Three Uses of the Knife

On the Nature and Purpose of Drama

Nonfiction, Entertainment, Performing Arts, Theatre, History & Criticism, Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, Drama History & Criticism, Religion & Spirituality, Philosophy, Aesthetics
Cover of the book Three Uses of the Knife by David Mamet, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
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Author: David Mamet ISBN: 9780804151085
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Publication: August 14, 2013
Imprint: Vintage Language: English
Author: David Mamet
ISBN: 9780804151085
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication: August 14, 2013
Imprint: Vintage
Language: English

The purpose of theater, like magic, like religion . . . is to inspire cleansing awe. What makes good drama? And why does drama matter in an age that is awash in information and entertainment? David Mamet, one of our greatest living playwrights, tackles these questions with bracing directness and aphoristic authority. He believes that the tendency to dramatize is essential to human nature, that we create drama out of everything from today’s weather to next year’s elections. But the highest expression of this drive remains the theater.
With a cultural range that encompasses Shakespeare, Bretcht, and Ibsen, Death of a Salesman and Bad Day at Black Rock, Mamet shows us how to distinguish true drama from its false variants. He considers the impossibly difficult progression between one act and the next and the mysterious function of the soliloquy. The result, in Three Uses of the Knife, is an electrifying treatise on the playwright’s art that is also a strikingly original work of moral and aesthetic philosophy.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

The purpose of theater, like magic, like religion . . . is to inspire cleansing awe. What makes good drama? And why does drama matter in an age that is awash in information and entertainment? David Mamet, one of our greatest living playwrights, tackles these questions with bracing directness and aphoristic authority. He believes that the tendency to dramatize is essential to human nature, that we create drama out of everything from today’s weather to next year’s elections. But the highest expression of this drive remains the theater.
With a cultural range that encompasses Shakespeare, Bretcht, and Ibsen, Death of a Salesman and Bad Day at Black Rock, Mamet shows us how to distinguish true drama from its false variants. He considers the impossibly difficult progression between one act and the next and the mysterious function of the soliloquy. The result, in Three Uses of the Knife, is an electrifying treatise on the playwright’s art that is also a strikingly original work of moral and aesthetic philosophy.

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