The Pocket Guide To Plays Playwrights

Everything you need to know about plays and playwrights in one handy guide by leading expert Maureen Hughes who has had one of her 8 musicals produced in the West End and teaches musical theater. Covering everything from the top playwrights through the centuries to a comprehensive A-Z listing of plays from around the world. Accessibility is a key selling point with factboxes highlighting key or curious facts about the subject.

The one-act play stands apart as a distinct art form with some well known writers providing specialist material, among them Bernard Shaw, Tom Stoppard, Harold Pinter, Caryl Churchill. Alan Ayckbourn, Edward Albee and Tennesee Williams. There are also lesser-known writers with plenty of material to offer, yet sourcing one-act plays to perform is notoriously hard. This companion is the first book to survey the work of over 250 playwrights in an illuminating A-Z guide. Multiple styles, nationalities and periods are covered, offering a treasure trove of compelling moments of theatre waiting to be discovered. Guidance on performing and staging one-act plays is also covered as well as essential contact information and where to apply for performance rights. A chapter introducing the history of the one-act play rounds off the title as a definitive guide.

Playwrights.

Everything you need to know about classic literature in one handy guide by lecturer Maureen Hughes. Covering everything from the authors to the plays themselves and their common themes, accessibility is a key selling point with factboxes highlighting key or curious facts about the subject. Its size makes it the perfect stocking filler for the Christmas market or at anytime of the year for those wanting more information about what theyre reading or studying in a handy, pocket-sized guide.

We were going to call this a Pocket Guide to Noble Scandals but theres nothing noble about these aristocrats. Tales of greed, list, murder and mayhem litter the pages of Andy Hughes must-read book. Whether its gambling away their familys fortune, writing racy poems and shocking decent people, the aristocracy have been at the center of scandals for centuries, abusing their position of power to take advantage of everyone else or kill those who get in their way. This Pocket Guide to Scandals in the Aristocracy is a race through history, divided into eras to introduce the best and worst scurrilous tales from Francis Lovell being bricked up alive in his stately home to the ongoing mystery of Lord Lucan and delicious (but true) gossip which delighted readers when the aristocrats were thinly disguised in the novels of their day. Bring history alive with this fact-filled guide.Youll also love: The Pocket Guide to Royal Scandals and The Pocket Guide to Political Scandals, both by Andy Hughes

A fact-filled reference for discovering, and learning more about, the literary greats of the nineteenth century. The Victorian era produced many famous writers and poets, including Dickens, Thackeray, H.G. Wells, and Tennyson. Magazines like The Strand launched famous creations such as Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, whose cliffhanger stories were told in part-works to add to the excitement. And the poetry was epic—Tennyson’s Morte d’Arthur and The Lady of Shalott tapped into the Pre-Raphaelite style so popular in the art of the day. In this guide, Russell James has explored the role of the Victorian writer and their genres, from Dickens’s desire to correct social wrongs and expose poverty to H.G. Wells’s desire to escape the modern world. The responsibility of the Victorian poet is also revealed from romantic declaration and escapism to heroism and historical commemorations—would modern generations know about the Charge of the Light Brigade if Tennyson hadn’t immortalized it? Together with A–Zs of writers and poets, this is a must-read book for everyone who loves good writing and wants to discover more.

Stephen Unwin's A Guide to the Plays of Bertolt Brecht is an indispensable, comprehensive and highly readable companion to the dramatic work of this challenging and rewarding writer. Besides providing detailed accounts of nineteen key plays, it explores their context and Brecht's dramatic theory to equip readers with a rich understanding of how Brecht's work was shaped by his times and by his evolving thinking about the function of theatre. Bertolt Brecht's work as a director, his critical and theoretical writing, and above all the remarkable plays that emerged from one of the most turbulent periods in history have had a profound and lasting influence on theatre. Central to theatre studies courses and whose plays are frequently revived on stage, Brecht is nevertheless perceived as a difficult writer. This companion is divided into two sections: the first seven chapters outline the tumultuous historical, cultural and theatrical context of Brecht's work. They explore his theatrical theory and provide an account of his approach to staging his plays which informs an understanding of how they work in practice. The second section provides an analysis of nineteen plays in six chronological groupings, each prefaced by a brief sketch of Brecht's life and theatrical development in that period. For each play, Stephen Unwin offers a synopsis, a critical commentary and an account of the work in performance. The book concludes with an examination of Brecht's legacy and a chronicle of his life and times. Written by experienced theatre director Stephen Unwin, this is the perfect companion to Brecht's plays and life for student and theatre practitioner alike.

A must-have guide to the scandalous behavior of politicians around the world. Andy Hughes’s fascinating book guides us through centuries of political abuse—and just plain stupidity. This pocket guide exposes the secret side of politics, including politicians who risked or ruined their own careers for personal gain. Stories include the MP who liked to party hard and be whipped even harder; the prime minister and his hookers; expenses claims for manure; and the US president who called for all gay men to be castrated. Politicians have mixed scandal with eggs, adult movies, helicopters, drugs, shoes, beef burgers, public toilets, mobile phones, rape, turkeys, orgies, and even ice cream. And it’s not just today’s politicians who are embroiled with scandal. This explosive book reveals the questionable behavior of politicians of yesteryear from around the world.