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Paperback
Applause
Publisher: Applause Books
416 Pages
Published by Applause Books
Softcover
Five great forces - Checkhov, Hauptmann, Ibsen, Strindberg and Zola - dramatists whose work define, embrace and transcend the trends and genres of the modern stage, meet here in this extraordinary exhibition of their sustained and sustaining power in todayÕs theatre.
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| Five Gems. |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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I think it's probably safe to assume that this type of anthology, which offers a sampling of representative authors of certain "schools" or time periods or types of literature, is aimed primarily at college students who are required to imbibe at least a minimum of this sort of stuff in order to be considered well-rounded. And, evidently, when the books have served their purpose of conferring a bit of culture to their owners, said students are eager to divest themselves of the no longer needed baggage, for these little collections are a dime-a-dozen, or more literally, a quarter apiece, at library sales.
After these anthologies have made their descents to the stratum of library sales and garage sales, frugal bibliophiles such as myself guiltily purchase them, knowing full well they will probably collect dust for decades, but still unable to resist such a bargain in critically acclaimed world literature.
I am happy to report this book escaped the fate of bookshelf oblivion. Knowing that I was soon going to watch a film adaptation of Strindberg's "Miss Julie', I retrieved the book, for that is one of the plays contained therein. I was quite impressed with the Strindberg play. Though it was set in the 19th century, and the conventions of society were much more rigid and class-conscious than we're used to today, it is evident that Strindberg had a perceptive grasp of psychological influences on behavior, for the people in his play were motivated by the same compulsions, obsessions, and formative familial influences as people in our permissive modern society. The difference is, that people of that earlier age were more apt to suffer horribly for not conforming to their contemporary rules of convention.
But there was something else, perhaps of more importance from an artistic viewpoint, which I noticed about this play. That is that I was surprised at how real and life-like Strindberg made the characters seem, just through the use of dialog. I had avoided reading plays, because of my preconception that dramas were essentially stripped down novels or prose stories. Somehow, the idea had become ingrained that a narrative device which explained the action was necessary to give a full rendering of a story. On the contrary, 'Miss Julie' seemed to be more powerful just because the character of the players was revealed through dialog.
This discovery led me to check out the other plays in the volume, and to my surprise, I found they all were engrossing tales which revealed powerful stories just through the use of dialog and minimal stage descriptions. In a short time I had read all five plays, and was on the internet checking out other works and biographical information on these playwrights. To anyone who, like myself, loves great literature, but has somehow sidestepped drama, I would highly recommend this sampler to see what you may have been missing.
The plays included are: Therese Raquin, by Emile Zola
An Enemy of the people, by Henrik Ibsen
Miss Julie, by August Strindberg
The Weavers, by Gerhart Hauptmann
The Sea Gull, by Anton Chekhov
There is a nice introduction which briefly describes the plays and gives a short biographical glimpse of the authors' lives. All of these plays are supposed to be representative of the naturalist movement, which arose in opposition to what was considered the unrealistic idealism of the romantic movement. But that knowledge is not necessary to the enjoyment of the plays. In all of the plays, we see the characters trying somehow to adapt to the environment in which they find themselves, either by some sort of accommodation, or by trying to change it.
I was particularly struck by Hauptmann's 'The Weavers'. Not to be preachy, but I think it would do us all good to consider how well off we are today, in this country at least, in comparison to the abominable conditions exposed in supposedly "civilized" Europe in relatively modern times. But Hauptmann's play is not an ideological pamphlet, but a work of art with vivid existential portraits of the lives of unbelievably exploited workers who had no advocate to defend them against their oppressors.
In reading this anthology, I came to learn why these playwrights merit the stature they have been accorded, and why their reputations have withstood the test of time. These are not stories with happy endings, but they show us vivid and artistically rendered pictures of the human condition.
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