The second volume in the series of authoritative Methuen editions of Strindberg's Collected Plays This volume contains two of Strindberg's best-known plays from the years following his mental breakdown: the expressionist masterpiece A Dream Play (1901), which he described as 'my most beloved play, child of my greatest pain'; and both parts of The Dance of Death (1900), a terrifying analysis of a tormented marriage: 'it leaves an astonishing, an almost unaccountable, impression of genius . . . as a beggar's cloak full of holes may have a kind of majestic beauty when the wind fills it, so this broken drama, having unmistakably the winds of vision in it, has beauty and dignity and power' (The Times, 1928). Also included is his earlier short play The Stronger (1889), a fascinating study of the power of personality. "Michael Meyer is the translator most actors turn to when seeking a definitive text" (Sunday Times) August Strindberg (1849-1912) was a Swedish dramatist, novelist, poet and essayist. His plays include The Father (1887), Miss Julie (1888), The Sronger (1890), Easter (1900), The Dance of Death (1900), A Dream Play (1902), and The Ghost Sonata (1907). Michael Meyer first went to China in 1995 with the Peace Corps. The winner of a Lowell Thomas Award for travel writing, Meyer has also won a Whiting Writers' Award for nonfiction and a Guggenheim Fellowship. His stories have appeared in the New York Times , Time , Smithsonian , Sports Illustrated , Slate , the Financial Times , the Los Angeles Times , and the Chicago Tribune . He is the author of The Last Days of Old Beijing , which became a bestseller in China, and he divides his time between Pittsburgh and Singapore.