In the late 1970s PBS presented a hilarious trilogy of plays called "The Norman Conquests." I've been trying ever since to find them again. And here they are! This volume contains the scripts for all three of these amazing plays. Their premise: Norman is a real charmer who seduces (not necessarily sexually) everybody he meets. Each of the three plays takes place on a different stage. It's the same story and the same six characters, but seen from what happens only in each room in each play. It's an amazing accomplishment for a writer. This book carries an introduction by Ayckbourn that explains how he did it. And he says the plays are meant to be seen in any order. But I prefer the order given here: "Table Manners" (in the dining room), "Living Together" (the sitting room) and "Round and Round the Garden." If you haven't experienced it, the videos are available now (finally!), as well. The production (the same I saw on PBS) stars Tom Conti as an unforgettable Norman.

Terrific work (again!) from this major British playwright showing a disasterous family weekend where a would be Casanova sets his sights on his sister in law and the whole family ultimately become involved. Although written and set in the mid 1970s it remains just as funny (if not more so) now. All of the characters are classics and there are a feast of one liners. It really needs a stage production to be done justice though.

This book really made my feet itch. Can't wait to be on the road, on my way to anywhere. Great laughs, too. Not so detailed as some other guidebooks, but definitely with the best attitude.

Mothers and wives fighting? Sounds oddly familiar. The problems in this household are comedic yet amazingly real. Feels like home to me!

The performance text, more or less, with a few footnotes and entertaining illustrations of Ken Campbell's award winning comic monologue Pigspurt or Six Pigs from Happiness. A wealth of inventive storytelling most of which is autobiographical at root if not in full flower. A complexly structured but deceptively accessible associative rap encompassing Gnostic thought, theatrical anecdote, sexual role playing, an exploration of anima and animus and shadow, Philip K Dick's later work, conspiracy theory, the customs of Vanuatu, the comedy of Ken Dodd and much else besides. A funny, funny book with a few pointers to further thought. The illustrations also mean its quite fun to flick through.

There aren't really any other books much like this I can think of but works in peripherally similar veins include;

The BFI casebook on the Exorcist by Mark Kermode

VALIS, The Divine Invasion, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer by Philip K Dick,

In search of VALIS by Laurence Sutin,

An Inspector Calls by JB Priestley,

Why is John Lennon wearing a skirt? by Claire Dowie

Swimming to Cambodia by Spalding Gray

Laughter in the Air by Barry Took

I saw this play at the theatre twice before I read the book. The book loses a bit because to a certain extent it is the author's face and voice that made me laugh so much, and the delivery. And the wearing of a tea-cosy on his head and David Mellor's teeth!

Violin Time was not really a play, more a collection of anecdotes (some of which I suspect were untrue), mixed with esoterics quantum physics, an infinite improbability drive [we know he's familiar with Douglas Adams] and an old Stephen Fry joke. I'm sure you get the idea that this very mixed bag proved very interesting and amusing from start to finish. Because there's such a lot in the play, this makes having a written record of the play even more important. I doubt whether Ken will perform Violin Time again, so pop out and buy the book.

Dave Farmbrough 1/12/'98

Like Virgil did for Dante, Ken Smith takes his readers on a tour through hell. This is no allegory, though, but a very real sojourn among the incarcerated. Smith wrote these poems from his experience as poet-in-residence at Wormwood Scrubs Prison in England. A master of his craft, he weaves biblical allusion, his own inner struggle, and the stories of the men he meets behind bars into a collection of verse one will not soon forget. With his customary sensitivity to the losers in life, together with a wry sense of humor, Ken Smith confronts us squarely with the humanity of people we may not want to think about.

No, I haven't read the book. I saw the play put on by The Shakespeare Theater in Washington. Tessa Auberjonois was an absolute darling in the title role; you couldn't help but feel glad for Margery's odd-but-happy ending.

If Wycherley was no Shakespeare, he did this sort of play better than the Bard. Nothing is quotable, the characters are one dimensional and only the "China" scene got real laughs. But Wycherley did a neat and nasty take on Restoration mores and made it enjoyable, too.

Far from being a silly comedy, The Country Wife is a work aimed at lashing Seventeenth Century loose morals. We laugh, of course, but through the alluring yet disturbing character of Horner, we perceive that something must be done if Restoration society wants to survive.

