In James Goldman’s classic play The Lion in Winter, domestic turmoil rises to an art form. Keenly self-aware and motivated as much by spite as by any sense of duty, Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine maneuver against each other to position their favorite son in line for succession. By imagining the inner lives of Henry, Eleanor, and their sons, John, Geoffrey, and Richard, Goldman created the quintessential drama of family strife and competing ambitions, a work that gives visceral, modern-day relevance to the intrigues of Angevin England. Combining keen historical and psychological insight with delicious, mordant wit, the stage play has become a touchstone of today’s theater scene, and Goldman’s screenplay for the 1968 film adaptation won him an Academy Award. Told in “marvelously articulate language, with humor that bristles and burns” (Los Angeles Times), The Lion in Winter is the rare play that bursts into life on the printed page.

    That current is best identified by its catch-labels--Theater of the Absurd, Black Comedy, the Theater of Cruelty--which is to say the theater of alienation, of moral anarchy and despair. To the practitioners of those philosophies Man of La Mancha must seem hopelessly naive in its espousal of illusion as man's strongest spiritual need, the most meaningful function of his imagination. But I've no unhappiness about that. "Facts are the enemy of truth," says Cervantes-Don Quixote. And that is precisely what I felt and meant."--Dale Wasserman, from the Preface.

    Susy Hendrix, a blind Greenwich Village housewife, is terrorized by a trio of men looking for heroin they believe her husband has hidden in a doll.

    Echoes of Waiting for Godot resound, reality and illusion mix, and where fate leads heroes to a tragic but inevitable end.

    They are humanity, wayward saints all, who are far from home and without means. A nobleman may be their salvation if they can put on a good show for him. Surprisingly, the Company chooses to present the history of man, from the Garden of Eden through Everyman in birth, adolescence, marriage and death. Along the way they enact other wayward adventures such as the assassination of Julius Caesar and the homecoming of Odysseus. It is a fine mosaic of life redeemed by humor and human understanding."Has something to say [and] says it extremely well. It is darned good theatre." - Arthur Ballet, U. of Minnesota"The first part is amusing slapstick entertainment...[The second makes] a point about how pride and arrogance destroy collective efforts." - Hollywood Reporter

    This is a collection of Yoruba verse plays.

    Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.This adaptation of the classic Greek trilogy is designed for contemporary stage presentation and is the version to be used by the Minnesota Theatre Company or its production of the work at the Tyrone Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis. The volume provides the texts of the three plays, Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Furies, and, in addition, a director’s introduction by Sir Tyrone Guthrie and an adapter’s introduction by John Lewin.In his introduction, Guthrie points out that fidelity neither to the literal meaning of the original nor to the distinctive spirit of the Oresteia is necessarily the supreme virtue for a stage version of this work. In performance, he explains, the music of verse is almost as important in conveying its meaning as is the syntax, and thus this version, The House of Atreus, with its simple and lyrical choruses, has been created to provide an interesting and vivid dramatic vehicle.In a perceptive and illuminating discussion of the plays in his introduction, John Lewin demonstrates the need for the kinds of changes he has made in the scripts.