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Title: The School for Scandal (Dover Thrift Editions) by Richard Brinsley Sheridan ISBN: 0-486-26687-7 Publisher: Dover Publications Pub. Date: 01 February, 1991 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $2.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.25 (4 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Easy to Read - Great Comedy More Than Two Centuries Later
Comment: The School for Scandal was a pleasant surprise. We meet devious and unscrupulous characters, not the ragtag pickpockets found in later stories by Dickens, but self-centered members of the leisure class in London. The cast includes the appropriately named Lady Sneerwell, Mr. Snake, Mr. Crabtree, Sir Benjamin Backbite, Mrs. Candour, and the superficial Mr. Surface - individuals all too capable of undermining the most refined and honest reputations with innuendoes and ingenious fabrications.
Unlike the literature and poetry of the preceding centuries, footnotes are not needed for this late eighteenth century play. I read the entire play in a single session, and clearly this is a comedy to be relished, one whose enjoyment comes as naturally today as when it was first staged at Drury Lane theater in London in 1777.
Why does Richard Brinsley Sheridan's play still resonate with today's audience? Sheridan offers a deliciously humorous look at that fascinating and seemingly unchanging human characteristic, the propensity to gossip, to tell tales about others with only limited concern for the truth. Like Mrs. Candour, we all claim to abhor gossip, and would not ourselves consider creating fictitious tales, but are we immune from conveying stories about others, even stories which are suspect?
Lady Sneerwell rationalizes: Wounded myself in the early part of my life by the envenomed tongue of slander, I have since known no pleasure equal to the reducing others to the level of my own injured reputation.
Mr. Snake, another memorable villain, explains: I beg your ladyship ten thousand pardons: you paid me extremely liberally for the lie in question, but I unfortunately have been offered double to speak the truth.
The School for Scandal is a classic example of an English comedy of manners. The dialogue is witty and entertaining. The plot is elaborate and contrived, but always maintains interest and momentum as Sheridan brings his intertwined subplots to an entertaining and satisfactory conclusion. Along the way we encounter devious plots and counterplots, disguised identities, and outrageous behavior. It is great fun.
Rating: 4
Summary: Good satire of gabby society
Comment: Sheridan's phrase "school for scandal" is a grand metaphor for the gossipy London society of the late 1770's, and the longevity of the play that bears it as its title attests to its relevance in any place and time. Sheridan captures the inherent drama and humor in the truism that people are always talking about other people behind their backs and uses it as a foundation on which to devise a plot of intrigue.
The school's "principals" are Lady Sneerwell and a man named Snake, who like to collect gossip about their neighbors and others in London society; one of their cohorts is the brilliantly ironic character Mrs. Candour, who openly reprehends idle gossip but blithely participates in it anyway. One of their favorite subjects of gossip is the Surface brothers, Joseph and Charles. The popular perception is that Joseph is responsible and respectable, while Charles is a wastrel and a miscreant.
The Surface brothers' uncle, Sir Oliver Surface, returns to London after spending many years in India, hears the rumors about his nephews, and decides to verify them for the purpose of choosing an heir between the two. Since he has been gone so long that his nephews would not recognize him, he visits them incognito. Posing as a moneylender to Charles, and as a poor relative to Joseph, he discovers that his nephews are not quite of the natures he has been led to believe.
Sheridan employs some typical comedic devices like love triangles and hiding characters, but for the most part this is an inventive play that picks its targets well and hits the bullseye every time. Considering it was written at such a turbulent time in England's history, it's interesting that social satire still managed to break through greater national concerns and be successful and appreciated.
Rating: 4
Summary: Delightfully Scandalous
Comment: This book made it fun and delightful to follow how rumors and scandals are started. Anyone who wants a ligth hearted read in the style of a Shakespearean comedy, "School for Scandal" by Richard Sheridan is for you. It has the most entertaining characters, who anyone could recognize as being people they know and are friends with, and it pokes fun at soap-opera-like dramas that have forbidden loves and misleading coincidences. The situations that arise seem so unthinkable and impossible, and then you realize that you or someone you know has been there right down to the last detail. "School for Scandal" is a entertaining read for anyone who has ever passed on a rumor.
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Title: The Rivals by Richard Brinsley Sheridan ISBN: 0486404331 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 20 October, 1998 List Price(USD): $1.50 |
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Title: She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith ISBN: 0486268675 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 01 June, 1991 List Price(USD): $2.00 |
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Title: The Prince of Homburg by Heinrich Von Kleist, Bernard Sahlins, Heinrich Von Kleist ISBN: 0929587448 Publisher: Ivan R Dee, Inc. Pub. Date: December, 1990 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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Title: Woyzeck by Georg Bchner, Nicholas Rudall, Georg Buchner ISBN: 1566634490 Publisher: Ivan R Dee, Inc. Pub. Date: January, 2003 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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Title: The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde ISBN: 0486264785 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 01 July, 1990 List Price(USD): $1.00 |
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