This first volume in the Coward Collection contains four plays written within a two year period when Coward and the century were still in their 20s. The volume is introduced by Sheridan Morley, Coward's first biographer.

Hay Fever, a comedy of bad manners, concerns a weekend with friends of the Bliss family, who have all been invited independently for a weekend at their country house near Maidenhead. The Vortex was a controversial drama in its time, introducing drug-addiction onto the stage at a time when alcoholism was barely mentioned. Fallen Angels, which is...

The third volume of Coward's plays contains some of his best work fromthe thirties.

Design for Living - is about a triangular alliancebetween two men and a woman, based on friends of Coward's, which hewaited to write "until she and he and I had arrived by different roadsin our careers at a time and a place when we felt we could all threeplay together with a more or less equal degree of success." Cavalcadewas Coward's most ambitious stage project, set during the Boer War, which cost 30,000 in its day and which includes scenes of the reliefof the sinking of the Titanic...

Mad Dogs and Englishmen, Don't Put your Daughter on the Stage, Mrs Worthington and over 250 more lyrics from Coward's musical masterpieces.

Noel Coward is one of the greatest lyricists of the twentieth century. Songs such as A Room with a View, The Stately Homes of England, Mad Dogs and Englishmen and Mrs Worthington are known, sung and loved the world over. This edition gathers together over 250 of Coward's lyrics, arranged in chronological order and grouped by show. In addition, these masterpieces of verse are accompanied by an...

The eighth volume in the Coward Collection includes I'llLeave It To You and The Young Idea, the first of Coward's plays ever tobe produced. These were, as he said, "enthusiastically acclaimed by thecritics and ran five weeks and eight weeks respectively. In both ofthem I appeared with the utmost determination."

This Was a Man, aslightly later play, was written in 1926, after the successes whichmade his name. It was originally banned by the Lord Chamberlain "forfacetious adultery."

Coward's tribute to theatre is set in a retirement home for actresses, all former stars. Jealousies abound, especially between Lotta and another who was also married to her former husband. A tragedy brings them to their senses and a new solarium brings out everyone's good nature. Lotta chooses to stay with her old friends rather than go live with her son.

"Should rejoice those of us who still have hearts." London News Chronicle.

Editor Barry Day has collected the definitive edition on Noel Coward's verse including all the work in the three-volumes published in Coward's lifetime plus rare, previously unpublished material Coward sent to family and friends. This new edition paints a more full and vivid portrait of this totally unique writer, known for his quick wit and insatiable interest in people and his skillful rendering of their public and private lives on stage.

The book is arranged in theme chapters on a wide variety of chapters including: war, theatre, love, friends, travel, and God and the infinite...