Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) was an Italian dramatist, novelist, and short story writer who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934. It was Capuana who encouraged Pirandello to dedicate himself to narrative writing. In 1893, he wrote his first important work Marta Ajala, which was published in 1901 with the title L'Esclusa. In 1894, he published his first collection of short stories, Amori Senza Amore. Pirandello intensified his collaborations with newspaper editors and other journalists in magazines such as La Critica and La Tavola Rotonda in which he would publish, in 1895, the first part of the Dialogi Tra Il Gran Me e Il Piccolo Me. In 1898, with Italo Falbo and Ugo Fleres, he founded the weekly Ariel in which he published the one-act play L'Epilogo and some novellas. In 1900, he published in Marzocco some of the most celebrated of his novellas such as Lumie di Sicilia and La Paura del Sonno.

Six characters in search of an author (Methuen modern play)

Luigi Pirandello

Methuen Drama

One of the major figures of modern theater, Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936) wrote dramas and satires that sparked controversy with their radical departures from conventional theatrical techniques. His most celebrated work, Six Characters in Search of an Author, embodies the Nobel Prize-winning playwright's innovations by presenting an open-ended drama on a stage without sets. First performed in 1923, this intellectual comedy introduces six individuals to a stage where a company of actors has assembled for a rehearsal. Claiming to be the incomplete, unused creations of an author's imagination, they demand lines for a story that will explain the details of their lives. In ensuing scenes, these "real-life characters," all professing to be part of an extended family, produce a drama of sorts — punctuated by disagreements, interruptions, and arguments. In the end they are dismissed by the irate manager, their dilemma unsolved and the "truth" a matter of individual viewpoints. A tour de force exploring the many faces of reality, this classic is now available in an inexpensive edition that will be welcomed by amateur theatrical groups as well as students of drama.

Six Characters in Search of an Author (Dover Thrift Editions: Plays)

Literature & Fiction

Dramas & Plays

Dover Publications

Six Characters in Search of An Author, 1921 According to Translator Arthur Livingstone: "Six Characters in Search of an Author" has won a distinguished place in the dramatic literature of the Western world, attracting audiences and engaging intellects far removed from the particular influences which made of it a season's sensation in Italy. "Six Characters" is something more than an unusually ingenious variation of the "play within a play." It is a dramatization of the artistic process itself, in relation to the problem of reality and unreality, which has engaged Pirandello in one way or another for more than 20 years. The object of Pirandello's bitter irony is not the stage-manager, nor the theatrical producer, nor even the dramatic critic: it is the dramatist; it is the artist; it is, in the end, life itself. What are people really like? In the business of everyday life, nothing is commoner than the categorical judgment sweeping and assured in its affirmatives. But as we cut a little deeply into the living matter of the spirit, the problem becomes more complicated. Do we ever understand the whole motivation of an action—not in others only but even in ourselves? Henry VI "'Henry IV.,'" an equally strong and original variation of the insanity motive, is the first of two plays by Pirandello dealing with a special aspect of the problem of reality and unreality. The second, not yet given to the public, is Vestire gli ingnudi ("... And ye clothed me!"). In the former Pirandello studies a situation where an individual finds a world of unreality thrust upon him, voluntarily re-assuming it later on, when tragedy springs from the deeper reality. In "And ye clothed me!" we have a girl who, to fill an empty life of no importance, creates a fiction for herself, only to find it torn violently from her and to be left in a naked reality that is, after all, so unreal. These two plays indicate the present tendency of Pirandello's rapid production—a tendency that promises even richer results as this interesting author delves more extensively into the mysteries of individual psychology. "As You Like It," in the spirit of Pirandello's title in general, would have been another Shakespearean reminiscence: "... and Thinking Makes It So."

Six Characters in Search of an Author (Three Plays by Luigi Pirandello) : Includes Henry IV and Right You Are (If You Think So)

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Books by Luigi Pirandello

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Luigi Pirandello. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Six characters in search of an author (Methuen modern play)

Six Characters in Search of an Author (Dover Thrift Editions: Plays)

Six Characters in Search of an Author (Three Plays by Luigi Pirandello) : Includes Henry IV and Right You Are (If You Think So)