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The Classic Theatre, Vol II : Five German Plays
The Classic Theatre Vol II Five German Plays Author:Eric Bentley (Editor) The fact that Egmont is known outside Germany only as something for which Beethoven wrote an overture gives some indication of how little we know of the German classics. Certainly it was not ever thus, for in the nineteenth century English translations of Goethe and Schiller were ridely read. But today most of those translations have gone as dea... more »d as the Victorian versions of Greek tragedy, and so, before the Germans could presented in The Classic Theater series, translations new in spirit as well as in fact had to be made.
This volume presents five German classics in a new English dress: Egmont, perhaps the most lively of Goethe's plays; Don Carlos and Mary Stuart, which are perennially among the most popular plays of Schiller, the latter having been a recent success even in London and New York, the former familiar, at least, in its operatic form; and finally, tow of the greatest plays of Heinrich von Kleist, a figure who holds more interest for many readers today than Schiller or even Goethe. Penthesilea and The Prince of Homburg are amont the most amazing plays ever written.
This volume can mean the rediscovery of Goethe and Schiller -- and the discovery of Kleist -- for stage and study alike.« less