blogis librorum. A blog about books. Rare books.

Maurice Maeterlinck was a Belgian playwright and essayist who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911. If Maeterlinck’s name is new to you, as it may well be, it’s likely because his work is of an uncommon variety. What has certainly hurt the playwright’s longevity is that he chose to pick sides...and lost. Maeterlinck staunchly resisted the aesthetic tides of naturalism and realism, instead aligning himself with the aims and sensibilities of the Symbolist movement. The problem is, of course, that the realistic style has prevailed to this day, while Symbolism has ostensibly perished. Yet, Maeterlinck’s defiance of the dominant trend helped him to admirably explore his principle concern: What lies behind the mysteries of life?

“More light!” —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s last words

In a letter to Carl Friedrich Zelter, the iconic German poet and playwright Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, “All poetry is supposed to be instructive but in an unnoticeable manner; it is supposed to make us aware of what it would be valuable to instruct ourselves in; we must deduce the lesson on our own, just as with life.” If his words are to be taken at face value, that makes Goethe himself one of the most valuable teachers the world has ever known.

There is an often unthought-of tension between the stage’s representation of drama and the play in its written form. Neoclassical considerations of the stage as immoral, temporary, and material were in stark contrast to its view of printed literature as immortal, spiritual, and morally grounded. These complications have a long history, beginning with Platonic forms, leading all the way to the boom of print culture in renaissance England. Here, we explore a brief history of drama as literature.

“All Shaw's characters are himself: mere puppets stuck up to spout Shaw.”
-Fanny’s First Play (1911), Epilogue

It’s how Inside the Actor’s Studio host James Lipton concludes each interview. A handful of questions adopted from famed French interviewer and journalist Bernard Pivot, Lipton’s inquiries are designed to not only entertain but also probe the psyches of his guests to discover what turns them on, turns them off, moves them, and makes them tick. Lipton gives a nod to Pivot as his inspiration for the final segment of each episode, and he also briefly acknowledges Marcel Proust — author of the seminal novel À la recherche du temps perdu, or In Search of Lost Time — who popularized the questionnaire in the early part of the 20th century and from whom the questionnaire received its name. 

“It seems pointless to be quoted if one isn’t going to be quotable…
it’s better to be quotable than honest.”
–Tom Stoppard, 1973

Many are, no doubt, familiar with Tom Stoppard’s work without being aware of it.The prolific Czech-born British playwright’s talents extend beyond the stage to the screen and the radio.Not only will many who would otherwise avoid absurdist drama have delighted in his 1988 Oscar-winning film Shakespeare in Love, still others will have seen 1989's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade without knowing that Stoppard had a hand it.

In 1901, a young James Joyce was rapidly approaching the end of his studies at Trinity College, Dublin. A quick glance at the legendary author’s corpus, and it is easy enough to discern what he must have studied at school. Traces of St Augustine can be identified throughout his beloved bildungsroman A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), just as a familiarity with Homeric epics must have been a necessity for his great undertaking, Ulysses (1922). These pieces were no doubt common to the reading lists of many of that era’s scholars. Where Joyce’s education may have departed slightly from the norm, however, was in his decision to study the Dano-Norwegian language. While Dano-Norwegian might not have the pedigree of Latin or Greek, or the immediately associated classics of most romance languages, it had one significant draw for the young James Joyce: Henrik Ibsen.

In 1983, Arthur Miller directed his masterpiece, Death of a Salesman, for an audience in China. At the time - in the midst of the Cold War - Communist China was viewed by many as an opposite cultural pole to the capitalist America dramatized in Miller’s famous tragedy. As a result, bringing to life the Brooklyn of the 1940s for a Chinese audience in the 80s was a momentous task for the performers. But, Miller was deliberate in shifting the focus from matters of national and cultural identity. On the first day of rehearsal, Miller said, "the first thing I want to discuss with you is the problem of how to act like Americans. The answer is very simple...You must not attempt to act like Americans at all...One of my main motives in coming here is to try to show that there is only one humanity."

This week we celebrate Mitch Albom, bestselling author, playwright, musician, and philanthropist. Best known for his memoir, Tuesdays with Morrie, Albom’s books have sold over 35 million copies and have been translated into 45 languages.

As a lover of literature, you may think you know everything there is to know about Shakespeare.  After all, no other author can really claim to have influenced language and storytelling the way he has. Even if Shakespeare’s works aren’t your favorite beach read, his writing and life demand respect from anyone who loves a good book. Since your high school English classes probably missed a few turn when reviewing his biography, here are eleven facts that may surprise you!