Tom Stoppard

1
Tom Stoppard

• The Worlds a Stage

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Biographical Overview

• Born in 1937 in Czechoslovakia
• German invasion prompted move to Singapore
• Father killed in Japanese invasion extended
  family killed in Holocaust

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Biographical Overview

• 1942mother and brother evacuated to India
• Attended an American school
• 1945mother married Major Kenneth Stoppard in the
  British Army in India
• 1946family settled in England

4
Biographical Overview

• Worked as journalistfilm and theater critic
• 1960began writing plays, novels, and radio plays
• 1967gained fame with Rosencrantz and
  Guildenstern are Dead

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Biographical Overview

• Writes for film, television, radio, and the stage
• Three Tony-Award-winning plays
• 1999won Oscar for Shakespeare in Love

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Postmodern Characteristics

• Mixture of high art and popular culture
• Literary Allusions
• Historical dislocation/anachronism
• Humor/Parody/Sense of the Absurd

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Postmodern Characteristics

• Use of fantasy
• Blurring boundaries between life and art
• Stage as metaphor for postmodern reality

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The Real Inspector Hound

• Parodies the traditional mystery and theater
  criticism
• Implies that clear solutions and neatly resolved
  endings are no longer viable in postmodern
  reality
• There is no Real Inspector Hound!
• Expresses the tenuous nature of existential
  realitywe can script multiple realities

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Shakespeare in Love

• Scene 1
• Scene 2

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Shakespeare in Love

• Scene 3

Paltrow as Thomas Kent playing Romeo And Lady
Viola playing Juliet
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Shakespeare in Love

• Scene 4
• Scene 5

Viola and Shakespeare on stage as Juliet and Romeo