Race

This book, in its 64 pages is a ---- A?It is a play. A play --Play? As in?Words. A play on words.Staged.Stage? A play on words. Performed on the ---- stage.Yes. It takes apart race as a construct, and deconstructs the deconstructionists. To the root of their thinking.Root? "Roots?" So, if a black man speaks his mind, he's Kunta Kinte?I didn't say ---- you THOUGHT it.I thought the words you put on my lips?Funny way to use ---- use?-- a stock phrase. Not. "In my mouth." But, "On my lips."So, subconsciously?Yeah. Subconsciously. "On my lips." All y'alls.

Somehow Mamet seems to often capture the zeitgeist of what's happening in American society. The firestorm of political correctness and the Clarence Thomas hearings spawned his earlier play Oleanna and now, in the wake of the Treyvon Martin shooting, reading Race becomes an incendiary experience. What appears to be a comic portrayal of lawyers scheming to get an apparently guilty man off a heinous charge of raping a black woman becomes a swirling cauldron of a barely suppressed race war played out in Mamet's typically profane and witty language. The male lawyers apparently in charge of the case discover that they had no idea what was really at stake when they took it on until the very last line of the play. Thought-provoking and a fast, memorable read.

The play is pretty good. Not the best, but still a good piece of work. However, the book is overpriced and filled -- and I mean filled -- with what appear to be printing errors. Countless sentences are littered with periods throughout. I mean in mid sentence. There is no discernible effect here. Mamet cannot possible write like that. I mean, what dramatic purpose would be served by this:"You look at a man, across a room, you know. What his intentions are."Or"We cannot put. Enough white people. On the jury. To find one who is not afraid. Of being thought prejudiced. By letting him off, on your theory."I'm familiar with "Mamet-speak," but is this Mamet-punctuation?Also, a 64-page play at $13.95, the price of a trade paperback novel? Most plays are under $10.

The delivery met expectations.

An engrossing experience reading this play. The tension and intrigue engages from the first page. Mamet's play takes the race theme to another level with its twists and debates and leaves the reader with much to contemplate about the nature of relationship, the function of the legal system, gender, truth, attitudes, values and much more. It is also a masterful dramatic work with a wonderful rhythm and tension throughout. A joy to read that was also insightful.

There were periods all over the place! It was weird. I'm not sure if there are that many in the printed text or not, but there were at times a period after each word in a sentence. As far as the service is concerned, though, my actually getting the book was great! Easy, easy, easy. I like being able to get a book that quickly and for a good price.Thanks!

Not Mamet's best, but still great. For such a thick, important subject matter, it flows really well. Easy to read with his trademark bite and humor. I'd love to have seen it onstage...

I usually purchase scripts through Samuel French or similar. This time I wanted quick via Amazon Prime. Unfortunately, I don't know what this is exactly, but it's not the official script. It's got weird typos all through it - periods, semicolons and other punctuation in the middle of sentences, rendering it unreadable. I've done Mamet plays and I know his writing is difficult to read at times, but this is something else. It seems like someone took an actual script, and typed it out badly.

I had the feeling that this play was the third draft and it needed to get the seventh draft to really come out and say what it needs to say. Considering there are only four characters in the whole play, I think it would be a good idea to make them all real people instead of just having the main character be real and the others (especially the lone female) cardboard cutouts that facilitate the plot for the main character. Hardly surprising that the woman (who is central to the plot) has little to say and what she does say is very stilted and fake. Perhaps David Mamet bit off more than he could chew with this one. His theatrical world is peopled with type A men with dysfunctional personalities, so maybe that's where he should stay. There's the potential for something amazing here, but it doesn't really come to fruition.

Beautiful WrittingAn amazing storyIt was just a fiction novel and almost became a true storyDavid Mamet is a story teller