Page 12 University Daily Kansan Wednesday, March 6, 1963
Publishers Also Look to Friends of the Drama
CLASSICAL GERMAN DRAMA,
translated by Theodore H. Lustig,
introduction by Victor Lange
(Bantam Classics, 75 cents); 19TH
CENTURY RUSSIAN DRAMA,
translated by Andrew MacAndrew,
introduction by Marc Slonim (Bantam
Classics, 75 cents).
These are two exceptionally worthwhile paperback volumes of plays, several of them not too common in anthologies. The German collection includes Lessing's "Nathan the Wise," Goethe's "Egmont," Schiller's "Mary Stuart," Kleist's "The Prince of Homburg" and Buchner's "Danton's Death."
The Russian plays are Pushkin's "The Stone Guest," Gogol's familiar "The Inspector General," Turgenev's "A Month in the Country," Ostrovsky's, "The Thunderstorm" and Tolstoy's "The Power of Darkness." Each volume has a distinctive cover and is well bound.
FOUR GREAT PLAYS, by Henrik Ibsen (Bantam Classics, 50 cents).
Reprinted and restyled in this exceptionally fine collection, with an introduction by John Gassner, this is an anthology that sets off Jensen well, and the introduction demonstrates the significance of the great Norwegian in both realism and symbolism.
The plays are "A Doll's House," "Ghosts," "An Enemy of the People" and "The Wild Duck." Though Ibsen's causes—woman's rights, an enlightened public, an awareness of veneerable disease and heredity—seem obvious and old-fashioned today, they were shocking in the eighties.
THREE PLAYS, by Thornton
Wilder (Bantam Classics, 60 cents)
Though his total dramatic product has not been extensive, Thornton Wilder has seldom failed. And here, in a reprint, are those warm, comic, extraordinarily perceptive plays that made his reputation.
Here in one volume are "Our Town," "The Skin of Our Teeth" and "The Matchmaker." Each of them, especially the first two, say much to us about our own selves and our civilization. "Our Town" has become part of our literary consciousness, and "The Skin of Our Teeth" is a play that reveals the fact that man, throughout the ages, has really changed little. "The Matchmaker" is, quite simply, one of the funniest things ever written.
THE CRUCIIBLE, by Arthur Miller (Bantam Classics, 50 cents).
This Miller play, though it had no substantial success on Broadway, has grown through the years. Europeans particularly have praised it, and its meaning builds with its success. Now it is available in a reissued paperback.
Miller's setting is Salem of witchcraft days. Besides being an excellent play of that period, it has contemporary relevance, for Miller wrote it in the darkest days of McCarthyism.
MAN AND SUPERMAN, by
Bernard Shaw (Penguin, 85 cents);
BACK TO METHUSELAIL, by
Bernard Shaw (Penguin, 81.25).
In these two volumes one may find two kinds of Shaw—superior and unsuccessful. This is not to say that unsuccessful Shaw is a failure; it is merely unsuccessful Shaw, "Man and Superman" is a consistently funny and penetrating story of the battle of the sexes; "Back to Methuselah" is an eventually unfortunate effort to deal with the question of immortality that absorbs so many writers.
Many readers know the story of "Man and Superman," of the pursuit of Tanner, "the revolutionist," by Ann, and of her eventual conquest of him. Many theatergoers know especially the use to which Act III was put in the famous "Don Juan in Hell" a few years ago.
"Back to Methuselah" seems quite unperformable. It starts with Adam and Eve and takes us far into the future, making sharp digs meanwhile at our society, but really failing to come to grips with the question of old age and whether it is really worth attaining.
THE WALTZ OF THE TOREADORS, by Jean Anouilh (Coward-McCann, $1.50); BECKET, by Jean Anouilh (Coward-McCann, $1.95).
Viewed either as theater or literature, here are two of the most rewarding plays of recent years. "The Waltz of the Toreadors" is a bitter, cynical, extremely funny story of an aging roué who has designs on an old love and whose wife is a screaming and bedridden (but only when she chooses to be) harridan.
"Becket" is the beautiful, emotional and disturbing story of Thomas Becket and Henry II and their strong affection for each other.
er, an affection that was destroyed when Becket decided to take seriously his appointment as archbishop and became a man of God rather than a stoope of the king.
THE ORESTES PLAYS OF AESCHYLUS, a new translation by Paul Roche (Mentor Classics, 75 cents).
Three plays make up this new paperback volume—"The Agamemon." "The Libation Bearers," and "The Eumenides." Besides these, there are production notes, a glossary, and a history of the Greek theater.
Paul Roche, the translator, suggests that these plays "must be read with relish. There is an unashamed sweep and range to the whole thing that will capture you and drag you along. . . . There is no better tonic for our poor little cellar-white psychologies than to be hurtled along by the gorgeous words of Aeschylus through sun, gusts, blood and mountains..."
PERIOD OF ADJUSTMENT, by Tennessee Williams (Signet, 50 cents).
The cover tells us that this play has become a movie, and doubtless you've seen it or heard about it by now. It's not at all typical Williams. It's a domestic comedy (a bit gamy, one must admit), with the expected southern and sexual overtones. Things are working out well at final curtain, and everyone has had a few laughs.
