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The Night of the Iguana

$14.95

The Night of the Iguana-also made into an unforgettable film by John Huston-is Williams’ robust and persuasive plea for endurance and resistance in the face of human suffering. The earthy widow Maxine runs a hotel on a Mexican cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean where the defrocked Rev. Shannon, his tour group of ladies from a West Texas women’s college, the self-described New England spinster Hannah and her ninety-seven-year-old grandfather, “the world’s oldest living and practicing poet,” a family of grotesque Nazi vacationers, and an iguana tied by its throat to the veranda all find themselves assembled for a rainy and turbulent night.

Celebrated American playwright Doug Wright (the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play I Am My Own Wife) has written a playful and revealing introduction for this edition. Also included are Williams’ own essay about the play, his original short story “The Night of the Iguana,” the essay “Acts of Grace” by noted Tennessee Williams scholar Kenneth Holditch, and a chronology of Williams’ life.