La Ronde (Modern Plays) - Softcover

Schnitzler, Arthur

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0413495302 ISBN 13: 9780413495303

Publisher: Methuen Drama, 2004

Synopsis

Schnitzler's masterpiece, La Ronde, shows a spectrum of social class from prostitutes to noblemen in a series of drily observed, loveless sexual encounters. Remembered by many as the basis of a famous film in 1950, the real notoriety of La Ronde goes back to 1900 when it was privately printed and subsequently banned. It was not performed until 1920 in Berlin, where anti-Semitic riots broke out, resulting in the arrest and trial of the cast and director, allegedly for obscenity. The controversy continued with David Hare's adaptation, The Blue Room, which starred Nicole Kidman, at the Donmar Warehouse.

This translation is by the playwright and critic Frank Marcus, who has also provided a full introduction to Schnitzler's life and work.

About this title

Review:

The characters of Schnitzler's play talk endlessly of love, but it's sex they are after, and in the end, it is their search for it that spins them off a life-long dance. The moment he finishes with the young maid, the soldier returns to the dance hall. The young wife returns to her husband after her dalliance with the young man. The Count surely is reunited with his friend Louis, uncertain whether or not anything happened with the sleepy prostitute, who reminds him of someone he has met long ago. Was he once the young soldier of the first scene, completing the circle? In the end, Schnitzler's world is not so much an immoral one as it is a society of dissatisfied beings. Rain Taxi Review Of Books

About the Author:

Arthur Schnitzler (1862-1931) was born and brought up in Vienna. A doctor by profession, whhisose views often matched those of Sigmund Freud, his contemporary and fellow-Viennese. Schnitzler started writing stories, poems, essays and one-act plays in the 1880s. As well as Anatol (published 1892) and La Ronde (Reigen, published 1900), his prolific work for the theatre includes the tragedy Playing with Love (Liebelei, 1895), The Green Cockatoo (Der grune Kakadu, 1899), set on the eve of the French Revolution, and The Legacy (Das Vermachtnis, 1898).

About this edition

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0413495302
• ISBN 13: 9780413495303
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96