The Second Mrs Tanqueray

by Arthur Wing Pinero, Stephen Unwin (Introduction)

Overview

When Aubrey Tanqueray marries for the second time, he knows that his new wife, Paula, is a ‘woman with a past’. But he has no idea how that past will catch up with himin the end.

More probing than Oscar Wilde, more accessible than Ibsen, Pinero’s The Second Mrs Tanqueray (1893) is one of the masterpieces of the Victorian theatre: sexy, dramatic, funny and very moving.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781849433921
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	02/26/2013
Series:	Oberon Modern Plays
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	120
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Born in 1855, Arthur Wing Pinero was an English actor, then playwright & director. He is considered by some to have been the leading playwright during the Victorian and Edwardian periods. His plays include The School Mistress, The Magistrate and Trelawny of the Wells. In 1909 he became the second ever man to be knighted for services to drama. He died in 1934.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Arthur Wing Pinero: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text

The Second Mrs.Tanqueray:A Play in Four Acts

Appendix A: Pinero on Drama

1. From T.H.L., “How I Construct My Plays: A Chat with Mr. Pinero,” Sketch (1893)
2. Pinero, “The Modern British Drama,” Theatre (June 1895)
3. From Pinero, Robert Louis Stevenson: The Dramatist (1903)
4. From William Archer, Real Conversations (1904)
5. From Pinero, “Robert Browning as a Dramatist,” Browning’s Centenary (1912)
6. From Pinero, “Foreword,” Two Plays (1930)

Appendix B: The Second Mrs.Tanqueray, The Golden Butterfly, and the Albany

Appendix C: Social Background

1. From Caroline Norton, A Letter to the Queen on Lord Chancellor Cranworth’s Marriage and Divorce Bill (1855)
2. From the Divorce and Matrimonial Act (1857)
3. From John Ruskin, “Of Queens’ Gardens” (1865)
4. Eliza Lynn Linton, “The Girl of the Period,” Saturday Review (14 March 1868)
5. From A. St. John Adcock, “Leaving the London Theatres,” Living London (1901)
6. From Emily Constance Cook, “The London Season,” London and Environs (1897-98)
7. “Police,” The Times (5 November 1895)
8. “The Charge Against Mr. George Alexander,” The Times (6 November 1895)
9. “School Teacher’s Suicide: Letters from a Married Man,” The Times (29 June 1920)

Appendix D: Contemporary Reactions to The Second Mrs. Tanqueray

1. L.F.A., Illustrated London News (3 June 1893)
2. William Archer,World (31 May 1893)
3. Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News (3 June 1893)
4. Punch (10 June 1893)
5. Saturday Review (3 June 1893)
6. T.H.L., “A Chat with Mrs. Patrick Campbell,” Sketch (7 June 1893)
7. From Yorkshire Post (22 September 1893)
8. From T.W.M. Lund, The Second Mrs.Tanqueray: What? And Why? (1894)
9. From Bernard Shaw, Saturday Review (23 February 1895)
10. From H. Barton Baker, History of the London Stage and Its Famous Players (1576-1903) (1904)

Appendix E: Dramatic Techniques

1. The Original Closing Scene to Pinero’s The Profligate (1889)
2. The Performed Closing Scene of the First Production of The Profligate (1889)
3. From Henry Arthur Jones, Act 4, The Liars (1897)

Select Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

The illusion of Victorian solidity conjured to perfection.” —The Telegraph

“Poetic, fast-paced and worth the trip.” —The Huffington Post

“Fascinating.” —The Stage

“Compelling throughout - an intriguingly conflicted play.” —British Theatre Guide

From the Publisher