Tom Stoppard’s first play,

was first performed in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe on 24th August 1966; seven months later, on 11th April 1967, it opened in a production by the National Theatre Company at the London Old Vic. The eminent critic Harold Hobson wrote in

that its “ingenuity is stupendous, and the delicacy and complexity of its plot are handled with a theatrical mastery astonishing in a writer as young as Mr. Stoppard” (16 April 1967). Kenneth Tynan, the influential pro-avant-garde critic who had encouraged the Old Vic to produce the play, explained that it concerns “two bewildered men playing pointless games in a theatrical void while the real action unfolds offstage” (Rosenthal).  Frank Pike, who was to be…

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Citation: Baker, William, Robert Clark. "Rosencrantz and Guildernstern are Dead". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 July 2023 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=2253, accessed 21 November 2024.]

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