WHAT I KNOW SO FAR
Partly based on this American playwright and screenwriter's own family, the drama is narrated by Tom Wingfield, who supports his mother Amanda and his crippled sister Laura (who takes refuge from reality in her glass animals). At Amanda's insistence, Tom brings his friend Jim O'Connor to the house as a "gentleman caller" for Laura. While O'Connor is there, the horn on Laura's glass unicorn breaks, bringing her into reality, until O'Connor tells the family that he is already engaged. Laura returns to her fantasy world, while Tom abandons the family after fighting with Amanda
A Glass Menagerie (Tennessee Williams)
Published in 1929. The record of several schoolmates who represent a generation destroyed by the dehumanization of World War I's trench warfare, it tells of their enlistment in the army at the urging of their teacher, Kantorek, whose wisdom they trusted.
All Quiet On the Western Front by Erich Maria
The work presents a great writer suffering writer's block who visits Venice and is liberated uplifted, and then increasingly obsessed, by the sight of a stunningly beautiful youth. Venice, and finally, the writer himself, succumb to a cholera plague.
Death in Venice by Thomas Mann
An American author best known for the novel The Catcher in the Rye. Many of Salinger's short stories featured the Glass family, including "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," in which Seymour and Muriel Glass are on vacation at a Florida resort. Seymour meets a young girl named Sybil Carpenter and talks with her about the title creatures, before returning to his hotel room and shooting himself. In "For Esmé—with Love and Squalor," the narrator Sergeant X replies to a wedding invitation with two distinct memories; in the first, he meets Esmé, an English orphan, during a church choir practice, and in the second, set during his time as a soldier in Bavaria, he receives a letter containing a wristwatch from Esmé. Both of those stories are included in Salinger's collection Nine Stories.
J.D Salinger
fifteen years earlier and presented the manuscript to his third wife with instructions that it not be produced until 25 years after his death. Actually produced three years after he died, it centers on Edmund and the rest of the Tyrone family but is really an autobiographical account of the dysfunction of this American playwright and Nobel laureate in literature own family, set on one day in August 1912. The father is a miserly actor, while the mother is a morphine addict, and the brother is a drunk; they argue and cut each other down throughout the play.
A Longs' Journey Into the Night (O'Neill)
Her father's 1940 court fight against racist housing laws provided the basis for this African American playwright and Arthurs about the Younger family, who attempt to move into an all-white Chicago suburb but are confronted by discrimination. The first play by an African-American woman to be performed on Broadway also tore down the racial stereotyping found in other works of the time. The title comes from Langston Hughes's poem "Harlem" (often called "A Dream Deferred").
A Raisin in the Sun (Lorraine Hansberry)
Blanche DuBois and Stanley Kowalski represent Williams's two visions of the South: declining "old romantic" vs. the harsh modern era. Blanche is a Southern belle who lost the family estate, and is forced to move into her sister Stella's New Orleans apartment
A Streetcar Named Desire (Tennessee Williams)
Addie Bundren, the wife of Anse Bundren and the matriarch of a poor southern family, is very ill, and is expected to die soon. Her oldest son, Cash, puts all of his carpentry skills into preparing her coffin, which he builds right in front of Addie's bedroom window.
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
It is a 1987 novel set after the American Civil War (1861-65), it is inspired by African American slave, Margaret Garner, who escaped slavery in Kentucky late January 1856 by fleeing to Ohio, a free state.
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Centers on a fight between two sons, Gooper and Brick, over the estate of their father "Big Daddy" Pollitt, who is dying of cancer. After his friend Skipper dies, ex-football star Brick turns to alcohol and will not have sex with his wife Maggie ("the cat"). Yet Maggie announces to Big Daddy that she is pregnant in an attempt to force a reconciliation with—and win the inheritance for—Brick.
