Product Description

Tom Stoppard's new play is centered around A.E.Housman, poet and Classics scholar, whose most famous poem was A Shropshire Lad. This new play premiered at the Royal National Theatre in 1997, directed by Richard Eyre.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #59668 in Books
• Published on: 1997-10-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 106 pages

Customer Reviews

Wit and scholarship on the banks of the Styx
As the play begins, A.E. Housman-- that most classical of English lyric poets-- has just died and is being escorted by Charon to the Underworld. As they cross the River Styx, Housman sees his earlier self in a boat with his collegiate friends, and thus "The Invention of Love" is set into motion. Discussions of scholarship and literature, including Housman's wickedly astute jibes at his less able classical "peers," ensue, as does Stoppard's exploration of Housman's presumed homosexuality, which threatens to swamp the second act with a sort of too earnest apologia for "Greek love." Nevertheless, the play is often laugh-out-loud funny, and the intellectual currents running through it would power a dozen American dramas. Definitely a must-have, and a worthy sequel to "Arcadia."

Deserves closer attention
After reading and seeing on stage Tom Stoppard's masterpiece Arcadia, I went on a Stoppard reading spree, ending on The Invention of Love, a difficult play that is definitely less approachable at a first glance than for instance The Real Thing. However, it is a play that rewards closer attention, and the writing - as always - is wonderful. All in all, The Invention of Love is a beautiful and moving elegiac play about a man who couldn't (or wouldn't) let himself live his love.