treatment. Dr Dysart is the man given the task of uncovering what happened the night Strang committed his crime, but in doing so will open up his own wounds. Dysart struggles in secret to define sanity, to justify his marriage, to account for his career, and finds himself questioning the 'normality' of his way of life. Ultimately, he must ask himself: is it patient or psychiatrist whose life is being laid bare? The most shocking play of its day, Equus uses an act of violence to explore faith, insanity and how the materialism of modern life can destroy humanity's capacity for pain and passion. Peter Shaffer (b. 1926), born in Liverpool, is an English playwright. Among his plays are The Salt Land (1954), Equus (1973) which won Shaffer the 1975 Tony Award for Best Play, as well as the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and Amadeus (1979) which won the Evening Standard Drama Award and the Theatre Critics Award for the London production, as well as being adapted into a 1984 film starring F. Murray Abraham and Simon Callow. If you enjoyed Equus, you might like Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire, also available in Penguin Modern Classics. 'Sensationally good' Guardian 'A very important play' The New York Times

An explosive play that took critics and audiences by storm, Equus is Peter Shaffer's exploration of the way modern society has destroyed our ability to feel passion. Alan Strang is a disturbed youth whose dangerous obsession with horses leads him to commit an unspeakable act of violence. As psychiatrist Martin Dysart struggles to understand the motivation for Alan's brutality, he is increasingly drawn into Alan's web and eventually forced to question his own sanity. Equus is a timeless classic and a cornerstone of contemporary drama that delves into the darkest recesses of human existence.

The Tony Award-winning drama deals with a psychiatrist's exploration of the psyche of a troubled seventeen-year-old boy who senselessly and systematically blinds six horses.

"The Royal Hunt of the Sun" recreates the story of Francisco Pizarro's conquest of the Inca empire in Peru, with a group of only 167 men, in 1532. The play is an incisive and visually dazzling exposition of colonization in which cultural and religious clashes, driven by the promise of immense wealth, lead to betrayal, death and destruction. It is also a deeply moving exploration of personal honour and frailty as the ageing peasant from Trujillo, Pizarro, encounters the Sovereign Inca and Sun God, Atahuallpa. The combination of the historical and the personal gives rise to a play of enduring pleasure and interest. As Nicole Ridgway, the editor, indicates, Shaffer's play raises questions about literature and culture that are of continuing relevance to contemporary society. This new edition encourages students to experience the theatrical and thematic richness of the play and to grapple meaningfully with its issues by providing extensive support in the form of a comprehensive introduction and user-friendly annotations.; Designed to meet the needs of South African students, this edition is invaluable for students and teachers as it offers a stimulating and enjoyable approach to studying a dramatic text.

In the rich, humid air of sixteenth-century Peru, Atahuallpa, the Sun-God King, meets Pizarro the Conquistador, representative of the Spanish Empire at its most insatiable. While the Inca King is convinced of his own immortality, the Spaniard is cynical and greedy, leading to a collision of power and authority. Soon both men are locked in a struggle for survival; one of them must die and the survivor must face mortality, and the terrible truth of the world he lives in. Moving and atmospheric, The Royal Hunt of the Sun is an unforgettable drama of pride, empire and the conquest of bodies and souls.