Last Act

Early Modern Playhouse Manuscripts and the Editing of Shakespeare

Early Modern Playhouse Manuscripts and the Editing of Shakespeare argues for editing Shakespeare's plays in a new way, without pretending to distinguish authorial from theatrical versions. Drawing on the work of the influential scholars A. W. Pollard and W. W. Greg, Werstine tackles the difficult issues surrounding 'foul papers' and 'promptbooks' to redefine these fundamental categories of current Shakespeare editing. In an extensive and detailed analysis, this book offers insight into the methods of theatrical personnel and a reconstruction of backstage practices in playhouses of Shakespeare's time. The book also includes a detailed analysis of nineteen manuscripts and three quartos marked up for performance - documents that together provide precious insight into how plays were put into production. Using these surviving manuscripts as a framework, Werstine goes on to explore editorial choices about what to give today's readers as 'Shakespeare'.

How a Play is Produced - Illustrated by Joseph Čapek

This vintage text contains a comprehensive guide to producing a play, and is intended for dramatists, dramatic critics, and the general public. It explores what transformations a play must go through before it may flourish, and contains a wealth of interesting and invaluable information on the subject. The chapters of this book include: 'The First Beginnings', 'Casting the Play', 'The Production', 'Reading the Play', 'In the Rehearsal Room', 'Further Rehearsals', 'The Play Matures', 'The Dress Rehearsal – I', 'The Dress Rehearsal – II', 'The Mise en Scéne', 'The First Night', 'After the First Night', etcetera. Karel Capek (1890 - 1938) was a famous Czech writer of the early twentieth-century. He worked as a playwright, publisher, literary reviewer, and art critic, but is most remembered for his science fiction writing. We are republishing this antiquarian text in an affordable, modern edition, complete with a specially commissioned new biography of the author.

The Revised Statutes of the Province of Quebec