The complete plays [of] Brendan Behan

This volume contains everything Brendan Behan wrote in dramatic form in English. Included are three of his famous full-length plays: The Quare Fellow, set in an Irish prison; The Hostage, set in a Dublin lodging-house of doubtful repute; and Richard's Cork Leg, set in a graveyard. The volume also contains three one-act plays, originally written for radio and all intensely autobiographical: Moving Out, A Garden Party, and The Big House.

"The spirit of Behan ... is one of the most joyous, one of the most precious qualities encountered in the theatre in the last twenty years."—Harold Hobson, The Times

"It seems to be Ireland's function, every twenty years or so, to provide a playwright who will kick English drama from the past into the present. Mr. Behan may well fill the place vacated by Sean O'Casey."—Kenneth Tynan, Observer

Contains the three famous full-length plays: The Quare Fellow, set in an Irish prison ("In Brendan Behan's tremendous new play language is out on a spree, ribald, dauntless and spoiling for a fight … with superb dramatic tact, the tragedy is concealed beneath layer after layer of rough comedy" Observer); The Hostage, set in a Dublin lodging-house of doubtful repute where a young English soldier is being kept prisoner, "shouts, sings, thunders and stamps with life…a masterpiece" (The Times); and Richard's Cork Leg, set in a graveyard, "a joyous celebration of life" (Guardian). The volume also contains three one-act plays, originally written for radio and all intensely autobiographical, Moving Out, A Garden Party and The Big House.