Stopped Rocking and Other Screenplays (SIGNED by Richard Gilman and Maureen Stapleton)

Tennessee Williams

ISBN 10: 0811209016 / ISBN 13: 9780811209014

Published by New Directions, 1984

About this Item

Used; Very Good. 59-F-21 New Directions 1984 Hardcover. SIGNED twice by Richard Gilman who wrote the Introduction- once on the title page and again at the end of the Introduction. SIGNED 4 times by Maureen Stapleton. On page 293 is the play "Stopped Rocking", which was dedicated to Maureen Stapleton. She signed on this page, the next two pages, and at the end of the play. Tucked into the book is a letter to previous owner from Richard Gilman, stating that he would be happy to sign the book if it was sent to him. There is no other markings in the book. Jacket has light wear and is in a mylar protective cover. Book Condition: Very Good Jacket Condition; Very Good 3-32 . 1984. HARDCOVER.

Seller Inventory # 9780811209014

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Stopped Rocking and Other Screenplays (SIGNED by Richard Gilman and Maureen Stapleton)
• Publisher: New Directions
• Publication Date: 1984
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0811209016
• ISBN 13: 9780811209014
• Binding: HARDCOVER
• Condition: Used; Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Dust Jacket Included
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Entertainment
  • G.T. Parsons 3rd

About this title

Synopsis

Written at various times over the last twenty-five years but never produced, the four scripts included in Tennessee Williams’s Stopped Rocking and Other Screenplays encompass both the realistic style of “the early Williams” (the author’s quotes) and the more experimental dramatic devices of many of his “later” plays. Two screenplays from the fifties, All Gaul Is Divided and The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond, remained in the files of Williams’s New Orleans apartment until a thorough cleaning uncovered them in the mid-seventies. Thus, All Gaul, an expanded version of the story of a St. Louis teacher’s dreams of love told in A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur (1978) actually predates that play. A companion piece in mood and style, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond lyrically evokes the late twenties debutante society of Memphis and the Delta plantations. Adapted from the graphic short story of the same name, One Arm concerns a young male hustler awaiting execution for murder. Because much of the visual action is combined with a voice-over narration, Williams considered the form of this “film-play” from the late sixties somewhat experimental. In Stopped Rocking (1977), Williams returns to a familiar theme, the institution as the last haven of those who cannot cope with daily conflict and have “resigned from life.” He was confident that this play, like so many of his others, would eventually find its audience: “I know that the ’dark’ of the work is more than balanced by its humanity, and that this light of humanity will tip the balance favorably, as a natural act of grace.”

About the Author

 Tennessee Williams (1911–1983) was America’s most influential playwright. Readers have devoured his poetry, essays, short stories, and letters, as well as his fantastic late plays, his remarkable corpus of one-acts, and his greatest plays―The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Night of the Iguana, The Rose Tattoo, Suddenly Last Summer, and Camino Real. Williams is a cornerstone of New Directions―we publish everything he wrote. He is also our single bestselling author.