Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"
    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"
    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"
    Ebook40 pages29 minutes

    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"

    By Gale and Cengage

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Drama For Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Drama For Students for all of your research needs.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCengage Learning - Gale
    Release dateAug 3, 2016
    ISBN9781535838146
    A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"

    Read more from Gale

    Related to A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"

    Related ebooks

    Literary Criticism For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Broadway’s Golden New Age?

      Mar 25, 2019

      Broadway’s Golden New Age?
      9 min read

    • Article

      Refugees

      Mar 1, 2019

      Refugees
      12 min read

    • Article

      It’s Time To Act!

      Mar 21, 2020

      It’s Time To Act!
      4 min read

    • Article

      This Iraq War Veteran Didn't Just See 'Water By The Spoonful.' He Lived It

      Mar 7, 2018

      LOS ANGELES - It's intermission during Quiara Alegria Hudes' "Water by the Spoonful," the Pulitzer Prize-winning centerpiece of her Elliot trilogy of plays portraying the experiences of a Marine during and after the Iraq war. It's interesting, a tall

      4 min read

    • Article

      “Where Did You Laugh?”

      Dec 14, 2019

      “Where Did You Laugh?”
      4 min read

    • Article

      We Laughed–until We Cried

      Feb 5, 2020

      We Laughed–until We Cried
      4 min read

    • Article

      Norwegian Wood

      Jul 25, 2019

      HENRIK IBSEN: THE MAN AND THE MASK By Ivo de Figueiredo, translated by Robert Ferguson. Yale University Press, New Haven, Conn., 2019. 704 pp., $40 cloth. HOW DO WE UNDERSTAND HENRIK IBSEN? Theatrically, he was the Master Builder himself, setting the

      7 min read

    • Article

      The 10 Best Shows

      Dec 19, 2016

      The 10 Best Shows
      3 min read

    • Article

      Polly Stenham

      Jun 4, 2016

      Polly Stenham
      1 min read

    • Article

      Onstage March 19

      Feb 25, 2019

      Onstage March 19
      26 min read

    • Article

      The Legacy Of Jerome Robbins

      Jan 31, 2019

      The Legacy Of Jerome Robbins
      6 min read

    • Article

      Liev Forever

      Apr 5, 2019

      Liev Forever
      15 min read

    • Article

      Singin’ In The Rain

      May 5, 2019

      NAME THE GREATEST musical ever made. Now, name the finest film on the subject of filmmaking. Okay, name the greatest argument ever made for the Hollywood studio system: the grand pageant of the dream factory, sun-kissed on the Californian coast and g

      4 min read

    • Article

      Mother!'s Theater of Cruelty

      Sep 24, 2017

      Mother!'s Theater of Cruelty
      5 min read

    • Article

      Jasmine Lee-Jones Interview: I Want People To Come To The Theatre Like They Watch Netflix

      Jun 24, 2021

      Back in 2019, you either saw seven methods of killing kylie jenner or you were trying to get a ticket for it. Jasmine Lee-Jones’s debut play, exploring female friendship, cultural appropriation and the internet, became one of the most talked-about pl

      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths"

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Study Guide for Maxim Gorky's "The Lower Depths" - Gale

      1

      The Lower Depths

      Maxim Gorki

      1902

      Introduction

      The Lower Depths is Maxim Gorki’s best known play, widely considered both a masterpiece and an extremely problematic work. Subtitled Scenes from Russian Life, the play was a huge success from its first performance. The idea for the play was conceived in 1900, and it was written during the winter of 1901 and the spring of 1902. It was produced by the Moscow Arts Theatre on December 18, 1902. Konstantin Stanislavsky directed the play and starred in it as Sahtin, and as it was one of his earliest successes, it became a hallmark of his work, the Moscow Arts Theatre, and Russian socialist realism. The play is a portrait, without much overriding plot, of a destitute, lower-class group in a lodging house in Volga. Realistic depiction of this segment of Russian society was new and avant-garde at the turn of the century, in contrast to the age-old trend towards romanticizing the underclasses. Some critics at the time took issue with Gorki’s subject matter, and his pessimistic, unredemptive presentation of the lower depths. Others disliked the ambiguity of the moral message about the human condition, and the unconventional structure of conversation around this. Most agreed, however, that the play’s character sketches were powerful and moving, and the subject matter, at the very least, provocative. Debate over its chief theme, the merits of the truth versus the consoling lie, continues to engage audiences and scholars today, and it continues to be produced worldwide a century after its inception.

      Author Biography

      Maxim Gorki was born Alexei Maximovich Peshkov in Nizhy Novgorod, Russia, on March 16, 1868. His father died when Maxim was five years old, and he was raised by his maternal grandparents. His childhood was a brutal one; he was abused by his grandfather and forced to earn his own living from the age of eight. While he was still a child, Gorki became a menial laborer and a tramp, experiences that informed the works for which he is most famous. He was frequently beaten and abused by his employers, and to escape the miserable conditions of his life, he became an avid reader. In this way Gorki was self-educated, and came to see literature as a means of salvation for all people, as he details in his autobiographies and the essay collection, On

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1