Ostrovsky: Four Plays


Book Description

Three comedies and a tragedy by one of Russia's greatest playwrights.




Four Plays


Book Description

Includes the plays The Forest, Artistes and Admirers, Wolves and Sheep and Sin and Sorrow Four of Ostrovskys finest plays. The best known of these, The Forest (1871), has two young lovers in thrall to their tyrannical elders, who are prevented from marrying until a pair of strolling actors come to their rescue. In Artistes and Admirers (1881), a comedy of theatre life, a dedicated young actress renounces both love and fortune in order to pursue her sacred calling. In the comedy Wolves and Sheep (1875) Ostrovsky returns to a favourite theme, the double-dealing and hypocrisy of the Russian landowning classes, while the melodrama Sin and Sorrow (1863) explores the tragic consequences of a bored provincial wifes brief affair.




Without a Dowry and Other Plays


Book Description

Contemporary of Turgenev, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy and precursor to Chekhov, he was a keen sociological observer, often exposing abuses of power, landing him in trouble with the censors again and again. He wrote 47 original plays and began the tradition of acting today associated with Stanislavsky. Ostrovsky’s plays were written with performance in mind and with a masterful use of colloquial language. To this day they are a much-performed part of the Russian repertory. Â This volume collects four of Ostrovsky’s key plays, each from a different decade—A Profitable Position, An Ardent Heart, Without a Dowry, and Talents and Admirers, and is rounded out by the translator’s introduction, an afterword for each play, an extensive bibliography, and complete list of Ostrovsky’s works.




Plays


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Four Russian Plays


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The Invention of Russia


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WINNER OF THE ORWELL PRIZE WINNER OF THE CORNELIUS RYAN AWARD FINALIST FOR THE LIONEL GELBER PRIZE FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR “Fast-paced and excellently written…much needed, dispassionate and eminently readable.” —New York Times “Filled with sparkling prose and deep analysis.” –The Wall Street Journal The breakup of the Soviet Union was a time of optimism around the world, but Russia today is actively involved in subversive information warfare, manipulating the media to destabilize its enemies. How did a country that embraced freedom and market reform 25 years ago end up as an autocratic police state bent once again on confrontation with America? A winner of the Orwell Prize, The Invention of Russia reaches back to the darkest days of the cold war to tell the story of Russia's stealthy and largely unchronicled counter revolution. A highly regarded Moscow correspondent for the Economist, Arkady Ostrovsky comes to this story both as a participant and a foreign correspondent. His knowledge of many of the key players allows him to explain the phenomenon of Valdimir Putin - his rise and astonishing longevity, his use of hybrid warfare and the alarming crescendo of his military interventions. One of Putin's first acts was to reverse Gorbachev's decision to end media censorship and Ostrovsky argues that the Russian media has done more to shape the fate of the country than its politicians. Putin pioneered a new form of demagogic populism --oblivious to facts and aggressively nationalistic - that has now been embraced by Donald Trump.










The Soviet Theater


Book Description

In this monumental work, Laurence Senelick and Sergei Ostrovsky offer a panoramic history of Soviet theater from the Bolshevik Revolution to the eventual collapse of the USSR. Making use of more than eighty years’ worth of archival documentation, the authors celebrate in words and pictures a vital, living art form that remained innovative and exciting, growing, adapting, and flourishing despite harsh, often illogical pressures inflicted upon its creators by a totalitarian government. It is the first comprehensive analysis of the subject ever to be published in the English language.




By Way of Deception


Book Description

The first time the Mossad came calling, they wanted Victor Ostrovsky for their assassination unit, the kidon. He turned them down. The next time, he agreed to enter the grueling three-year training program to become a katsa, or intelligence case officer, for the legendary Israeli spy organization. By Way of Deception is the explosive chronicle of his experiences in the Mossad, and of two decades of their frightening and often ruthless covert activities around the world. Penetrating far deeper than the bestselling Every Spy a Prince, it is an insider's account of Mossad tactics and exploits. In chilling detail, Ostrovsky asserts that the Mossad refused to share critical knowledge of a planned suicide mission in Beirut, leading to the death of hundreds of U.S. Marines and French troops. He tells how they tracked Yasser Arafat by recruiting his driver and bodyguard; how they withheld information on the whereabouts of American hostages, paving the way for the Iran-Contra scandal; and how their intervention into secret UN negotiations led to the sudden resignation of ambassador Andrew Young and the downfall of his career. By Way of Deception describes the shocking scope and depth of the Mossad's influence, disclosing how Jewish communities in the U.S., Europe, and South America are armed and trained by the organization in secret ?self-defense? units, and how Mossad agents facilitate the drug trade in order to pay the enormous costs of its far-flung, clandestine operation. And it portrays a network that has grown dangerously out of control, as internal squabbles have led to the escape of terrorists and the pursuit of ?policies? completely at odds with the interests of the state of Israel. This document is possibly the most important and controversial book of its kind since Spycatcher.