The American theatre comes alive in Mary McCarthy’s provocative anthology of essays
Her literary writings and dramatic criticism have appeared in the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books. Mary McCarthy’s Theatre Chronicles gathers together a wide-ranging collection featuring a cast of playwrights, actors, and directors that reads like a “who’s who” of American theatre.
With chapters ranging from “The Unimportance of Being Oscar” to “Odets Deplored,” this lively and witty volume opens a revealing window onto every aspect of theatre. McCarthy brings singular productions of the world’s most famous plays to vivid dramatic life while dissecting literary giants like Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller. She offers her controversial opinion on everything from the American school of realism as epitomized by Brando to what creates a great actress to how a badly written play can still make for good theatre.
With passages on theatre figures from Shakespeare to Shaw to Ibsen and O’Neill, this is a must-have for theatre lovers and armchair critics everywhere.
This ebook features an illustrated biography of Mary McCarthy including rare images from the author’s estate.
People note American writer Mary Therese McCarthy for her sharp literary criticism and satirical fiction, including the novels The Groves of Academe (1952) and The Group (1963).
McCarthy studied at Vassar college in Poughkeepsie, New York and graduated in 1933. McCarthy moved to city of New York and incisively wrote as a known contributor to publications such as the Nation, the New Republic, and the New York Review of Books. Her debut novel, The Company She Keeps (1942), initiated her ascent to the most celebrated writers of her generation; the publication of her autobiography Memories of a Catholic Girlhood in 1957 bolstered this reputation.
This literary critic authored more than two dozen books, including the now-classic novel The Group, the New York Times bestseller in 1963.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.