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Book Condition: Used
Seller: Peter Harrington

United Kingdom
About Item: London: Ernest Benn Limited,, 1925 & 1927. First editions, first impressions. The Vortex premiered on 25 November 1924 at the Everyman Theatre, London, and The Marquise in 1927 at the Criterion Theatre, London. "By the time the sensational The Vortex appeared in 1924, Coward was already a star in the making, and London was ready to be shocked. The Vortex did just that, with its tale of an older woman taking a younger lover, and her son taking cocaine (commentators have since seen the drug as a mask for homosexuality). Coward went along with the convenient myth of his overnight success in the play which quickly transferred from Hampstead to the West End (see his memoir Present Indicative); yet this was as much a construction as the idea that The Vortex was the first English production to deal with drug abuse (the story of Billie Carleton, the chorus girl who died apparently from a cocaine overdose in 1918 and whose fate inspired Coward's play, had sparked off at least three drug-themed productions in… Read More
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