Two Sisters And A Piano And Other Plays
$11.6
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Two Sisters And A Piano And Other Plays
Description not available.
Drama
Where Do We Live And Other Plays
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Where Do We Live And Other Plays
Description not available.
Drama
Measure For Measure
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Measure For Measure
Written in 1604 when James I--a king particularly concerned with the religious aspects of his leadership--was fresh on the throne, MEASURE FOR MEASURE is a reflection of its time. In it, a sovereign's role in the legislation of morality is explored, as two extreme poles of government are navigated--the Duke's over-leniency as the play opens, and his deputy's rigid judgement that precipitates the tragicomedy. When the Duke realizes that his rule is too lax, he appoints his deputy Angelo to reinforce authority. However, forgiveness, a Christian virtue and therefore an implied virtue of the play's Christian government, is not a characteristic of Angelo, who, reviving an old morality law,
condemns Claudio to death for impregnating Juliet.
The dilemma of the drama is presented when Claudio's sister Isabella leaves the cloister of the convent to plead for Claudio's freedom. Scandalously, Angelo agrees to free Claudio if Isabella will sleep with him. An estranged wife, a bed trick, and a subplot concerning a pimp present further complications, but ultimately lighten the atmosphere to lead a tragic drama toward a comic resolution. Shakespeare drew on many sources that were themselves inspired by a real 16th-century event in which an Italian man who was condemned to death was promised freedom after his wife accepted a sexual proposition from the judge in exchange. The first records of performance point to December 26, 1604. The next documentation recalls a performance one hundred years later. Though records certainly get destroyed, such scant evidence indeed suggests poor public reception of the play. MEASURE FOR MEASURE was the last of Shakespeare's comedies, and intense tragic material surfaces in it that is fully developed in the plays to come, including OTHELLO, KING LEAR, and MACBETH.
Drama
Romeo and Juliet
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Romeo and Juliet
Set during five of the most intensely dramatic days ever portrayed, ROMEO AND JULIET was probably written in 1594 or 1595, and first published in a 1597 edition, as transcribed by actors who had performed it. Other editions appeared later, but even the more authoritative versions, such as that of 1599--probably drawn from Shakespeare's own manuscript copies--lack the detailed stage directions present in the actors' transcription; thus, modern editions incorporate several sources. ROMEO AND JULIET is among the most oft performed of Shakespeare's works, and it has been among the most beloved since its earliest days on the stage. Though the title page of the 1597 edition declares that ROMEO AND JULIET had been performed and enjoyed many times prior to its publication, the first extant direct record of the events of a production refer to a 1662 staging, in which the play was probably adapted or altered--adaption was particularly popular in the 17th century. One London stage ran different conclusions on alternative nights; audiences who went home glum on Friday could be uplifted by the play's ending if they returned on Saturday night. The story of ROMEO AND JULIET was derived by Shakespeare from many sources. The version most contemporary to his own was the 1562 poem The Tragicall History of Romeus and Iuliet by Arthur Brooke, which itself was an adaptation of a French piece by Pierre Boaistuau, which Boaistuau had adapted from the Italian. Indeed, aspects of the tragic story have recurred throughout Western literature since at least the third century. Shakespeare greatly intensified the pace by compressing a piece which had unfolded over the course of several months into the space of five days--a period in which much transpires at daybreak, including the famous balcony scene where Romeo declares, But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?/It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. Romeo is forced to approach Juliet in secret because of the impassioned rivalry bet...
Drama
Julius Caesar
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Julius Caesar
Presents the original text of Shakespeare's play side by side with a modern version, discusses the author and the theater of his time, and provides quizzes and other study activities.
Drama
As You Like It
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As You Like It
One of Shakespeare's early plays, written in 1598 or 1599, AS YOU LIKE IT is in many ways a typical Elizabethan romantic comedy, but it is also a satire in which Shakespeare ridicules many of the courtly-love conventions that were still current in his day: love as a disease, for example, and the lover as slave to his imperious mistress. In AS YOU LIKE IT, when these notions rear their heads, they are presented as silly absurdities. Orlando is in thrall to Rosalind, the simple shepherd Silvius is put through mental tortures by Phoebe--but ridiculing such formulaic excesses (Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love) and keeping the play grounded in reality, Shakespeare reminds his audience that true love can bring happiness and is a force for good. In Jaques's famously acerbic soliloquy on the stages of a man's life (which end in a second childhood followed by oblivion), he speaks of the naturalness and inevitability of change--and as the characters in AS YOU LIKE IT enter the Forest of Arden, they undergo changes that will ultimately lead to a transformation in their attitudes. Embittered men are reunited with the brothers they loathed, the rightful Duke is returned to his throne, and four absurdly warring couples are reconciled. The forest provides--as it does in many plays of the period--a pastoral interval in which the characters come to their senses and return to the city better people. In the course of the play, despite its light-hearted tone, Shakespeare does tackle some difficult questions involving love, aging, nature, and the coming of death.
Drama
Much Ado About Nothing
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Much Ado About Nothing
Presents the comedy of two couples who are happily united with the help of bumbling Constable Dogberry. Includes commentary on each page of the text.
Drama
Hamlet
$11.5
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Hamlet
Shakespeare's classic tragedy of love, madness, and revenge was first enacted in London in 1602. Young Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, is in mourning for his dead father, is visited by his father's ghost telling him that he was murdered by his own brother, Claudius, who then assumed the throne and married Hamlet's mother, Gertrude. Intent on revenge, Hamlet feigns madness and plots to kill Claudius. When he accidentally stabs Polonius, Claudius's counselor, Hamlet is sent into exile--and Polonius's
daughter, Ophelia, who had been in love with Hamlet, goes mad from grief and drowns herself. In the climax of the play, old scores are settled at last, and Hamlet's speaks his famous last words: The rest is silence. Considered one of Shakespeare's greatest plays, HAMLET is part of the well-established tradition of revenge tragedies that were popular at the end of the Elizabethan era, but the play transcends all its influences in its examination of justice and duty, and as a subtle portrait of a sensitive young man torn between righteous revenge and his duty as a moral man.
Drama
Hamlet
$11.35
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Hamlet
Shakespeare's classic tragedy of love, madness, and revenge was first enacted in London in 1602. Young Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, is in mourning for his dead father, is visited by his father's ghost telling him that he was murdered by his own brother, Claudius, who then assumed the throne and married Hamlet's mother, Gertrude. Intent on revenge, Hamlet feigns madness and plots to kill Claudius. When he accidentally stabs Polonius, Claudius's counselor, Hamlet is sent into exile--and Polonius's
daughter, Ophelia, who had been in love with Hamlet, goes mad from grief and drowns herself. In the climax of the play, old scores are settled at last, and Hamlet's speaks his famous last words: The rest is silence. Considered one of Shakespeare's greatest plays, HAMLET is part of the well-established tradition of revenge tragedies that were popular at the end of the Elizabethan era, but the play transcends all its influences in its examination of justice and duty, and as a subtle portrait of a sensitive young man torn between righteous revenge and his duty as a moral man.
Drama
The Best Men`s Stage Monologues 2005
$11.35
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The Best Men`s Stage Monologues 2005
Description not available.
Drama