Wicherley presents us with unhappy wives and brutal or indifferent husbands who are utlimately fooled by Horner, the man who knows how to exploit the misery produced by mercenary unions. Poor Margery Pinchwife, the heroine of the piece, eventually brings tears in our eyes when we realize that she shall never be free from a violent man that considers marriage a cheaper substitute for keeping a mistress. Margery is the victim of both her husband and her careless lover. She is looking for love, but she keeps on coming across men who are interested in sex only. They can see her body; they can't see her delicate, naif soul.

However, Whycherley (who, we must remember, was the spiritual son of the great moralists Graciàn, Larochefoucault and so on, whose maxims are easily detected in the whole bulk of Wycherley's works) is able to see a way out in the honest, disintrested love between Alithea, Margery's brilliant sister-in-law, and Harcourt, Horner's dashing best friend. (these characters' names symbolize the perfection of their union: her name means "truth", while his name is significantly "Frank".)

This comedy is at its best when performed; however, it is well worth reading, especially if you have a lively imagination. don't miss the notorious "china scene": fifteen minutes of laughter that will make your sides ache.

Be careful: The Country Wife merely "looks" like a stupid, shallow comedy, but it is in fact a deep reflection on society, marriage and, why not?, even the situation of Seventeenth-Century English women.

I recently reread this play for the third time and taught it in a British Literature survey at the University of Texas. Not only do I find it more entertaining and more brilliant with every reading, but I was shocked to find that the vast majority of my students really enjoyed it and preferred Wycherley to Shakespeare. If you want a smart, hilarious, and dark comedy that plumbs the depths of jealousy and sexual possession, this is a must-read play. If you're easily offended or have a hard time following complicated plots and catching bawdy puns, you'll certainly want to avoid it.

Henry James, The Spoils of Poynton (Dell, 1897)

The Spoils of Ponyton is the first novel James wrote in his "later style," in other words, drawing-room satire that isn't really about much of anything at all. For some odd reason, later-era James is what's universally praised in lit classes around the globe, while the early stuff, which is actually worth reading, is largely ignored.

To be fair, James did get better at satire as time went on, but The Spoils of Ponyton has all the hallmarks of being a first attempt at a stylistic change. The novel centers on two characters who are utterly incapable of action, which wouldn't be so bad if the characters who were doing the acting were more involved. Such is, sadly, not the case. Owen and Fleda just sort of drift and react; as the book is told from Fleda's point of view, we end up with page after page of something that, in the hands of a better author (even a later James, had he re-written it) would have come off as uber-Tevye; weighing the various merits of various courses of action, not being able to decide on a course, and letting fate take her where it will. In Fiddler on the Roof, it works (largely because Tevye's monologues are brief and to the point); in Poynton, it blithers on endlessly, with all the fascination for the reader of watching cheese spoil.

If you're new to James, by all means do yourself a favor and start with something he wrote earlier in his career. Leave Poynton until after you've developed enough of a taste for James to pick up later-era works, and then read the major ones before diving into this. *

I give this three stars in an internal world where 5 is James at his best. In comparison to most fiction the rating would be higher, but as a DEVOUT fan, I live in my own internal world. In that world, James who was more critical than any of us, would understand that in comparison to other later era work and even middle period work, Spoils does not live up to his best. It is fun and light, another reviewer mentioned obvious signs of a stylistic shift perhaps being too obvious here. That feels on the money to me. That said, if you've read almost everything, it is a light turn with the Master and that has something delicious in it no matter what.

I read this one a few years ago, and I have to rank it at the bottom of the list (along with "The Europeans").

Though Fleda Vetch can be fascinating in a Hamlet-esque way (through her infuriating inability to act), this novel is far from a must-read as far as James goes.

Frieden's work reads like a dissertation written by someone in a hurry to get his degree. He never fully defines either term sufficiently in order for the connection to be made between the two (Genius and Monologue). THe main problem is trite writing which calls on literary catchphrases instead of explanation. Too often, the book reads as if one were looking through an index of a work by Derrida or Kristeva--term-dropping rather than content. Hopefully, as Frieden matures, his work will drop this overzealous reliance on bywords and begin to address and explain the concepts he endeavors to get across to the reader.