Tragedy
Venus and Adonis
Venus and Adonis is Shakespeare's narrative poem about the love of the goddess Venus for the mortal youth Adonis, dedicated partly to his pa…
Frankenstein
Victor Frankenstein discovers the secret of animating lifeless matter and, by assembling body parts, creates the monster who has no name in …
Rosmersholm
Rosmersholm is a play written in 1886 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. In the estimation of many critics the piece is Ibsen's masterwor…
The Duchess of Malfi
John Webster's bloody Jacobean tragedy exposes the decadence of the Italian court. The virtuous Duchess of Malfi, a young widow, secretly ma…
The Two Noble Kinsmen
The Two Noble Kinsmen is a Jacobean tragicomedy co-written by William Shakespeare and John Fletcher, first published in 1634. Set in ancient…
The Cenci
Written in 1819, but not first staged for over hundred years after it was written due to controversial themes of incest and parricide, it wa…
The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus
The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, commonly referred to simply as Doctor Faustus, is a play by Christopher Marlow…
Iphigenia in Aulis
Iphigenia in Aulis (Ancient Greek: Ἰφιγένεια ἐν Αὐλίδι) is the last extant work of the playwright Euripides. Written between 408, after the …
Mary Stuart
Schiller's tragedy depicts the final days of Mary, Queen of Scots, who has been imprisoned by her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I, because of her …
Hedda Gabler
Hedda Gabler has just returned from her honeymoon. She has married out of ennui, and is already heartily sick of her husband, who is a plodd…
Cain
Cain: A Mystery is Lord Byron's retelling of the classical Biblical story from the point of view of its antagonist. Undoubtedly influenced b…
The Persians
The earliest of Aeschylus' plays to survive is "The Persians" (Persai), performed in 472 BC and based on experiences in Aeschylus'…
A Doll's House
Published in 1879, this play was a bombshell, exposing the tragic hypocrisy of Victorian like middle class marriage. The play is significant…
Antigone
This is the final installment in Sophocles' Theban Plays, following Oedipus Rex and Oedipus at Colonus. Oedipus's daughter Antigone deliber…
The Tragic Bride
The story centers on Gabrielle Hewish, only and lonely child of Sir Jocelyn Hewish, a loveable lush and owner of the peaceful Roscarna estat…
Love and Intrigue
Ferdinand is an army major and son of President von Walter, a high-ranking noble in a German duke's court, while Luise Miller is the daughte…
Electra
Electra or Elektra is a Greek tragedy by Sophocles. Its date is not known, but various stylistic similarities with the Philoctetes (409 BC) …
Phaedra
In the court of Louis XIV, adaptations of Greek tragedies were very popular. This play, heavily influenced by Euripides' Hippolytus, deals w…
The Persians
This is one of the few Greek tragedies that deals with historical events rather than mythological ones. The elders of the Persian court awa…
Women Beware Women
Thomas Middleton's masterful 17th century tragedy is packed with adultery, incest, intrigue, revenge, and inventive methods for murder. Lean…