Stoppard, Tom.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead.

London: Faber & Faber, 1967. First edition of the author's masterpiece. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with a hint of toning to the spine. Signed by the author on the title page. With "Compliments of Tom Stoppard" slip laid in.

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is the fabulously inventive tale of Hamlet as told from the worm’s-eye view of the bewildered Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two minor characters in Shakespeare’s play. In Tom Stoppard’s best-known work, this Shakespearean Laurel and Hardy finally get a chance to take the lead role, but do so in a world where echoes of Waiting for Godot resound, where reality and illusion intermix, and where fate leads our two heroes to a tragic but inevitable end. “Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead [is] verbally dazzling…the most exciting, witty intellectual treat imaginable.” (Edith Oliver, The New Yorker).

Item #2514