Martin Esslin – författare

A unique book of criticism that brings both theatre and film studies within a single theoretical framework Martin Esslin is the author of seminal critical studies such as The Theatre of the Absurd and Brecht: A Choice of Evils. Covering artists as diverse as Duchamp and Brecht, Busby Berkely and Congreve, Pinter and WC Fields, Esslin's approach is fresh and genuinely inquisitive, examining various prepared positions and testing the jargon. Taking each element of drama - the actor, the setting, the text, the music - and making provocative cross-references to stage and screen, Esslin offers a carefully argued "system" of his own, much fuller and more sensitive than anything that has gone before.

"A brilliantly perceptive study of the most ambiguous and perpetually fascinating figure of the twentieth century European theatre" (Kenneth Tynan) Brecht's influence on the theatre may well be as powerful as Kafka's influence on the novel and this study of Brecht's life and work was unanimously well received when first published just after the writer's death in 1959. This book portrays the paradox of a man whose work was admired on the Western side of the Iron Curtain despite ideological differences whilst in the East his artistic output was criticised but his communist ideas were welcomed. This authoritative text has stood the test of time

In 1958 The Birthday Party was dismissed by all but a few critics and closed after one week's run in London. Since then Harold Pinter has come to be acknowledged as "our best living playwright" (Irving Wardle, The Times) Martin Esslin's study of Pinter's plays has become a standard work since its publication in 1970. This sixth, revised edition - published to mark Pinter's 70th birthday and updated to cover his most recent plays, Moonlight, Ashes to Ashes and Celebration - offers a comprehensive survey of the whole span of Harold Pinter's writing career by one of the most distinguished commentators on modern theatre."It will certainly not be the last book on Pinter, but seems bound to remain one of the best" John Russell Taylor"Holds its place as the most straightforwardly useful account of Pinter's work to date" Times Literary Supplement

Having spent most of his career working with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Martin Esslin appraises American TV with the eyes of both a detached outsider and a concerned insider. "American popular culture," writes Esslin, "has become the popular culture of the world at large. American television is thus more than a purely social phenomenon. It fascinates and in some instances frightens the whole world."The Age of Television discusses television as an essentially dramatic form of communication, pointing to the strengths and weaknesses that spring from its character. It explores its impact on generations destined to grow up under its influence, with such questions as how TV turns reality into fiction, and fiction into reality. Esslin considers the long-term effects of television on our abilities to reason, to read, to create. He asks if current programming on American television constitutes what we want and deserve, and asks what we would change, if we could. These are but a handful of the questions Esslin probes in this penetrating analysis of contemporary television and its impact on our lives.In his new introduction, Esslin discusses changes in the media over the last two decades. He explores the increasing number of television stations available, the rise of "boutique" channels concentrating on news, sports, or film, and the relationship between television and other forms of electronic media such as video games and the Internet. Finally, he considers the effect of these developments on our ability to concentrate, our sensitivity to violence, and even our artistic taste. Most compelling of all is his final question: Can the Age of Television, with all its dangers, yet become a golden age of cultural growth?Martin Esslin is professor emeritus of drama at Stanford University. His numerous critical works include: Brecht-The Man and his Work, The Theatre of the Absurd, An Anatomy of Drama, and Artaud. He currently resides in London, England.

It is against this background of the theater's high prestige as a forum for ideas, as the summit of the literary arts, as the place where all the arts coalesce in a Wagnerian 'Gesamtkunstwerk' or dialectically oppose and ironize each other in Brechtian epic 'alienation, ' of the drama as a method of thought, of concrete philosophizing, that the astounding wealth of critical and theoretical writings about drama and theater that the German-speaking world has produced over the last two hundred and fifty years must be seen and appreciated.

First published in 1977, the third edition of Pinter is an excellent analysis of Harold Pinter and his works. Written when Pinter was only a few plays old, the book draws on several sources, including interviews with Pinter himself, to comment on Pinter’s career, his aesthetic and philosophical choices, and his oeuvre as a writer. The section devoted to his individual plays has been arranged in a chronological manner to visually represent the growth of the playwright and the relationship shared between his early and later works. Esslin, known for coining the term ‘theatre of the absurd,’ was himself an inspiration to Pinter and hence, the book records an intellectual and creative exchange between the author and his subject. The book will be of interest to students of literature, drama, history as well as to an academically inclined theatre audience.

First published in 1977, the third edition of Pinter is an excellent analysis of Harold Pinter and his works. Written when Pinter was only a few plays old, the book draws on several sources, including interviews with Pinter himself, to comment on Pinter’s career, his aesthetic and philosophical choices, and his oeuvre as a writer. The section devoted to his individual plays has been arranged in a chronological manner to visually represent the growth of the playwright and the relationship shared between his early and later works. Esslin, known for coining the term ‘theatre of the absurd,’ was himself an inspiration to Pinter and hence, the book records an intellectual and creative exchange between the author and his subject. The book will be of interest to students of literature, drama, history as well as to an academically inclined theatre audience.

First published in 1980, Mediations supplements, extends, and deepens Martin Esslin’s earlier writings on Samuel Beckett and Bertolt Brecht. In the third section of this collection of essays, Esslin discusses the mass media as dramatic art and their effects – radio as a medium for drama; television’s insatiable appetite for artistic skills, its commercials, and its series, which he labels modern folk epics. Intimately acquainted with the cultural implications of several languages and ideologies and with the possibility for distortion inherent in translating them, Esslin’s Mediations gathers together decades of his rich experience and reflections on cross linguistic and artistic boundaries, as well as theatre. This book will be of interest to students of literature, drama, and media studies.

First published in 1980, Mediations supplements, extends, and deepens Martin Esslin’s earlier writings on Samuel Beckett and Bertolt Brecht. In the third section of this collection of essays, Esslin discusses the mass media as dramatic art and their effects – radio as a medium for drama; television’s insatiable appetite for artistic skills, its commercials, and its series, which he labels modern folk epics. Intimately acquainted with the cultural implications of several languages and ideologies and with the possibility for distortion inherent in translating them, Esslin’s Mediations gathers together decades of his rich experience and reflections on cross linguistic and artistic boundaries, as well as theatre. This book will be of interest to students of literature, drama, and media studies.

Having spent most of his career working with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Martin Esslin appraises American TV with the eyes of both a detached outsider and a concerned insider. "American popular culture," writes Esslin, "has become the popular culture of the world at large. American television is thus more than a purely social phenomenon. It fascinates and in some instances frightens the whole world."The Age of Television discusses television as an essentially dramatic form of communication, pointing to the strengths and weaknesses that spring from its character. It explores its impact on generations destined to grow up under its influence, with such questions as how TV turns reality into fiction, and fiction into reality. Esslin considers the long-term effects of television on our abilities to reason, to read, to create. He asks if current programming on American television constitutes what we want and deserve, and asks what we would change, if we could. These are but a handful of the questions Esslin probes in this penetrating analysis of contemporary television and its impact on our lives.In his new introduction, Esslin discusses changes in the media over the last two decades. He explores the increasing number of television stations available, the rise of "boutique" channels concentrating on news, sports, or film, and the relationship between television and other forms of electronic media such as video games and the Internet. Finally, he considers the effect of these developments on our ability to concentrate, our sensitivity to violence, and even our artistic taste. Most compelling of all is his final question: Can the Age of Television, with all its dangers, yet become a golden age of cultural growth?Martin Esslin is professor emeritus of drama at Stanford University. His numerous critical works include: Brecht-The Man and his Work, The Theatre of the Absurd, An Anatomy of Drama, and Artaud. He currently resides in London, England.