Gertrude (The Cry): AND Knowledge and a Girl (The Snow White Case) (Paperback)

Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' never satisfactorily explains the craven apology of
Gertrude - the protagonist's mother - and Barker's scepticism has inspired
him to study the nature of her passion in a wholly new context. The pain of
the passionate eroticism which binds her and Claudius together leads to
fearful outcomes, but as with all great tragedy, the extremes of emotion
bring to them both a new understanding of life and death.

The play introduces new characters and alters the actions of the old, but
it is more than a study of love-as-religion. It is also - through its
presentation of the Prince of Denmark himself - a profound meditation on
the original.

A second bête noir - of folk tale rather than literature - who Barker
redeems from popular contempt, is Snow White's Wicked Stepmother. Here she
is seen as a childless melancholic whose pain is sufficient justification
for her cruelty. The absence of the king from the old tale is remedied in
this intriguing study of marital sexuality.

Barker's recent work, now firmly part of the international repertoire, is
characterized by an ever deepening investment in language and metaphor; a
poet of the stage, his texts resonate at many levels of the European
cultural past and illuminate its present.

Barker has broadly followed the line of theatre created by Brecht and Bond,
yet he is an individual whose style shows a different development from his
contemporaries, characterised by his vivacity and linguistic verve.
Barker's plays explore power, sexuality and human behaviour with a poetic
and compelling language that overflows with ideas, beauty, violence and
rich, dark comedy.

In his more recent work, Barker has moved further into a world of
alternative history and myth. His brand of theatre - `The Theatre of
Catastrophe' - echoes the concerns and anxieties of modern life; it is
catastrophe, either collective or individual, that looms over all of us.
The power of his writing, the fertility of his imagination, and the depth
of his dramatic invention and stage-craft make Barker, without question,
one of the major voices of the modern theatre.

There have been numerous productions of his work in the major national
theatres of Europe, Australia and North America. In Britain, aside from
productions by the Royal Court, Royal Shakespeare Company and some regional
and experimental theatres such as The Almeida in London, Barker's plays are
also toured by a specialised theatre company called 'The Wrestling School'
- a company dedicated solely to the work of Barker whose productions are
often directed by the playwright himself.

Barker is the prototypal literary figure for the new millennium - a
myth-maker of the highest order who probes the past to speculate on the
future, presenting the world in new forms and imprinting in the memory
unforgettable images and metaphors.