What's it about? A boy and girl who find that that first night of wedded bliss has scared them both silly, along with a hearse-like honeymoon car, an ugly motel room, and the need to adjust to each other. There is no Blanche Dubois, no Stanley Kowalski, no cannibalism, no incest, no castration. Not Williams, but not exactly Rachel Crothers either.
TWO FOR THE SEESAW and THE SEESAW LOG, by William Gibson (Bantam. 50 cents).
This reviewer knows of nothing comparable to the intricate examination of himself and others that William Gibson has made in his "Seesaw Log." The book is the story of how "Two for the Seesaw" made it to Broadway. After one finishes Gibson's perceptive and amusing account he can read the
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Professor of Chemistry, Columbia U.
and JEROME L. ROSENBERG,
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play itself, and perhaps read it with more discernment than he otherwise would have had.
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Kansas Union Book Store
He tells about obtaining Fred Coe and Arthur Penn as producer and director, respectively, about finding a Hollywood castoff named Anne Bancroft to portray the Jewish gal from the Bronx, Gittel Mosca, and about what in retrospect looks like a blunder, the signing of a big name, Henry Fonda, to play Jerry Ryan, the square from Nebraska.
including 2700 solved problems By BARNETT RICH, Ph.D., Brooklyn Technical H.S.
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By FRANK AYRES, Jr., Ph.D.
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Blunder because Fonda becomes the villain of the piece, in a sense. He hated the play right from the start and got out of it as soon as he could. We see writer, director, producer and two stars through the Washington and Philadelphia try-out runs, working the play over, trying to beef up the part of the man, and then opening in New York for the critical running of the gauntlet.
STORIES FOR THE SIXTIES,
edited by Richard Yates (Bantam,
75 cents); 20TH CENTURY RUSSI-
AN DRAMA, edited and translated
by Andrew MacAndrew
(Bantam, 75 cents); MEDIVAL
AND TUDOR DRAMA, edited by
John Gassner (Bantam, 75 cents).
As the paperback publishers use up all emerging writing with the gluttony of television, they are forced to turn to all kinds of sources to keep readers and bookstores happy. Note these three new
"Stories for the Sixties" is a compilation of never-before-published authors. So the names of the writers will mean little to most readers, though the stories themselves were the best contributions in the Esquire-Bantam short story contest. The prize-winners are Samuel Reilfer's "Two Semesters at Wagner's Inn," George Cuomo's "A Part of the Bargain," and Robert Cairns' "Solitary Bugler."
Bantam volumes. All have merit.
None is routine.
The third of these new paperbacks is a kind of curiosity. It really goes back, to offer plays that leaned on the classic heritage, plays of the Christian mummers and the ritual beginnings of Christianity, the English passion play and the Cornish passion play, "Everyman," and finally Tudor comedy and tragedy by Nicholas Udall, Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville.
"20 CENTURY RUSSIAN Drama" has at least three plays that are standard: Chekhov's "The Three Sisters," Gorky's "The Lower Depths," and Andreyev's "He Who Gets Slapped." These commonly appear in anthologies. The others are Mayakovsky's "The Bathouse" and Olesha's "A List of Assets." These last two are post-revolution entries. And like the work of Sholokhov and Pasternak they show that literature has not been dormant — nor necessarily constricted — since the coming of communism.
New titles in Indiana's quality paperback series
Vergil's Aeneid
MIDLAND BOOKS
Translated, introduction, notes by LR. Lind, Chairman, Department of Classics and Classical Archeology, University of Kansas. A new, truly modern translation which avoids, however, the unwarranted liberties of other contemporary versions and faithfully renders the narrative, language and verse structure of the original. (MB-45) 352 pages. April. (Cloth $7.75) $1.95
An Introduction to the Greek Theatre
From the Foreword by H.D.F. Kitto: "Can be warmly commended . . . It gives the reader of the plays just what he needs, and what he will not easily find elsewhere." (MB-42) 256 pages, illus. 80-45
Reflections on the Death of a Porcupine
Philosophical essays, in which Lawrence develops his creed on life and love. (MB-A3) 250 pages. $1.93
The Three Worlds of Boris Pasternak
By Robert Fayne
Provides a wealth of biographical detail, critical evaluations of his writings and a brief collection of his best verse.
(MB-A4) 220 pages, illus. $1.95
SELECTED MODERN CRITICISM
Essays on the Odyssey
Edited by Charles H. Taylor, Jr.
Seven distinguished articles explore the most notable features of the Odyssey, (MB-46) 276 pages, April, (Cloth $6.00) $1.95
The Living Thoughts of Kierkegaard
Presented by W.H. Auden
The most significant passages from Kierkegaard's great works.
(MB-47) 225 pages. April.
$1.95
New POETRY PAPERBACK
Coming of Age
NEW AND SELECTED POEMS
By Babette Deutsch
Includes work from volumes published before 1954, more recent poems, and translations from Villon, Rilke, Pasternak, and others.
(PPB:17) 160 pages. $1.75
A complete selection of MIDLAND BOOKS and POETRY PAPERBACKS is available at your Union Book Store.
INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS Bloomington