Three Great Plays

Part of the 'Penguin Active Reading' series, this book provides a range of integrated activities designed to develop reading skills and consolidate vocabulary, and offers personalised project work.

An important trio of plays by one of America's greatest playwrights: The Emperor Jones, a forceful psychological portrayal of brute power; The Hairy Ape, combining elements of class struggle and surreal tragedy; and Anna Christie.

This classic has been simplified, the vocabulary controlled to a level of approximately 1300 words, and the sentence structures chosen with care for this pre-intermediate stage. The introduction gives information on the author and story, and exercises for comprehension and discussion are included.

These are three of Shakespeare's greatest, and most tragic, plays. In each story, the main characters die; cruel Lord MacBeth, unhappy King Lear, and the doomed lovers, Romeo and Juliet. They die because they, or others, are weak, greedy or very foolish. But, like real people, they have good qualities and moments of greatness too. From p. 4 of cover.

Lope de Vega (1562-1635), widely regarded as the architect of the drama of the Spanish Golden Age, was known by his contemporaries as the `monster of Nature' on account of his creativity as a playwright. Claiming to have written more than a thousand plays, he created plots and characters notable for their energy, inventiveness and dramatic power, and which, in contrast to French classical drama, combine the serious and the comic in their desire to imitate life. Fuente Ovejuna, based on Spanish history, and revealing how tyranny leads to rebelliion, is perhaps his best-known play. The Knight from Olmedo is a moving dramatization of impetuous and youthful passion which ends in death. Punishment without Revenge, Lope's most powerful tragedy, centres on the illicit relationship of a young wife with her stepson and the revenge of a dishonoured husband. These three plays, grouped here in translations which are faithful to the original Spanish, vivid and intended for performance, embody the very best of Lope's dramatic art. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Three of the greatest plays in American literature collected in one volume This important new omnibus edition features an illuminating foreword by playwright John Guare and an extensive afterword for each play drawing on unpublished letters and other unique documentary material prepared by Tappan Wilder. Our Town—Wilder's timeless 1938 Pulitzer Prize-winning look at love, death, and destiny is celebrated around the world and performed at least once each day in the United States. The Skin of our Teeth—Wilder's 1942 romp about human follies and human endurance starring the Antrobus family of Excelsior, New Jersey. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1943. The Matchmaker—Wilder's brilliant 1954 farce about money and love starring that irrepressible busybody Dolly Gallagher Levi. This play inspired the Broadway musical Hello, Dolly!.

A little boy drums up quite a procession.

The most famous Russian authors Chekhov, Gogol, Tolstoy wrote not only voluminous novels (or short stories) but also plays for theater. Most of them retain their relevance and are staged the world over to this day. This book contains Three Classic Russian Plays you need to read: The Three Sisters, The Inspector-General, The Power of Darkness.