Life is a Dream (Thrift Editions) - Softcover

De La, Pedro Calderon

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0486421244 ISBN 13: 9780486421247

Publisher: Dover Publications Inc, 2003

Synopsis

A king is suspicious of his son's role in an impending revolution. Considered one of the outstanding Spanish dramas of all-time, this 17th-century allegory explores the mysteries of human destiny, the illusory nature of existence, and the struggle between predestination and free will. Includes an excellent new English translation, with an informative introduction and footnotes.

About this title

Review:

I have read about twelve of [Calderon's] plays; some of them certainly deserve to be ranked among the grandest and most perfect productions of the human mind. He exceeds all modern dramatists with the exception of Shakespeare. (Percy Bysshe Shelley)

About the Author:

Pedro Calderon de la Barca (1600–1681), Spanish dramatist, last important figure of the Spanish Golden Age. His more than 100 plays were carefully contrived, subtle, and rhetorical. His finest work is in his more than 70 autos sacramentales (one-act religious plays), among them El divino Orfeo and A Dios por razón de estado [to God for reasons of state]. Of his philosophical dramas the best known are El mágico prodigioso [the wonderful magician] and La vida es sueño [life is a dream], which deals with the themes of fate, prognostication, and free will.

Gragary J. Racz is associate professor in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature at Long Island University, Brooklyn. His translation of the mock-Renaissance farce Rigmaroles appeared in Three Comedies, his edited volume of plays by the contemporary Spanish dramatist Jaime Salom. Racz has published works by the Cuban writer Jose Lezama Lima, the Peruvian Eduardo Chirinos, and the Argentine experimental XUL group.

About this edition

• Publisher: Dover Publications Inc
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0486421244
• ISBN 13: 9780486421247
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96