Cat on a Hot-Tin Roof (Tennessee Williams)
This play questions American values of success. Willy Loman is a failed salesman whose firm fires him after 34 years. Despite his own failures, he desperately wants his sons Biff and Happy to succeed. Told in a series of flashbacks, the story points to Biff's moment of hopelessness, when the former high school star catches his father Willy cheating on his mother, Linda
Death of a Salesman (Arthur Miller)
An American author known for his works in the detective fiction, science fiction, and horror genres. In "The Cask of Amontillado," the narrator, Montresor, lures Fortunato into catacombs with the promise of the title wine, but ends up chaining Fortunato to a wall and burying him alive due to unnamed "insults." Poe also wrote "The Tell-Tale Heart," in which an unnamed narrator murders an old man with a "vulture-eye" and buries him beneath his floorboards. However, while being questioned by police, the guilty narrator hears the constant beating of his victim's heart, and orders them to "tear up the planks" to reveal the body. Other short stories by Poe include "The Gold-Bug," "The Pit and the Pendulum," "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," and "The Fall of the House of Usher."
Edgar Allen Poe
Written by and published in 1815. Youthful title character Woodhouse, whose long-time governess and friend Miss Taylor has just married Mr. Weston, takes some solace in being left alone with her aging father by claiming that she made the match herself.
Emma by Jane Austen
An American author many of whose stories feature the semi-autobiographical character Nick Adams. Adams appears in "Big Two-Hearted River," in which he goes on a fishing trip to the town of Seney, Michigan. In "Hills Like White Elephants," a woman named Jig talks with a man at a train station, considering an unnamed "procedure," which is implied to be an abortion. "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" begins with the description of a frozen leopard carcass; its protagonist, Harry, is a writer who dies of gangrene while on an African safari with his wife Helen. Hemingway also apocryphally wrote a six-word story consisting of the words "For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
Ernest Hemingway
Published in 1939. It is an expression of the dreaming collective psyche as it relives the major conflicts of myth and history. This psyche is divided into the two sexual principles, the major representations of which are Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker (HCE) and Anna Livia Plurabelle (ALP).
Finnegans Wake by James Joyce
A Catholic American author who wrote in the "Southern Gothic" style. In her story "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," Bailey takes his family on a vacation; when they stop at a diner, "the grandmother" talks with the owner Red Sammy about The Misfit, an escaped murderer. After the cat Patty Sing causes the family's car to crash into a ditch, a group of men led by the Misfit murder the family, including the grandmother, who claims The Misfit is one of her own children before he shoots her three times. In "Good Country People," Hulga has her prosthetic leg taken by Manley Pointer, a nihilistic atheist Bible salesman. O'Connor also wrote "Everything That Rises Must Converge," in which Julian rides on a newly-integrated bus with his mother.
Flannery O'Connor
It is a prose satire by Irish writer and clergyman published in 1726. It is an adventure story involving several voyages of Lemuel title character, a ship's surgeon, who, because of a series of mishaps en route to recognized ports, ends up, instead, on several unknown islands living with people and animals of unusual sizes, behaviors, and philosophies, but who, after each adventure, is somehow able to return to his home in England where he recovers from these unusual experiences and then sets out again on a new voyage.
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
A French author who frequently used ironic endings in his stories, including "The Necklace." In that story, Mathilde Loisel borrows the expensive-looking title piece of jewelry from Madame Forestier, and loses it at a high-class party. In order to afford a 36,000 francs replacement, she and her husband sell everything they own. Ten years later, Madame Forestier recognizes Mathilde on the street and informs her that the necklace was a fake. In "Boule de Suif," translated into English as "Ball of Fat," the title character is a prostitute who is on a carriage leaving Prussian-occupied Rouen. The travelers are detained by the Prussians until Boule de Suif sleeps with an officer, for which she is judged for the remainder of the trip even though her fellow passengers pressured her to do so.
