Arcadia
By Tom Stoppard
Synopsis
In a large country house in Derbyshire in April 1809 sits Lady Thomasina Coverly, aged thirteen, and her tutor, Septimus Hodge. Through the window may be seen some of the '500 acres inclusive of lake' where Capability Brown's idealized landscape is about to give way to the 'picturesque' Gothic style: 'everything but vampires', as the garden historian Hannah Jarvis remarks to Bernard Nightingale when they stand in the same room 180 years later.
Bernard has arrived to uncover the scandal which is said to have taken place when Lord Byron stayed at Sidley Park.
Tom Stoppard's absorbing play takes us back and forth between the centuries and explores the nature of truth and time, the difference between the Classical and the Romantic temperament, and the disruptive influence of sex on our orbits in life - 'the attraction', as Hannah says, 'which Newton left out'.
-- from Amazon.
Bernard has arrived to uncover the scandal which is said to have taken place when Lord Byron stayed at Sidley Park.
Tom Stoppard's absorbing play takes us back and forth between the centuries and explores the nature of truth and time, the difference between the Classical and the Romantic temperament, and the disruptive influence of sex on our orbits in life - 'the attraction', as Hannah says, 'which Newton left out'.
-- from Amazon.
Contributor's Note
A good life is: time to try defying entropy
This is my favourite Tom Stoppard play, a time-travelling waltz between Romanticism, chaos theory, scholarship and sex, that asks big questions about our place in the universe while spinning us on with rich characters and warm humour. The only thing better than reading this play is watching it!
- Nathaniel, NL
This is my favourite Tom Stoppard play, a time-travelling waltz between Romanticism, chaos theory, scholarship and sex, that asks big questions about our place in the universe while spinning us on with rich characters and warm humour. The only thing better than reading this play is watching it!
- Nathaniel, NL