General Books

PART I. SCENE.—A Court of Justice. Usher, Clerk of the Court, Mr. Hungary, Q.C., and others.  Mr. La-di-da, the prisoner, not in the dock, but seated in a chair before it.  [Enter Mr. Justice Nupkins. Usher.  Silence!—silence! Mr. Justice Nupkins.  Prisoner at the bar, you have been found guilty by a jury, after a very long and careful consideration of your remarkable and strange case, of a... 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...

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...

ACT I. SCENE I.—SGANARELLE, ARISTE. SGAN. Pray, brother, let us talk less, and let each of us live as he likes. Though you have the advantage of me in years, and are old enough to be wise, yet I tell you that I mean to receive none of your reproofs; that my fancy is the only counsellor I shall follow, and that I am quite satisfied with my way of living. AR. But every one condemns it. SGAN. Yes, fools... more...

HOW TO BE A GOOD RADIO ACTOR The play in this book has actually been produced on the radio. Possibly you have listened to this one when you tuned in at home. The persons whose voices you heard as you listened, looked just as they did when they left their homes to go to the studio, although they were taking the parts of men and women who lived long ago and who wore costumes very different from the ones... more...

ACT I A large old-fashioned room in Matthew Beeler's farm-house, near a small town in the Middle West. The room is used for dining and for general living purposes. It suggests, in architecture and furnishings, a past of considerable prosperity, which has now given place to more humble living. The house is, in fact, the ancestral home of Mr. Beeler's wife, Mary, born Beardsley, a family of the... more...

SCENE I.—The Library Enter SURFACE and SERVANT SURFACE. Mr. Stanley! and why should you think I would see him?— you must know he came to ask something! SERVANT. Sir—I shouldn't have let him in but that Mr. Rowley came to the Door with him. SURFACE. Pshaw!—Blockhead to suppose that I should now be in a Temper to receive visits from poor Relations!—well why don't you show the Fellow... more...

TRISTAN AND ISOLDA. ACT I. [A pavilion erected on the deck of a ship, richly hung with tapestry, quite closed in at back at first. A narrow hatchway at one side leads below into the cabin.] SCENE I. ISOLDA on a couch, her face buried in the cushions.— BRANGÆNA holding open a curtain, looks over the side of the vessel. THE VOICE OF A YOUNG SAILOR (from above as if at the mast-head).   ISOLDA... more...

ACT I A fine October morning in the north east suburbs of London, a vast district many miles away from the London of Mayfair and St. James's, much less known there than the Paris of the Rue de Rivoli and the Champs Elysees, and much less narrow, squalid, fetid and airless in its slums; strong in comfortable, prosperous middle class life; wide-streeted, myriad-populated; well-served with ugly iron... more...