Guy de Maupassant
An Argentine author known for his philosophical stories. In "The Library of Babel," the narrator's universe is made of adjacent hexagonal rooms, forming a library containing all possible 410-page books consisting of 25 basic characters. Another story by Borges, "The Garden of Forking Paths," is framed as a manuscript written by Doctor Yu Tsun, a World War I spy, who is pursued by Richard Madden. He realizes that the title labyrinth is actually an unfinished novel, and eventually shoots Stephen Albert to communicate the location of a British artillery park. Those two stories appear along with "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" in Borges's collection Ficciones. Borges also wrote "The Aleph," whose title location contains all other points in space.
Jorge Luis Borges
This play is really a trilogy, consisting of "Homecoming," "The Hunted," and "The Haunted." Though it is set in post-Civil War New England, O'Neill used Aeschylus's tragedy The Oresteia as the basis for the plot. Lavinia Mannon desires revenge against her mother, Christine, who with the help of her lover Adam Brant has poisoned Lavinia's father Ezra; Lavinia persuades her brother Orin to kill Brant. A distressed Christine commits suicide, and, after Orin and Lavinia flee to the South Seas, Orin cannot stand the guilt and kills himself as well, leaving Lavinia in the house alone.
Mourning Becomes Electra (Eugene O'Neill)
An American author whose stories are often set in New England. In "The Minister's Black Veil," This author wrote about Reverend Hopper, who stubbornly refuses to take off the title article of clothing. Hawthorne also wrote "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment," in which the title character shows off water from the Fountain of Youth. Both of those stories are included in his collection Twice-Told Tales. In "Rappaccini's Daughter," the title character is Beatrice, the child of a scientist who grows poisonous plants, whom herself becomes poisonous. After Giovanni falls in love with Beatrice, he brings her an antidote so they can be together, but, instead of curing her, the antidote kills Beatrice. That story appears alongside "The Birth-Mark" and "Young Goodman Brown" in the collection Mosses from an Old Manse.
Nathaniel Hawthorne
An American short story author is known for his twist endings. He included many of his stories in his collections Cabbages and Kings and The Four Million. In his story "The Gift of the Magi," the married couple Jim and Della exchange Christmas gifts. Della sells her hair to Madame Sofronie and buys a gold pocket-watch chain, while Jim sells his watch in order to buy a set of combs, rendering each other's gifts useless. This author also wrote "The Ransom of Red Chief," in which Ebenezer Dorset's son, the title character, is kidnapped by Bill and Sam, who intend to hold him for ransom. However, "Red Chief" annoys his captors so much that they pay Mr. Dorset to give him his son back.
O'Henry
A sentimental story that takes place in the village of Grover's Corners, New Hampshire just after the turn of the 20th century. Professor Willard and Editor Webb gossip on the everyday lives of town residents); "Love and Marriage" (Emily Webb and George Gibbs fall in love and marry); and "Death" (Emily dies while giving birth, and her spirit converses about the meaning of life with other dead people in the cemetery). A Stage Manager talks to the audience and serves as a narrator throughout the drama,
Our Town (Thornton Wilder)
First published complete in July 1890. In his London studio, artist Basil Hallward puts the finishing touches on his latest portrait, that of a young man. Although Lord Henry, who is visiting with Basil, asks about the young man's identity, Basil declines to answer, noting his preference for secrecy. Basil never intends to exhibit the painting, because if he did, it would bare the deepest feelings in his soul.
Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde
A play that debuted on Broadway in 1959. It portrays a few weeks in the life of the Youngers, an African-American family living on the South Side of Chicago in the 1950s. When the play opens, the Youngers are about to receive an insurance check for $10,000. This money comes from the deceased Mr. Younger's life insurance policy.
Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
An American author known for his science fiction works. "There Will Come Soft Rains," which appears in his collection The Martian Chronicles and takes its title from a Sara Teasdale poem, describes an empty house that survived a nuclear catastrophe. The house is fully automated and continues to operate even though the family is dead, a fact demonstrated by their silhouettes permanently burned on the side of the house. In his story "A Sound of Thunder," Eckels steps on a butterfly while hunting a T. Rex on a time-travel safari, which changes the future timeline so that the fascist Deutscher wins an election
Ray Bradbury
An American short story author and novelist known for her works in the mystery and horror genres. Her most famous short story is "The Lottery," whose publication in The New Yorker was extremely controversial, garnering her hate mail. The story begins with village children gathering stones, foreshadowing the end result of the title event. Mr. Summers tells all of the village families to draw slips of paper from a black box, and Bill Hutchinson's has a black spot. The entire Hutchinson family then has to draw, and Tessie receives the black spot, meaning she has "won" the title event. The story ends with her yelling "It isn't fair" as the townspeople stone her to death.
