Temptation by Vaclav Havel
In his most challenging work to date, Czech playwright Vaclav Havel has given the Faust legend a provocative twist. His setting is the Institute, whose mission is to combat the irrational tendencies in society through its scientific work. Personal and professional relationships at this lighthouse of truthful knowledge are a tissue of lies and sycophancy in which all concerned willingly collude. The only tempest in this teapot of careerism is Dr Foustka, who has lately been smitten by metaphysical doubt and is rumored to be dabbling in the black arts. His mentor, the unlikely Mephistopheles of the piece, is a dwarflike old man with smelly feet and a slippery logic that irresistibly appeals to Foustka's intellectual hubris. With great wit and originality Havel follows the familiar outlines of the story to a unique conclusion at a witches' sabbath garden party organized by the Institute's crafty director in the spirit of modern group-costume therapy. For Havel, the rational carried to surreal lengths of irrationality is not a theatrical technique but a fact of life in Czechoslovakia since the Soviet invasion of 1968. Yet in universalizing his tale through the Faust legend, he forcefully reminds us that under conditions of modern bureaucracy neither East nor West holds a monopoly on the sale of souls.Vaclav Havel was elected President of Czechoslovakia in 1989 and President of the Czech Republic in 1992. He is the author of many plays, essays, collections of letters, and memoirs, including Open Letters and Summer Meditations. Paul Wilson translated or cotranslated those books as well as Havel's Letters to Olga, Disturbing the Peace, and The Art of the Impossible. Peter Steiner is Professor in the Department of Slavic Languages at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of The Deserts of Bohemia: Czech Fiction and Its Social Context and Russian Formalism: A Metapoetics, both from Cornell.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780802131003 |
| ISBN 10 | 080213100X |
| Title | Temptation |
| Author | Vaclav Havel |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Avalon Travel Publishing |
| Year published | 1994-01-12 |
| Number of pages | 102 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |