The House on Parchment Street

 

I love giving chances on out-of-print children's books. This one is by Patricia McKillip who later became a fantasy writer. Apparently from the reviews I've read she got a billion times better later on, so I'll have to give her fantasy work a chance. This didn't change my life, but it was ok. It concerns a girl who moves to England to live with family. She and two boys there meet a ghost in the cellar and solve the mystery of the house. I put this on interlibrary loan which is usually the way to go with out-of-print children's books. Sure, you may get denied from time to time but it's better than taking a chance on a book that is worth more than $50. 

No Exit

 

This play was better when I read it when I was 11. This is where the quotation "Hell is other people" comes from. I felt that way when I was being bullied in elementary school, so it was more prominent then. It's still a good play though, three people are trapped in hell together and being with each other is their punishment. One is a tough guy who is really a coward, and one of the women killed a child. This one act play is riveting and depressing as they come. I've started reading another play of his The Flies this week.

A Loss of Roses

 

This was a disappointing William Inge play. It's not a classic like Picnic not even as good as The Dark at the Top of the Stairs although there were some things about it that I liked. It's about a gas station attendant still living with his mother during the depression. He is too close to his mother and it's not surprising that he starts a relationship with his mother's friend Lila who is rooming with them. Lila has dreams that he'll be the hero who will save her in the end. Things don't quite work out that way. I liked Lila's vulnerability. Warren Beatty was cast as the son and that really is perfect casting. It's too bad I couldn't have seen that production. He would have done a good job. 

Volpone

 

Ben Jonson was one of William Shakespeare's rivals at the time. Although this play is good there is just something about Shakespeare that is untimely. But then he just wasn't the best playwright of his time period, he is arguably the finest playwright in general. I guess it's an unfair comparison. In Volpone there is no likable character. It's about a rich man Volpone who sets out to dupe three men into thinking that they will be his heirs through deceitful means. Only he is cheated in the end by his servant Mosca who has been helping him all along. This would have made an awesome silent movie with someone like Conrad Veidt in the lead. It's a shame that no one envisioned this. 

The Dark at the Top of the Stairs

 

I loved William Inge's Picnic. I read it a few times when I was 11 and 12. I was thinking about that and decided to read another play from Inge. This one deals with the marriage of a salesman and his wife. After the salesman leaves after a fight, she is left with the possibility that it might have been for good. This leads to the wife begging her sister to let her family move in with them. In the family also their teenaged daughter has a tragedy happen with a friend and the lonely son is preoccupied with movies. It's too bad that the movie of this isn't available on amazon or YouTube. It didn't blow my mind like Picnic but this was a good play. I just interlibrary loaned a lesser-known William Inge play. We shall see if it is also good.