Shirley Jackson
First performed in 1664, is one of the most famous theatrical comedies by this French playwright and poet. attempts to seduce Orgon's wife, Elmire. Elmire shuts him down, then makes a deal with him: if he'll convince Orgon to let Mariane marry Valère, she won't tell Orgon about the incident. When Damis decides to tell Orgon what's happened, Orgon refuses to believe him - and disinherits him instead.
Tartuffe Molière
It is a 1982 epistolary novel. Celie, the protagonist and narrator of novel is a poor, uneducated, fourteen-year-old black girl living in rural Georgia. Celie starts writing letters to God because her father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her. Alphonso has already impregnated Celie once.
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
This American playwright chose the 1692 Salem witch trials as his setting, but the work is really an allegorical protest against the McCarthy anti-Communist "witch-hunts" of the early 1950s. In the story, Elizabeth Proctor fires the servant Abigail Williams after she finds out Abigail had an affair with her husband. In response, Abigail accuses Elizabeth of witchcraft. She stands trial and is acquitted, but then another girl accuses her husband, John, and as he refuses to turn in others, he is killed, along with the old comic figure, Giles Corey. Also notable: Judge Hathorne is a direct ancestor of the author Nathaniel Hawthorne.
The Crucible (Arthur Miller)
A portrait of drunkenness and hopeless dreams. Regular patrons of the End of the Line Café anticipate the annual arrival of Theodore "Hickey" Hickman, but in 1912 he returns to them sober. After the patrons reveal their "pipe dreams," Hickey implores them to give up those dreams and lead productive lives. The "Iceman" is supposed to represent the "death" found in reality.
The Iceman Cometh (Eugene O'Neill)
It is a play by this Irish poet and playwright . First performed on 14 February 1895 at the St James's Theatre in London. John Worthing, a carefree young gentleman, is the inventor of a fictitious brother, ___whose wicked ways afford John an excuse to leave his country home from time to time and journey to London, where he stays with his close friend and confidant, Algernon Moncrieff.
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
the novel to portray the harsh conditions and exploited lives of immigrants in the United States in Chicago and similar industrialized cities. His primary purpose in describing the meat industry and its working conditions was to advance socialism in the United States.
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Set on a plantation in 1900, this American playwright attempts to show that by this time any notion of antebellum Southern gentility has been destroyed by modern capitalism and industrialism. Three Hubbard siblings (Regina and her two brothers) scheme to earn vast riches at the expense of other family members, such as Regina's husband Horace and their daughter Alexandra. The title is taken from the Old Testament Song of Solomon: "the little foxes that spoil the vines."
The Little Foxes (Lillian Hellman)
It is a play by written in 1895 and first produced in 1896. It dramatizes the romantic and artistic conflicts between four characters: the famous middlebrow story writer Boris Trigorin, the ingenue Nina, the fading actress Irina Arkadina, and her son the symbolist playwright Konstantin Tréplev.
The Seagull by Anton Chekhov
It is an adventure novel published in 1883. Jim Hawkins is a young boy who lives at his parents' inn, the Admiral Benbow, near Bristol, England, an old sea captain named Billy Bones dies in the inn after being presented with a black spot, or official pirate verdict of guilt or judgment.
Treasure by Robert Louis Stevenson
It is a play staged in 1962. It examines the complexities of the marriage of a middle-aged couple, Martha and George. University and meet Nick and Honey, as guests, and draw them into their bitter and frustrated relationship.
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee
