While writers, dramatists and film-makers have already found inspiration in Orton's colourful life story, this Casebook comprises the first collection of scholarly criticism to investigate the works, life and legacy of the controversial playwright.

Though Orton’s roots lay in traditions as diverse as those represented by such writers as Wycherley, Congreve, Wilde, Shaw, Carroll, Firbank, Feydeau, Beckett and Pinter, he developed a form of ‘anarchic farce’ which was very much his own – hence the word ‘Ortonesque’. His work was deliberately subversive, not merely of the authority figures which he included in nearly all his plays, but of language and the congenialities of plot and character. Originally published in 1982, this study examines Orton’s principal plays, but its main concern is to identify his aesthetic, to elaborate the nature and achievements of anarchic farce and to locate him in relation to the developments in contemporary literature and art which have formed essential components of a post-modern sensibility.

A Study Guide for Joe Orton's "Entertaining Mr. Sloane," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Drama For Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Drama For Students for all of your research needs.

A Study Guide for Joe Orton's "What the Butler Saw," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Drama For Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Drama For Students for all of your research needs.

Seminar paper from the year 1999 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1 (A), Ruhr-University of Bochum (English Seminar), course: Advanced seminar: types of modern english comedy, 6 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: 1. Introduction There are certain characteristics in Joe Orton's plays that are very typical and of distinctive significance. The aspect of gender roles is one of those characteristics. The purpose of this paper is to explain, why the aspect of gender roles is so important, which different concepts of gender roles we can distinguish in Orton's plays and, eventually, to show and explain those different concepts explicitly at three selected plays. 2. What are gender roles? Before we are going to discuss the impact of gender roles in Orton's plays, we should give a short definition of what is meant by this term. Sex and gender are two terms that have to be clearly distinguished from each other. Whereas the term sex means the natural sex of a person, animal or thing, the term gender is aimed at the grammatical and sociological system of sex-references. In the German language, e.g., the grammatical gender of a girl is neuter (das M dchen) although her natural sex is, of course, feminine. In our context the term gender refers to the different concepts of roles that exist in society, i.e. different sets of norms for behaviour that are associated with being either feminine or masculine and thus create sexual identity. A traditional concept of the feminine role would, for instance, be the one of the housewife and mother, staying at home, cooking and looking after the children. Accordingly, the traditional concept of the masculine role would be the one of the hard-working head of the family. Of course, there are lots of other concepts, some of which we will find in Orton's plays.

Contents: The Nature of Farce; A.W. Pinero and the Court Farces; Ben Travers and the Aldwych Farces; Brian Rix and the Whitehall Farces; Post-Whitehall Farces; Joe Orton; Farce and Contemporary Drama: I; Farce and Contemporary Drama: II; Conclusion; ^R Appendix: a Chronological List of Plays; Notes; Bibliography; Index

I suppose I'm a believer in Original Sin. People are profoundly bad but irresistibly funny' Joe Orton. This volume contains everything that Orton wrote for the theatre, radio and television from his first play in 1964, The Ruffian on the Stair, up to his violent death in 1967 at the age of 34. It includes his major successes: Entertaining Mr Sloane, which 'made more blood boil that any other British play in the last ten years' (The Times); Loot, 'a Freudian nightmare', which sports with superstitions about death - as well as life; his farce masterpiece, What the Butler Saw; The Erpingham Camp, his version of The Bacchae, set in a Butlin's holiday resort; together with his television plays, Funeral Games and The Good and Faithful Servant. The volume includes a revealing introduction by John Lahr, Orton's official biographer."He is the Oscar Wilde of Welfare State gentility" (Observer)

The year 1956 marked a point when British drama and theater fell into the hands of a group of young playwrights who revolutionized the stage. During that time, playwrights such as Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter made the British theater as rich, varied, and vital as any national theater in history. This reference chronicles the history of British theater from 1956 to 1995 by providing detailed information about the playwrights of that period. Included are entries for some three dozen British playwrights active between 1956 and 1995. Entries are arranged alphabetically to facilitate use. Each entry supplies biographical information, the production history for particular plays, a survey of the playwright's critical reception, an assessment of the dramatist's work, and primary and secondary bibliographies. A selected, general bibliography at the end of the volume directs the reader to important sources of additional information about this period in theater history.

Contains alphabetically arranged entries that provide biographical and critical information on major and lesser-known nineteenth- and twentieth-century British writers, and includes articles on key schools of literature, and genres.

First Published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.