Tragedy
The Skin Game
A small play in three acts. A kind of comic tragedy. The plot tells the story of the interaction between two very different families in rura…
Iphigenia
Racine's version of the time-honored story of Iphigenia was acted for the first time in 1674. The model upon which it is shaped is the "…
The Steel Hammer
A large inheritance greatly transforms the lives of three people: a good man, who would have inherited at least a part of the fortune if his…
Tristan and Isolde
The Libretto of Richard Wagner's music drama Tristan and Isolde, translated into English by John P Jackson, is here presented as a spoken dr…
The Thebaid
"The reign of Louis XIV. in France, like the age of Pericles at ancient Athens, was remarkable for literary excellence no less than for…
The Road, The House
The Road, The House is a philosophical tragedy commissioned by BBC Radio 4 to celebrate the 60th birthday of playwright Howard Barker. Set i…
The Broken Heart
The Broken Heart stands next to ‘Tis Pity She's a Whore as Ford's most popular drama. All is not right in Sparta because of, as is typical i…
Cleone
This is a play in 5 acts. From the playwright's preface: "An imperfect hint towards the Fable of the following Tragedy was taken from t…
King Leir and His Three Daughters
King Leir and His Three Daughters is a poignant Elizabethan tragedy that explores the themes of loyalty, betrayal, and the complexities of f…
Henry IV, A Tragedy
A talented actor and historian falls off his horse in a historical pageant while playing the role of Henry IV. When he comes to, he believes…
Agamemnon
Agamemnon is a verse tragedy of 1012 lines written by the Roman playwright Seneca the Younger in the 1st Century CE and based on the Greek L…
Pelléas and Mélisande
Pelléas and Mélisande is a Symbolist play by the Belgian playwright and author Maurice Maeterlinck about the forbidden, doomed…
The Bacchae
Euripides' Bacchae tells of Dionysus, the God, come to the city of Thebes, there to drive mad those who refuse participation in his ecstatic…
Paolo and Francesca
The tragic and adulterous story of Paolo and Francesca was originally immortalized by Dante in his "Divine Comedy". Since then, t…
Body Language
Body Language by Alan Berrie tells the story of "Big Kenny" Hartley, a giant of a man who is loved by all who know him. However, h…
Esther
Esther — the first of Racine's two sacred dramas — is a tragedy in the Aristotelian acceptation of the term, as being concerned with a great…
Hecuba
Hecuba, the Trojan Queen, faces unimaginable grief as she wipes the blood of her slaughtered sons and grandsons from her body. With Troy fal…
The Gamester
The Gamester is Edward Moore's most famous work, and while it has fallen into relative obscurity in the last century, at the time it marked …
Ghosts
Ghosts is a powerful three-act play by Henrik Ibsen that delves into the complexities of family, societal expectations, and the haunting leg…
Romeo and Juliet
Two households, both alike in dignity,In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,Where civil blood makes…