Visitors from another planet announce that Earth's inhabitants will be destroyed, unless they can prove that they are happy. Easier said, than done...

An “absorbing” biography of the playwright and Nobel laureate that “unflinchingly explores the darkness that dominated O’Neill’s life” (Publishers Weekly). This extraordinary biography fully captures the intimacies of Eugene O’Neill’s tumultuous life and the profound impact of his work on American drama, innovatively highlighting how the stories he told for the stage interweave with his actual life stories as well as the culture and history of his time. Much is new in this extensively researched book: connections between O’Neill’s plays and his political and philosophical worldview; insights into his Irish American upbringing and lifelong torment over losing faith in God; his vital role in African American cultural history; unpublished photographs, including a unique offstage picture of him with his lover Louise Bryant; new evidence of O’Neill’s desire to become a novelist and what this reveals about his unique dramatic voice; and a startling revelation about the release of Long Day’s Journey Into Night in defiance of his explicit instructions. This biography is also the first to discuss O’Neill’s lost play Exorcism (a single copy of which was only recently recovered), a dramatization of his own suicide attempt. Written with both a lively informality and a scholar’s strict accuracy, Eugene O’Neill: A Life in Four Acts is a biography worthy of America’s foremost playwright. “Fast-paced, highly readable . . . building to a devastating last act.” —Irish Times

If: A Play in Four Acts by Lord Dunsany: Experience the world of drama and fantasy with Lord Dunsany's "If: A Play in Four Acts." Through this play, readers are transported to a realm where imaginative storytelling, allegory, and thought-provoking themes take center stage. Key Aspects of the Book "If: A Play in Four Acts by Lord Dunsany": Dramatic Exploration: "If" invites readers to engage with the world of drama, where characters, dialogue, and plot unfold on the stage, allowing for a unique and immersive reading experience. Allegorical Themes: The play delves into allegorical themes that invite readers to interpret symbolic elements and contemplate deeper meanings within the narrative. Imaginative World-Building: Dunsany's imaginative storytelling transports readers to a fantastical realm where the boundaries of reality and imagination blur. Lord Dunsany was an Irish author known for his contributions to fantasy, drama, and imaginative storytelling. Through If: A Play in Four Acts, Dunsany invites readers to engage with a play that combines allegory, drama, and a touch of the fantastical.

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THE STORY: is a modern version of the Cinderella fable, writes Atkinson, in the Times. It is set on Long Island in the 1950s, and deals with the involvement of a very rich family named Larrabee with Sabrina Fairchild, the daughter of their family

CARLOTTA. Yes, yes! Please! Quick! You see I must go-now, at once. And I can't possibly be seen in the street without something on my head. LOUISA (to herself as she leaves room, L.). Talk about swallowing a camel and straining at a gnat! Stops out all night, but she can't possibly be seen in the street without a hat. -from Scene II Arnold Bennett is considered one of the greatest novelists of the early 20th century, yet his work is all but forgotten today. This 1919 play, based on his novel of the same name (also known as The Book of Carlotta), is a delightful romp, a comedy of sexual manners and mores, of cads and fallen women, that reminds us that stories we suspect were ahead of their time were, in fact, very much of their moment. British writer ARNOLD BENNETT (1867-1931) wrote both fiction and nonfiction, but he is best known for the novels Anna of the Five Towns (1902), Buried Alive (1908), and Clayhanger (1910).