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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorThe Taming of the Shrew
William Shakespeare · 138 pages
This play within a play is a delightful farce about a fortune hunter who marries and tames" the town shrew. The comedy, often produced today because of its accessibility, is one of the plays Shakespeare intended for the general public rather than for the nobility. CliffsComplete combines the full original text of The Taming of the Shrew with a helpful glossary and CliffsNotes-quality commenta
The Goat, or, Who is Sylvia?
Edward Albee · 111 pages
"In the play, Martin - a hugely successful architect who has just turned fifty - leads an ostensibly ideal life with his loving wife and gay teenage son. But when he confides to his best friend that he is also in love with a goat (named Sylvia), he sets in motion events that will destroy his family and leave his life in tatters"--Jacket.
The House of Blue Leaves
John Guare · 100 pages
"Artie Shaugnessy is a songwriter with visions of glory. Toiling by day as a zoo-keeper, he suffers in seedy lounges by night, plying his wares at piano bars in Queens, New York where he lives with his wife, Bananas. Who is. Much to the chagrin of Artie's downstairs mistress, Bunny Flingus who'll sleep with him anytime but refuses to cook until they are married. On the day the Pope is making his f
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
Tom Stoppard · 126 pages
Acclaimed as a modern dramatic masterpiece, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead is the fabulously inventive tale of Hamlet as told from the worm’s-eve view of the bewildered Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two minor characters in Shakespeare’s play. In Tom Stoppard’s best-known work, this Shakespearean Laurel and Hardy finally get a chance to take the lead role, but do so in a world where echoes of
Accidental Death of an Anarchist
Dario Fo, Joseph Farrell · 73 pages
The Alchemist
Ben Jonson · 208 pages
First performed in 1610, The Alchemist is one of Ben Jonson’s greatest comedies. Written for the King’s Men—the acting company to which Shakespeare belonged—it was first performed in Oxford because the playhouses in London were closed due to the plague. It was an immediate success and has remained a popular staple ever since. The play centers around a con man, his female accomplice, and a roguis
Cloud 9
Caryl Churchill · 64 pages
A landmark play about sexual politics in colonial Africa and modern-day Britain, in which all our assumptions about sex and gender are stunningly exploded. Set in both colonial Africa and modern-day Britain, Cloud Nine is about relationships between women and men, men and men, women and women. -- Samuel French.
Lysistrata
Aristophanes · 115 pages
In Aristophanes' most popular play, sex is a powerful agent of reconciliation. As war ravages ancient Greece, a band of women, led by Lysistrata, promise to deny their husbands all sex until they stop fighting. This volume of Lysistrata brings the play up to date with modern scholarship, providing an account of its history and containing new information about the comic theater and its social and p
Waiting for Godot
Samuel Beckett · 87 pages
This volume is an absurdist play in which two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, wait endlessly and in vain for the arrival of someone named Godot. They claim he's an acquaintance but in fact hardly know him, admitting that they would not recognize him when they do see him.
The Arsonists
Max Frisch · 80 pages
"Fires are becoming something of a problem, but Biedermann has it all under control. A respected member of the community with a loving wife and a flourishing business, he believes nothing can get to him. Being the great philanthrope, he is happy to fulfil his civic duty and give shelter to two new houseguests, and when they start filling the attic with petrol drums he'll help them wire the fuse."
The Revenger's Tragedy
Thomas Middleton, Cyril Tourneur · 130 pages
A vivid and often violent portrayal of lust and ambition in an Italian court, the play typifies the satiric tone and cynicism of much Jacobean tragedy. The play fell out of favour at some point before the restoration of the theaters in 1660; however, it experienced a revival in the twentieth century among directors and playgoers who appreciated its affinity with the temper of modern times.
Caesar and Cleopatra
George Bernard Shaw · 136 pages
Caesar and Cleopatra satirizes Shakespeare's use of history and comments wryly on the politics of Shaw's own time, but the undertone of melancholy makes it one of his most affecting plays.
The Jew of Malta
Christopher Marlowe, H. Havelock Ellis · 122 pages
This edition is of the best-known play by one of Shakespeare's chief predecessors and early contemporaries, Christopher Marlowe. The Jew of Malta was enormously influential on Shakespeare when he came to write The Merchant of Venice, and for good reason, since the play explores anti-Semitism and revenge. An introduction discusses the significance of this formative and brilliant play, with detailed
Rhinoceros and Other Plays
Eugene Ionesco · 141 pages
A collection of three modern plays by the master of the absurd and member of the French Academy.
The Plays of Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde · 220 pages
Oscar Wilde took London by storm with his first comedy, Lady Windermere's Fan. The combination of dazzling wit, subtle social criticism, sumptuous settings and the theme of a guilty secret proved a winner, both here and in his next three plays, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and his undisputed masterpiece, The Importance of Being Earnest. This volume includes all Wilde's plays from hi
The Break of Noon: A Play
Neil LaBute · 103 pages
"What if God told you to be a better person but the world wouldn’t allow it? Such is the dilemma facing Joe Smith, a run-of-the-mill white-collar businessman who survives an office shooting and is subsequently touched by what he believes to be a divine vision. His journey toward personal enlightenment—past greed and lust and the other deadly sins—is, by turns, tense, hilarious, profane, and heartb