Simon Gray: Plays 4: Common Pursuit; Holy Terror; After Pilkington; Old Flames; They Never Slept

‘Sharp, funny and clever … What a pleasure to re-encounter a play that combines unabashed intelligence and zinging wit with a rare generosity of spirit.’

Daily Telegraph on The Common Pursuit

‘Gray’s stature as one of the handful of great tragi-comic English dramatists of the second half of the twentieth century would appear now to be undisputed.’ Howard Jacobson, Critical Quarterly

Hidden Laughter ‘A sad divine comedy, superbly written. Gray nurses his characters and cares for them, but he never pampers them, or pities them, or presumes to use them as his spokesman. In this respect, he has become an English Chekhov… At the same time, Gray dispenses some of the incandescent malice and moral savagery of Coward at his acid best… But, of course, comparisons can only help you get your bearings. Gray is entirely his own man in this painful, querulous, warm, hard and mature play.’ Sunday Times