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by Stephen S. Stanton (Editor)
In this classic anthology of French drama, Stephen S. Stanton has assembled the nineteenth century's finest "well-made plays" The Glass of Water and A Peculiar Position by Eugene Scribe; Camille by Alexander Dumas fils; Olympe's Marriage by Emile Augier; A Scrap of Paper by Victorien Sardou. In an incisive introduction, Stanton fully diagrams these works and their seminal influence on modern theater. Whether Dumas's risqu? study of courtesan love in Camille, or Augier's counterattack on the dangers of sentimentalizing such passions in Olympe's Marriage, these plays not only brilliantly evoke Second Empire and Third Republic French culture but also introduce domestic themes and theatrical devices that have influenced Western drama for the last one hundred and fifty years.
Author Biography
Stephen S. Stanton was born in 1915 at Ann Arbor, Michigan. Graduating from Harvard in 1938, he taught English at St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire, and acquired a master's degree from the University of Michigan before he joined the Naval Reserve in 1942. After the war Mr. Stanton was an instructor in English at Williams College, the University of Michigan, and Barnard College. In 1955 he received his doctorate in English and comparative literature from Colombia University. He was professor of English in the College of Engineering, University of Michigan, until his retirement in 1982. Currently he is professor emeritus at the university.
