The Infernal Machine by Jean Cocteau (Book Analysis)


Book Description

Unlock the more straightforward side of The Infernal Machine with this concise and insightful summary and analysis! This engaging summary presents an analysis of The Infernal Machine by Jean Cocteau, which is a sometimes comical, often tragic play. The author revisits the Ancient myth of Oedipus, parodying some parts, including references to psychoanalysis and Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and highlighting the inescapable quality of the bitter fate awaiting the protagonists. The play was successful and has enjoyed many performances since its writing, although it is not Cocteau's most famous work. Find out everything you need to know about The Infernal Machine in a fraction of the time! This in-depth and informative reading guide brings you: • A complete plot summary • Character studies • Key themes and symbols • Questions for further reflection Why choose BrightSummaries.com? Available in print and digital format, our publications are designed to accompany you in your reading journey. The clear and concise style makes for easy understanding, providing the perfect opportunity to improve your literary knowledge in no time. See the very best of literature in a whole new light with BrightSummaries.com!




Letter to the Americans


Book Description

Like Alexis de Tocqueville a century earlier, Jean Cocteau offers a powerful reminder to Americans of their own potential—and issues In 1949, Jean Cocteau spent twenty days in New York, and began composing on the plane ride home this essay filled with the vivid impressions of his trip. With his unmistakable prose and graceful wit, he compares and contrasts French and American culture: the different values they place on art, literature, liberty, psychology, and dreams. Cocteau sees the incredibly buoyant hopes in America’s promise, while at the same time warning of the many ills that the nation will have to confront—its hypocrisy, sexism, racism, and hegemonic aspirations—in order to realize this potential. Never before translated into English, Letter to the Americans remains as timely and urgent as when it was first published in France over seventy years ago.




The Infernal Machine


Book Description




Les Enfants Terribles


Book Description

At home, Paul shares a private world with his sister Elisabeth, a world from which parents are tacitly excluded. Their room is where the Game is played, the Game being their own bizarre version of life. All that they do outside is effectively controlled by the rules of the Game: unfortunately the rules of the Game prescribe that the two children must die...




The Infernal Machine: & Other Plays


Book Description

Four full-length plays by one of the greatest dramatists Europe has produced. Among the great figures who pioneered the modern movement in world literature, none showed himself more versatile than France's Jean Cocteau. Poet, novelist, critic, artist, actor, film-maker, Cocteau was also one of the greatest dramatists Europe has produced, with over a dozen plays which are frequently revived, not only in France, but in translation in many other countries. For this collection, fine translations of four full-length plays, one short play, and the “Speaker's Text" for the Cocteau-Stravinsky opera Oedipus Rex have been selected. The longer plays (The Infernal Machine, Orpheus, Bacchus, Knights of the Round Table) are re-creations of classic myth and legend—poetic and highly original interpretations of certain timeless themes which have inspired great drama through the ages. The Eiffel Tower Wedding Party is, by contrast, merely a "curtain-raiser," but remarkable as un jeu d'esprit, revealing the wit and psychological penetration for which Cocteau is famous.




American Moor


Book Description

The intelligent, intuitive, indomitable, large, black, American male actor explores Shakespeare, race, and America ... not necessarily in that order. Keith Hamilton Cobb embarks on a poetic exploration that examines the experience and perspective of black men in America through the metaphor of Shakespeare's character Othello, offering up a host of insights that are by turns introspective and indicting, difficult and deeply moving. American Moor is a play about race in America, but it is also a play about who gets to make art, who gets to play Shakespeare, about whose lives and perspectives matter, about actors and acting, and about the nature of unadulterated love. American Moor has been seen across America, including a successful run off-Broadway in 2019. This edition features an introduction by Professor Kim F. Hall, Barnard College.




The Enigma of the Hour


Book Description

This book features a compendium of texts and artworks that serve to expand the themes of translation, transformation, temporality, dreams and the unconscious.The title of the book takes its inspiration from a painting by Giorgio de Chirico from 1911.Featuring works by Linder, Daniel Silver and Paloma Varga Weisz, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, Duncan Grant, Barbara Ker-Seymer with John Banting and Rodrigo Moynihan, along with items from the collection of the Freud Museum and the archive of The International Journal of Psychoanalysis.Accompanies the exhibition 'The Enigma of the Hour: 100 Years of Psychoanalytic Thought', 6 Jun - 4 Aug 2019, Freud Museum, London.Co-published with Simon Moretti.




Livre Des Sans-foyer


Book Description

"In the course of fund-raising for civilian victims of World War I, Edith Wharton assembled this monumental benefit volume by drawing upon her connections to the era's leading authors and artists. The unique compilation forms a 'Who's Who' of early 20th century culture, featuring poetry, stories, illustrations, music and other contributions from scores of luminaries. ... Much of the text is presented in both English and French. Includes an Introduction by former U. S. President Theodore Roosevelt."--




Cock and Harlequin


Book Description




Under the Volcano


Book Description

Geoffrey Firmin, a former British consul, has come to Quauhnahuac, Mexico. His debilitating malaise is drinking, an activity that has overshadowed his life. On the most fateful day of the consul's life--the Day of the Dead, 1938--his wife, Yvonne, arrives in Quauhnahuac, inspired by a vision of life together away from Mexico and the circumstances that have driven their relationship to the brink of collapse. She is determined to rescue Firmin and their failing marriage, but her mission is further complicated by the presence of Hugh, the consul's half brother, and Jacques, a childhood friend. The events of this one significant day unfold against an unforgettable backdrop of a Mexico at once magical and diabolical. Under the Volcano remains one of literature's most powerful and lyrical statements on the human condition, and a brilliant portrayal of one man's constant struggle against the elemental forces that threaten to destroy him.