Cat on a Hot Tin Roof - Softcover

Williams, Tennessee

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0451144759 ISBN 13: 9780451144751

Publisher: Signet, 1958

Synopsis

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is the story of a Southern family in crisis, especially the husband and wife Brick and Maggie, and their interaction with Brick's family over the course of one evening gathering at the family estate in Mississippi. The party is to celebrate the birthday of patriarch Big Daddy Pollitt, "the Delta's biggest cotton-planter", and his return from the Ochsner Clinic with what he has been told is a clean bill of health. All family members (except Big Daddy and his wife, Big Mama) are aware he is dying of cancer. His family has lied to Big Daddy and Big Mama to spare the aging couple from pain on the patriarch's birthday but, throughout the course of the play, it becomes clear that the Pollitt family has long constructed a web of deceit for itself. Maggie, determined and beautiful, has escaped a childhood of poverty to marry into the wealthy Pollitts, but finds herself unfulfilled. The family is aware that Brick has not slept with Maggie for a long time, which has strained their marriage. Brick, an aging football hero, infuriates her by ignoring his brother Gooper's attempts to gain control of the family fortune. Brick's indifference and his drinking escalates with the recent suicide of his friend Skipper. Maggie fears that Brick's malaise will ensure that Gooper and his wife Mae end up with Big Daddy's estate. Through the evening, Brick, Big Daddy and Maggie-and the entire family-separately must face down the issues which they have bottled up inside.

About this title

About the Author

Tennessee Williams was born in 1911 in Columbus, Mississippi, where his grandfather was the episcopal clergyman. When his father, a travelling salesman, moved with his family to St Louis some years later, both he and his sister found it impossible to settle down to city life. He entered college during the Depression and left after a couple of years to take a clerical job in a shoe company. He stayed there for two years, spending the evening writing. He entered the University of Iowa in 1938 and completed his course, at the same time holding a large number of part-time jobs of great diversity. He received a Rockefeller Fellowship in 1940 for his play Battle of Angels, and he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1948 and 1955. Among his many other plays Penguin have published Summer and Smoke (1948), The Rose Tattoo (1951), Camino Real (1953), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Baby Doll (1957), Orpheus Descending (1957), Something Unspoken (1958),Suddenly Last Summer (1958), Period of Adjustment (1960), The Night of the Iguana (1961), The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore (1963), and Small Craft Warnings (1972). Tennessee Williams died in 1983.

About this edition

• Publisher: Signet
• Publication date: 1958
• ISBN 10: 0451144759
• ISBN 13: 9780451144751
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback