Schiller: Volume One: The Robbers; Passion and Politics

by Friedrich Schiller, Robert David MacDonald

Overview

Includes the plays The Robbers and Passion and Politics

Two plays concerned with tyranny and freedom. Schiller's first play, The Robbers (1781), was written in great secrecy under the prison like conditions of Württenberg's Karlsschule: Karl, the son of a count, is disinherited through the machinations of his brother Franz, and, turbaning his back on a social order he finds unjust and corrupt, becomes the leader of a band of robbers.

In Passion and Politics (1784), a 'bourgeoise tragedy', the love between Louise, a musician's daughter, and Ferdinand, a politician's son, crosses an unbridgeable social divide.

One of the great figures in German literature, Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805) was one of the most significant playwright of his day, numbering among his devotees Coleridge and Carlyle. His plays are known for their originality of form, vivid stage imagery and powerful language, faithfully rendered in Robert David MacDonald's acclaimed translations.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781840026184
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	09/01/2006
Series:	Oberon Classics
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	276
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Robert David MacDonald (1929 - 2004) was born in Elgin, Scotland. After originally training as a musician, he worked as a Director, Playwright and Translator. As an Assistant Director, he worked at both the Glyndebourbane Opera Festival and for the Royal Opera House. In 1971, he became Co-Artistic Director of the Glasgow Citizens Theatre, where he directed fifty plays and wrote fifteen for the venue before his retirement in 2003. The plays that he wrote for the Glasgow Citz include The De Sade Show (1975), Chinchilla (1977), Summit Conference (1978), also seen in the West End with Glenda Jackson and Gary Oldman, A Waste of Time (1980), Don Juan (1980), Webster (1983), Britannicus (2002) and Cheri (2003). As a translator, MacDonald translated over seventy different plays and opera from over ten different languages including The Threepenny Opera, Tamerlano, Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail, The Marriage of Figaro, Orpheus and The Human Voice, Conversation at Night, Shadow of Angels, The Balcony, The Government Inspector, Tasso, Faust I and II, Ibsen's Brand and Hedda Gabler, Lermontov's Maskerade, Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba, Moliere's School for Wives and Don Juan, Pirandello's Enrico Four, Racine's Phedre, Schiller's Mary Stuart, The Maid of Orleans and Don Carlos, Chekhov's The Seagull, Verne's Around the World In Eighty Days, Wedekind's Lulu and Goethe's Clavigo. His adaptation of War and Peace ran for two seasons on Broadway and received an Emmy award when shown on U.S television. The Finborough Theatre has previously presented Robert David MacDonald's versions of Rolf Hochhuth's Soldiers (2004) and The Representative (2006)