The Black Monk And The Dog Problem

The Black Monk has been called a singular "collaboration" between two writers: Anton Chekhov and David Rabe. Based on Chekov's novella of the same name, Rabe's brilliant stage adaptation tells the story of Kovrin, the young philosophy student who returns from Moscow to the estate owned by Pesotsky, where he spent his youth. Kovrin and Pesotsky's daughter, Tanya, soon fall in love and plan to marry. But the appearance of an emissary from the unknown -- the black monk -- threatens to have a devastating effect on all of them. Trouble starts in when Teresa tells her brother Joey that this guy Ray did something to her with his dog in bed. Nobody seems to know exactly what happened, but they do know that somebody's got to pay. So what is The Dog Problem? It starts with being born into a world where the wrong thing said to the wrong person ignites a chain reaction of misplaced passions and galloping sentences that race to a deadly conclusion. The playful title is revealed to be a wry pun on the Cartesian mind/body problem, as Uncle Mal, the aging mobster, must face his turn to be the dog in this darkly funny play about men, women, sex, betrayal, and ghosts. Vastly different in their aesthetic, these two recent and highly praised plays embody all of the celebrated hallmarks of David Rabe's writing and art: unflinchingly honest and perceptive themes, starkly luminous dialogue, and the unsettling humor that have made him an icon of the American theater for more than forty years.

Kovrin arrives at Pesotsky's estate, where he spent his childhood, to find the orchard filled with smoke and threatened by frost. When dawn arrives, the orchard is saved and, in the following weeks, Kovrin finds joy away from the demands of city and university life, begins to see Pesotsky's daughter Tanya in a new light, and becomes aware that Pesotsky is troubled about the survival of his magnificent gardens. He remains tormented by a subtle, original idea. An emissary from the unknown, the legendary Black Monk, appears to Kovrin, bringing opportunies and risks from invisible realms into the concrete world. While love makes certain claims in uncertain ways, Kovrin, Pesotsky and Tanya face choices that have consequences beyond the desired and foreseen.

Two plays exploring the struggle of mental illness by the Tony Award–winning “giant of American theater” and author of Hurlyburly (Chicago Tribune). Good for Otto, which premiered in October 2015 at the Gift Theatre in Chicago, is a “sprawling drama of mental illness” in which “Mr. Rabe digs into his subject with a depth that almost feels bottomless.” Drawing on material from Undoing Depression by psychotherapist Richard O’Connor, it explores the lives of a therapist and his many patients, all trying to navigate personal trauma (Charles Isherwood, The New York Times). Visiting Edna, which premiered in September 2016 at the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, is a drama of “deeply searing power” about the bond between mother and son. As Edna faces a short future plagued by her many illnesses—and a cancer that looms so large it becomes another character—she and her adult son struggle to communicate about their shared past as they contemplate the future (Variety). Taken together, the plays offer a satisfying glimpse into “Rabe’s theatrical universe . . . at once vivid and mysterious, a pageant and a puzzle” of contemporary American life (John Lahr, The New Yorker). “Many would list [Rabe] among the very greatest of living playwrights.” —Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune

Historical Dictionary of the Contemporary American Theater, Second Edition contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has more than 1.000 cross-referenced entries on plays, playwrights, directors, designers, actors, critics, producers, theaters, and terminology.

In these disquieting tales of confronting the past, the author and playwright showcases his “keen ear for how people talk, think, and behave” (Publishers Weekly). Listening for Ghosts collects some of David Rabe’s most compelling short fiction of the past few years, including three stories that appeared in the New Yorker. In “Things We Worried About When I Was Ten,” a group of seemingly carefree Midwestern boys are revealed to be egregiously uncared for by their parents. “The Longer Grief” is a slow-motion explosion, as one moment in time propels shards of reckoning through the shared history of a brother and sister. In “Uncle Jim Called,” a man cooking stir fry answers a phone call from the dead . “Suffocation Theory” slyly depicts our off-kilter and increasingly apocalyptic world. In the novella, I Have to Tell You, the elderly tenants of a Midwestern apartment complex seek fairness from a conniving landlord. When an emergency stay in the hospital brings a near-octogenarian named Emma face-to-face with looming injustice, she finds herself burdened with two mysteries to solve. She may never get to the bottom of them, but she is determined to do all she can. Also included are “Things We Worried About When I Was Ten,” which won the 2021 O. Henry Prize, and “The Longer Grief,” which won first prize in the 2019 Narrative Story Contest.

Contains the scripts of nine significant plays of the modern theater, written between 1944 and 1975 by playwrights including Harold Pinter, Bertolt Brecht, Samuel Beckett, Friedrich Durrenmatt, Jean Genet, Eugene Ionesco, Slawomir Mrozek, Tom Stoppard, and David Mamet.

A tale traversing a single day in small-town Iowa finds recent divorcee Janet's quest for solitude interrupted by an elderly widow who claims she is going to be "delivered to Rapture" that evening and hopes that Janet will care for her pets. By the playwright of Hurlyburly. 35,000 first printing.

The Decades of Modern American Drama series provides a comprehensive survey and study of the theatre produced in each decade from the 1930s to 2009 in eight volumes. Each volume equips readers with a detailed understanding of the context from which work emerged: an introduction considers life in the decade with a focus on domestic life and conditions, social changes, culture, media, technology, industry and political events; while a chapter on the theatre of the decade offers a wide-ranging and thorough survey of theatres, companies, dramatists, new movements and developments in response to the economic and political conditions of the day. The work of the four most prominent playwrights from the decade receives in-depth analysis and re-evaluation by a team of experts, together with commentary on their subsequent work and legacy. A final section brings together original documents such as interviews with the playwrights and with directors, drafts of play scenes, and other previously unpublished material. The major playwrights and their works to receive in-depth coverage in this volume include: * David Rabe: The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel; Sticks and Bones; and Streamers; * Sam Shepard: Curse of the Starving Class; Buried Child; and True West; * Ntozake Shange: For colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf; Spell #7; and Boogie-Woogie Landscapes * Richard Foreman: Sophia = (Wisdom) Part 3; The Cliffs; Pandering to the Masses: A Misrepresentation; and Rhoda in Potatoland (Her Fall-Starts).