A Number - Softcover

Churchill, Caryl

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1559362251 ISBN 13: 9781559362252

Publisher: Theatre Communications Group, 2003

Synopsis

Caryl Churchill, hailed by Tony Kushner as "the greatest living English language playwright," has turned her extraordinary dramatic gifts to the subject of human cloning how might a man feel to discover that he is only one in a number of identical copies. And which one of him is the original. . . ?

Churchill’s harrowing bioethics fable leaves us with a number of things to chew on.” Kris Vire, Time Out Chicago

A Number confirms Churchill’s status as the first dramatist of the 21st century. On the face of it, it is human cloning Like all Churchill’s best plays, A Number deals with both the essentials and the extremities of human experience The questions this brilliant, harrowing play asks are almost unanswerable, which is why they must be asked.” Sunday Times

Caryl Churchill’s magnificent new play only last an hour but contains more drama, and more ideas, than most writers manage in a dozen full-length works.” Daily Telegraph

Caryl Churchill has written for the stage, television and radio. A renowned and prolific playwright, her plays include Cloud Nine, Top Girls, Far Away, Drunk Enough to Say I Love You?, Bliss, Love and Information, Mad Forest and A Number. In 2002, she received the Obie Lifetime Achievement Award and 2010, she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

About this title

About the Author

Caryl Churchill (1938-) is probably the most respected woman dramatist in the English-speaking world. She is the author of some twenty plays including Light Shining in Buckinghamshire, Cloud Nine, Top Girls, Serious Money, The Skriker, Blue Heart, Far Away and A Number, seen and admired all over the world. CARYL CHURCHILL's plays include "Cloud Nine" (revived in 2007 to huge acclaim at the Almeida, London), "Top Girls", "Serious Money", "The Skriker", "Blue Heart", "Far Away" and "A Number". Most are published by NHB.

Review

A Number confirms Chuchill’s status as the first dramatist of the 21st century. On the face of it, it is human cloning Like all Churchill’s best plays, A Number deals with both the essentials and the extremities of human experience The questions of this brilliant, harrowing play asks are almost unanswerable, which is why they must be asked” Sunday Times

Caryl Churchill’s magnificent new play only last an hour but contains more drama, and more ideas, than most writers manage in a dozen full-length works.” Daily Telegraph

Caryl Churchill’s never stands still. After the dystopian nightmare of Far Away, she now comes up with a challenging new form of moral inquiry. And the key question she asks in this play is from what the essential core of self derives: from nature or nurture, genetic inheritance or environmental circumstance?” Guardian

Churchill’s harrowing bioethics fable leaves us with a number of things to chew on.” Kris Vire, Time Out Chicago

Stunning A Number, you see, is a gripping dramatic consideration of what happens to autonomous identity in a world where people can be cloned. The invaluable Ms. Churchill has not begun to stop surprising and unbalancing theatergoers. Since the 1970's this British dramatist has produced studies of a world quaking under constant siege in which style somehow always uniquely mirrors content. She has pondered mutations in gender (Cloud Nine) and language (Blue Heart), as well as the seismic disruptions of revolution (Mad Forest), civil war (Far Away) and environmental poisoning (The Skriker). She has now moved on to ponder a threat to the very cornerstone of Western civilization since the Renaissance: the idea of human individuality, a subject she manages to probe in depth in a mere hour of spartan sentences and silences. It is hard to think of another contemporary playwright who combines such economy of means and breadth of imagination.” -- Ben Brantley, New York Times



“A Number confirms Chuchill’s status as the first dramatist of the 21st century. On the face of it, it is human cloning... Like all Churchill’s best plays, A Number deals with both the essentials and the extremities of human experience... The questions of this brilliant, harrowing play asks are almost unanswerable, which is why they must be asked” – Sunday Times

“Caryl Churchill’s magnificent new play only last an hour but contains more drama, and more ideas, than most writers manage in a dozen full-length works.” – Daily Telegraph

“Caryl Churchill’s never stands still. After the dystopian nightmare of Far Away, she now comes up with a challenging new form of moral inquiry. And the key question she asks in this play is from what the essential core of self derives: from nature or nurture, genetic inheritance or environmental circumstance?” – Guardian

“Churchill’s harrowing bioethics fable leaves us with a number of things to chew on.” – Kris Vire, Time Out Chicago

“Stunning... A Number, you see, is a gripping dramatic consideration of what happens to autonomous identity in a world where people can be cloned. The invaluable Ms. Churchill has not begun to stop surprising and unbalancing theatergoers. Since the 1970's this British dramatist has produced studies of a world quaking under constant siege in which style somehow always uniquely mirrors content. She has pondered mutations in gender (Cloud Nine) and language (Blue Heart), as well as the seismic disruptions of revolution (Mad Forest), civil war (Far Away) and environmental poisoning (The Skriker). She has now moved on to ponder a threat to the very cornerstone of Western civilization since the Renaissance: the idea of human individuality, a subject she manages to probe in depth in a mere hour of spartan sentences and silences. It is hard to think of another contemporary playwright who combines such economy of means and breadth of imagination.” -- Ben Brantley, New York Times

About this edition

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1559362251
• ISBN 13: 9781559362252
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 64