Beschreibung:

WILLIAMS, Tennessee (1911-1983). The Glass Menagerie. New York: Random House, 1945. 8 o. Photographic frontispiece. Original red cloth; dust jacket (minor chipping to head of spine panel, two short closed tears to front and back panel). Provenance : Edward J. Corcoran (presentation and ownership inscription). FIRST EDITION in book form. PRESENTATION COPY, INSCRIBED BY WILLIAMS TO EDWARD J. CORCORAN on the front pastedown: "Affectionately to Ted from Tenn." With two photographs (excised from Playbill) of Williams pasted to rear endpaper. Thomas Lanier Williams, winner of four New York Drama Critics' Circle Awards and two Pulizer Prizes, introduced techniques into dramatic production which permitted a new freedom of expression in the theater. His works, many of which became vehicles for Elia Kazan and the Group Theater, depict the intimacies and barriers of characters pitched, at times, nearly on the edge of madness. In response to critics who attacked his excessive violence and exploration of sexuality, Williams published an interview he conducted with himself which identifies both his perception of contemporary controversy surrounding his work as well as his attitude toward his writing. Of the "disturbing note of harshness and coldness and violence and anger in [his] more recent works" he says, "I think, without planning to do so, I have followed the developing tension and anger and violence of the world and time that I live in through my own steadily increasing tension as a writer and person." To his question, "How far do you think you can go with this tortured view of the world?" he replies, "As far as the world can go in its tortured condition, maybe that far, but not further."