
La Ronde
Arthur Schnitzler(Author)
Ivan R Dee, Inc (Publisher)
Published on 16. January 2010
Book
Paperback/Softback
128 pages
978-1-56663-846-3 (ISBN)
Description
First published for private circulation in Vienna in 1900, Arthur Schnitzler's famous play looks at the sexual morality and class ideology of his day through a series of sexual encounters between pairs of characters. When published publicly in 1903, it became an immediate best-seller, scandalized Viennese society, and a year later was censored. Schnitzler was accused of pornography and worse. In 1922 Freud wrote to him that "you have learned through intuition-though actually as a result of sensitive introspection-everything that I have had to unearth by laborious work on other persons." By choosing characters across the social spectrum, La Ronde offers a powerful view of how sexual contact transgresses boundaries of class. Nicholas Rudall's new translation sensitively captures the language distinctions of the representative characters in the play while providing a remarkably playable script. New in the Plays for Performance series.
Reviews / Votes
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 *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Chicago
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 140 mm
Thickness: 7 mm
Weight
167 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-56663-846-3 (9781566638463)
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Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Arthur Schnitzler (1862-1931), Austrian physician, dramatist, and novelist, was among the most sophisticated writers of his time. Nicholas Rudall is renowned for his translations, especially of Ibsen and the Greek classics. He is emeritus professor of classics at the University of Chicago and former artistic director of the Court Theater there. He lives in Chicago.