Drama Books

Actus Primus. Scena Prima. Enter Dinant, a[n]d Cleremont. Din. Disswade me not. Clere. It will breed a brawl. Din. I care not, I wear a Sword. Cler. And wear discretion with it,Or cast it off, let that direct your arm,'Tis madness else, not valour, and more baseThan to receive a wrong. Din. Why would you have meSit down with a disgrace, and thank the doer?We are not Stoicks, and that passive... more...

THE FIRST ACT At Baden, near Vienna, in 1830. The drawing-room of the villa occupied by Maria Louisa. The walls are painted al fresco in bright colors. The frieze is decorated with a design of sphinxes. At the back, between two other windows, a window reaching to the ground and forming the entrance from the garden. Beyond, the balustrade of the terrace leading into the garden; a glimpse of lindens and... more...

INTRODUCTION This is the first of the series of three Comedies—'The Acharnians,' 'Peace' and 'Lysistrata'—produced at intervals of years, the sixth, tenth and twenty-first of the Peloponnesian War, and impressing on the Athenian people the miseries and disasters due to it and to the scoundrels who by their selfish and reckless policy had provoked it, the consequent... more...

August Strindberg died at Stockholm On May 14, 1912, just ten days after the first of his plays given in English in the United States had completed a month's engagement. This play was "The Father," which, on April 9, 1912, was produced at the Berkeley Theatre in New York, the same little theatre that witnessed in 1894 the first performance in this country of Ibsen's "Ghosts."... more...

INTRODUCTION THE greatest of English dramatists except Shakespeare, the first literary dictator and poet-laureate, a writer of verse, prose, satire, and criticism who most potently of all the men of his time affected the subsequent course of English letters: such was Ben Jonson, and as such his strong personality assumes an interest to us almost unparalleled, at least in his age. Ben Jonson came of the... more...

ACT I. I. 1 Scene I. Enter Duke, , Gaoler, , and other Attendants. Æge. Proceed, , to procure my fall, And by the doom of death end woes and all. Duke. Merchant of Syracusa, plead no more; I am not partial to infringe our laws: The enmity and discord which of late 5 Sprung from the rancorous outrage of your duke To merchants, our well-dealing countrymen, Who, wanting guilders to redeem their lives,... more...

ACT I It is half-past nine of a July evening. In a dining-roomlighted by sconces, and apparelled in wall-paper, carpet, andcurtains of deep vivid blue, the large French windows betweentwo columns are open on to a wide terrace, beyond which are seentrees in darkness, and distant shapes of lighted houses. On oneside is a bay window, over which curtains are partly drawn.Opposite to this window is a door... more...

A DOLL'S HOUSE ACT I (SCENE.—A room furnished comfortably and tastefully, but not extravagantly. At the back, a door to the right leads to the entrance-hall, another to the left leads to Helmer's study. Between the doors stands a piano. In the middle of the left-hand wall is a door, and beyond it a window. Near the window are a round table, armchairs and a small sofa. In the right-hand... more...

Excuse me, sirs, I pray—I can't yet speak—I'm crying now—and have been all the week."'Tis not alone this mourning suit," good masters:"I've that within"—for which there are no plasters!Pray, would you know the reason why I'm crying?The Comic Muse, long sick, is now a-dying!And if she goes, my tears will never stop;For as a player, I can't squeeze... more...

EDWARD THE SECOND By Christopher Marlowe DRAMATIS PERSONAE KING EDWARD THE SECOND.PRINCE EDWARD, his son, afterwards KING EDWARD THE THIRD.KENT, brother to KING EDWARD THE SECOND.GAVESTON.ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.BISHOP OF COVENTRY.BISHOP OF WINCHESTER.WARWICK.LANCASTER.PEMBROKE.ARUNDER.LEICESTER.BERKELEY.MORTIMER the elder. MORTIMER the younger, his nephew. SPENSER the elder. SPENSER the younger, his... more...