Quills

by Doug Wright

The play recounts the imagined final days in the life of the Marquis de Sade.

Quills premiered at Washington, D.C.'s Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in 1995 and subsequently had its debut Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop. Quills garnered the 1995 Kesselring Prize for Best New American Play from the National Arts Club and, for Wright, a 1996 Village Voice Obie Award for Outstanding Achievement in Playwriting.

Genres: Plays, Theatre, Drama, Historical Fiction, Horror, Fiction, Historical

82 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Doug Wright is an American playwright, librettist, and screenwriter. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2004 for his play, I Am My Own Wife.

Reviews

[a r e l i c · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could read this play everyday of my life, and still that would not be enough. Recommended to all non-anally retentive intellectuals with a sense of humour.

Here's the synopsis found on the back of this edition of the play (Since it's not included above):

Doctor Royer-Collard, head of Charenton Asylum, is visited by Renee Pelagie, wife of the asylum's most notorious inmate, the Marquis de Sade. Furious that her husband's sadomasochistic pornography has tarnished her reputation, she offers the Doctor any amount of money, if only her husband can be kept from writing. After confiscating the Marquis' quills and paper, the Abbe de Coulmier is surprised to find lascivious new stories circulating in public. The source? A lust young seamstress named Madeleine has been smuggling material out of the asylum. Immediately, the Abbe bars the girl from seeing the Marquis, but ever resourceful, the Marquis pens his stories on his bedclothes in wine, blood and worse. Driven to a fury, the Abbe strips bare the Marquis and his cell, leaving nothing but stone and straw. Undaunted, the Marquis devises a fantastic plan to whisper his stories from lunatic to lunatic, until Madeleine can pen them down - but the last lunatic, in whose cell Madeleine crouches, mutilates and kills the girl in response to the Marquis' grisly tale. A riot ensues, nearly destroying the asylum, and as the second act unfolds, the Abbe is driven to increasingly desperate acts to silence the Marquis: the removal of his hands, feet, genitals, and eventually his beheading. Wracked by guilt, the once humane but now murderous and sexually deviant Abbe is committed to his own asylum where he finds himself crying out for a paper and pen with which to record his own newly arisen perversions. In the last scene, the boxes containing the body parts of the Marquis tremble with pleasure. One hand snakes loose from it's box...and begins to write.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've wanted to read or see this play because I've loved the film version for years. The play is a bit different and I really love that they added elements of Marat/Sade to the movie that are not in the play. However, I love how the play works as both intellectual melodrama and an amazing piece of Grand Guignol. I now dream of putting this play on, though it would require some rather inventive staging.

[Nour Al Ashqar · Rating 1 out of 5]

ألا يمكن الحديث عن شغف الكتابة بغير هذا المضمون القذر ؟

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book contains graphic descriptions of sexual acts and other debaucheries often disturbing and horrific. It examines the effects the Marquis' writings had on readers, censorship and hypocrisy. Quills depicts the last days of the Marquis de Sade at the Charenton insane asylum. When it's discovered that confinement hasn't stopped the Marquis from writing Abbé du Coulmier is encouraged by Dr. Royer-Collard to take cruel measures to stop him. This sets off a chain of events that leads to the death of laundress Madeleine LeClerc and the Coulmier being corrupted himself in a most ironic way. The ending also features a very unexpected and memorable visual.

[Melissa Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the story of the Marquis de Sade who is locked away in a lunatic asylum because of his lewd and lascivious habits and scandalous literary works -- but still, he continues to write his pornographic books and get them published -- with the help of a young woman who works at the asylum. It's a fascinating trip into the mind of a strange man. They made a movie by the same title with Geoffrey Rush and Kate Winslet; good and twisted.

[lulzcannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great play about the nature of censorship that is equal parts wonderful and horrible. It reminded me of the Italian film "SALO" in the way the play layers the internal meaning beneath repulsive yet compelling imagery and prose. Those who are exceptionally sensitive may want to steer clear of this as it takes a some mental toughness and open mindedness to catch a glimpse of the hidden beauty in the words.

[Sheikha . D · Rating 5 out of 5]

الرّيشة للكاتب دوغ رايت

والمتضمنة حياة ماركيز دي ساد , وطقوس حياته داخل المصح النّفسي
وتأملاته الفلسفيّة, ومناضلته رغم المنع والإضطهاد من مسؤول المصح والدكتور إلا أنه دافع عن فلسفته الكتابيّة بشتّى الطرق, حيث أنه كان ينشر كتاباته عبر خادمة بريئة وجميلة في المصح, وذلك بوضع كتاباته داخل سلّة الملابس المتسّخة, وحينما علمٌوا بالأمر جرّدوه من الملابس والآثاث, ولم يقف بل جرح نفسه واستخدم دمه حبراً له .

[Joshua · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disturbing and delightful. Not certain if I loved it or loathed it. But, with most things De Sade, that's a pretty natural and, I'd say, wonderful response to his work. Revels in its own fiendish scares and torments, with a genuine, philosophic heart beating at it's core. A real page turner.

[Pilar A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of the Marquis de Sade that was later made into a movie with Geoffrey Rush shows the genius behind the madness. a good read.

[Saman]

در صورت تمایل، جهت مشخصات فیلمی که بر اساس این کتاب ساخته شده‌ است؛ می‌توانید از لینک زیر استفاده بفرمایید
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0180073

[Al · Rating 5 out of 5]

The play is so much more wild than the movie! Wright cuts away at the poor Marquis and shows how the Catholic mind operates on anybody with an artistic temperament.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

The guy who wrote The Little Mermaid musical is pretty messed up.

[Zsuzsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

as part of t he 2015 reading challange, category: A Play

[Jacqueline Dickson · Rating 5 out of 5]

don't know yet

[Peter McCambridge · Rating 2 out of 5]

Au Trident

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a lot of fun. Pales next to Marat/Sade.

[Radu Deme · Rating 4 out of 5]

... of passion...

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

"We eat, we shit, we kill and we die."

[Ceilidh · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's even darker and dirtier than the film! Love it!

[Sammy · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Let his volume lie by every Bible as its inverse. ... Which book tells the truth about mankind, and which lies?"

-1 star for how Mme de Sade was treated by the play, but otherwise a tremendous and ever-poignant read. The Marquis's parts are still in their boxes these centuries later as our fingers itch for quills alongside his.