Top Girls / Edition 2

by Caryl Churchill

Overview

Marlene hosts a dinner party in a London restaurant to celebrate her promotion to managing director of 'Top Girls' employment agency. Her guests are five women from the past: Isabella Bird (1831- 1904) - the adventurous traveller; Lady Nijo (b1258) - the mediaeval courtesan who became a Buddhist nun and travelled on foot through Japan; Dull Gret, who as Dulle Griet in a Bruegel painting, led a crowd of women on a charge through hell; Pope Joan - the transvestite early female pope and last but not least Patient Griselda, an obedient wife out of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. As the evening continues we are involved with the stories of all five women and the impending crisis in Marlene's own life. A classic of contemporary theatre, Churchill's play is seen as a landmark for a new generation of playwrights. It was premiered by the Royal Court in 1982.

"Top Girls has a combination of directness and complexity which keeps you both emotionally and intellectually alert. You can smell life, and at the same time feel locked in an argument with an agile and passionate mind." (John Peter, Sunday Times)

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780413554802
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	09/24/2009
Series:	Modern Classics
Edition description:	REVISED
Pages:	96
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.24(d)

About the Author

Caryl Churchill has written for the stage, television and radio. Her acclaimed body of work also includes Three More Sleepless Nights (1980); Top Girls (1982); Fen (1983); Mouthful of Birds (1986); Serious Money (1989); The Skriker (1984); Blue/Heart (1998) and Far Away in Autumn (2000) which transferred to the West End.

Table of Contents

Chronology (Churchill's life and work, alongside significant political, social and cultural events)

Contexts

* Historical contexts (women's rights/advancement; Thatcher's Britain)
* Theatrical contexts (The Royal Court; Max Stafford Clark; production history; critical responses)
* The play today (an interview with David Shirley, director of the play in 2014)

Themes

* Women and work
* Female Genealogy: Mothers and daughters (killing your mother; giving up your daughter); sisters (and sisterhood); 'Herstory'/re-finding women's histories
* Women's ability/freedom to occupy multiple/conflicting roles
* Women aping masculine behaviour/dress/passing as men
* 'Getting away'/freedom/travel/social mobility
* Class (individualism vs socialism; economic/social mobility; materialism vs human compassion; 'successful' women ignoring the plight of less fortunate women)

Dramatic Technique

* Language
* Structure
* Characterisation/multi-roling

Academic Debate (including suggestions for further reading)

Related Work

Play Text (with on-page glossing/notes)

Glossary of Dramatic Terms

Editorial Reviews

Top Girls has a combination of directness and complexity which keeps you both emotionally and intellectually alert. You can smell life and at the same time feel locked in an argument with an agile and passionate mind.” —Sunday Times

“Ms. Churchill is one of the best writers...her play is brilliantly conceived with considerable wit to illuminate the underlying deep human seriousness of her theme.” —Spectator

“A dramatist who must surely be rated among the half-dozen best now writing a playwright of genuine audacity and assurance, able to use her considerable wit and intelligence in ways at once unusual, resonant and dramatically riveting.” —New Statesman

From the Publisher

A dramatist who must surely be rated among the half-dozen best now writing a playwright of genuine audacity and assurance, able to use her considerable wit and intelligence in ways at once unusual, resonant and dramatically riveting.

New Statesman

Ms. Churchill is one of the best writers...her play is brilliantly conceived with considerable wit to illuminate the underlying deep human seriousness of her theme.

Spectator

Top Girls has a combination of directness and complexity which keeps you both emotionally and intellectually alert. You can smell life and at the same time feel locked in an argument with an agile and passionate mind.

Sunday Times

Top Girls has a combination of directness and complexity which keeps you both emotionally and intellectually alert. You can smell life, and at the same time feel locked in an argument with an agile and passionate mind.

The Sunday Times

When the curtain rises, Marlene has just gotten a promotion and is celebrating with a group of overachieving women of history. Next comes a montage of her at the employment agency where she works. Finally, comes a tense reunion with her sister and the daughter Marlene abandoned. This celebrated allegorical stage play of 1982 presents several difficulties for the audio producer. It requires eight women on mike at once, and much of the dialogue overlaps. Without visual cues, how to keep things clear? It helps to have a terrific cast, such as this one. Unfortunately, the director’s focus on his live audience works better for them than for his audiobook listeners, who may experience moments of confusion. Y.R. © AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine

FEB/MAR 07 - AudioFile