LITMIR.BIZ

Eugene O'Neill's 1922 Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, «Anna Christie,» is the story of a young woman who following an illness decides to visit and spend some time with her father, a coal barge captain who she hardly knows. During this time she meets a sailor, Mat, who is looking to settle down, and the two fall in love. «Anna Christie» is a gripping drama of a woman torn between the expectations of two men, her father and her lover, and the shocking confession of her past life that this conflict evokes.

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First staged in 1906, «The Doctor's Dilemma» is a play that revolves around a community of doctors, most specializing, unbeknownst to them, in different types of expensive, fraudulent treatments. Dr. Ridgeon, who has actually discovered a vaccine for tuberculosis, is conflicted about administering his limited remedy, for the husband of a woman he is in love with can pay, but his kind yet poverty-stricken colleague Dr. Blenkinsop cannot. Shaw's drama highlights the medical predicament of his day, that of treating patients with unnecessary practices to earn a living. A well-written, verbose play characteristic of Shaw, «The Doctor's Dilemma» still resonates with today's audience because of its thoughtful commentary on the continuing problem of providing adequate healthcare to the poor.

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Considered by many critics as Ibsen's masterpiece, «Rosmersholm» is the story of Johannes Rosmer, a former clergyman and owner of the title estate Rosmersholm. When Rosmer intends to use his position in the community to help the newly elected reformist government his ruling-class brethren turn against him. A series of tragic consequences ensue in this classic drama of social and political change.

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Oscar Wilde's classic drama, «An Ideal Husband,» is the story of an up-and-coming politician with a secret past and the blackmail scheme to keep that secret quiet. Wilde's play is a first-rate comedy that challenges its audience with the basic theme of morality and the greater standard that seems to fall upon those individuals in the public eye.

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Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) was a man with many roles. He was not only a playwright and poet, he was also a Whig Member of the British House of Commons and owner of the London Theatre Royal on Drury Lane. Though born in Ireland, Sheridan and his family moved outside of London when he was seven. Both of his parents were theatrical influences for him, as his mother was a playwright and novelist, and his father was at one time an actor. In 1722, the character of Sheridan's intended fiancé was challenged by Captain Thomas Mathews. The result was two duels, the first left both parties unscathed, while the second resulted in bloodshed, though Sheridan was the resounding winner. «The Duenna» was first performed in 1775 and was even deemed «the best opera ever written» by Lord Byron. It was a group effort between Sheridan, his father-in-law Thomas Linley the elder, an expert composer, and brother-in-law Thomas Linley the younger.

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The four plays in this collection are a representative collection of dramas that exhibits the development of the Jacobean era revenge play. In «The Spanish Tragedy» we find the aftermath of a conflict between the Viceroy of Portugal and the Spanish empire. The death of Spanish officer Andrea prompts Horatio, Andrea's best friend, and Bel-imperia, who was in love with Andrea against her family's wishes, to seek revenge against Andrea's murderer, Balthazar, the Viceroy's son. «The Revenger's Tragedy» follows the young son of an Italian duke through his attempt to revenge the death of an elder through the rape of the beautiful Gloriana. «The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois» concerns the story of Clermont D'Ambois whose brother Bussy has been gunned down in an ambush. Clermont becomes involved in a relationship with Tamyra, Bussy's former lover, who urges Clermont to take vengeance on her husband Montsurry, who is responsible for Bussy's murder. In «The Atheist's Tragedy» we find the story of D'Amville, a wealthy French nobleman and our titular atheist. D'Amville is a cynical, ruthless, and Machiavellian character who conspires to have his brother, the Baron Montferrers, killed and ruin his nephew, Charlemont, in order to gain the son's inheritance.

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John Webster's «The Duchess of Malfi» is a macabre and tragic play written between 1612 and 1613. Misuse of power, revenge, deception, cruelty, and corruption are among the many themes that run throughout this work. The work is set in the court of Malfi, in reality Amalfi in Italy, and concerns the story of the titular Duchess who is recently widowed and falls in love with Antonio, a lowly steward. However the Duchess' family, wishing her to not split up her inheritance, forbids the union. Also included in this volume are three other plays by John Webster. «The White Devil» is a revenge tragedy loosely based on the murder of Vittoria Accoramboni in Padua on December 22, 1585. «The Devil's Law Case» is the story of Romelio, a prominent merchant of Naples, and Contarino, a young nobleman indebted to the merchant, who hopes to marry Romelio's sister Jolenta. Lastly in «A Cure for a Cuckold» we have a work co-authored by John Webster and William Rowley. The story takes place at the wedding of Justice Woodroff's daughter Annabel with her suitor Bonvile, whose wedding night is interrupted when Bonvile's friend Lessingham asks Bonvile to second him in a duel. This collection brings together the best works of English Jacobean dramatist and Shakespearean contemporary John Webster.

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"The Iphigenia in Tauris is not in the modern sense a tragedy; it is a romantic play, beginning in a tragic atmosphere and moving through perils and escapes to a happy end. To the archaeologist the cause of this lies in the ritual on which the play is based. All Greek tragedies that we know have as their nucleus something which the Greeks called an Aition-a cause or origin. They all explain some ritual or observance or commemorate some great event." So begins the preface to «Iphigenia in Tauris» by Euripides as translated and prefaced by Gilbert Murray.

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"Little Eyolf", is the story of its title character, a young boy who is paralyzed in one leg, and his family, the Allmers. At the outset of the play we find Eyolf's father Alfred returning from a trip in the mountains where he has decided to abandon work on his book and focus on raising his son. The tragic irony of this newly found yet seemingly empty devotion is exhibited when Eyolf disappears unnoticed with the Rat-Wife, a woman capable of enchanting rodents into following her into the sea. Written in 1894 and first performed the following year, «Little Eyolf» is one of Ibsen's classic and tragic dramas.

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William Butler Yeats was born near Dublin in 1865, and was encouraged from a young age to pursue a life in the arts. He attended art school for a short while, but soon found that his talents and interest lay in poetry rather than painting. He came to prominence during a tumultuous period in Irish history, when he struggled with the idea of an independent Irish identity. Yeats dealt constantly with the contradictions he felt in his nature and in life, and spent much of his life seeking out a philosophical system to resolve this conflict. The first edition of «The Countess Cathleen» appeared in 1892, but underwent several revisions over the next thirty years as Yeats' vision of poetry and theatre evolved. The protagonist, Cathleen O'Shea, must choose between acting for the good of others or in her own personal interests, while weighing the suggestions of various allegorical characters.

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