Overview
Five Farces for Amateurs is a collection of five short dramatic works by Anatoly Lunacharsky, written for performance by amateur theatrical groups. The volume consists of separate comic plays rather than a single continuous narrative, and its title identifies the intended performers: non-professional actors, for whom the pieces were conceived. Each farce stands on its own as a self-contained dramatic text.
Contents
The five farces collected in the book are:
- “Sverkhchelovek” (Superman)
- “Esche skvernyi anekdot” (Another Nasty Anecdote)
- “Beglyi politik” (The Fugitive Politician)
- “Bomba” (Bomb)
- “Obshchestvo maloi skorosti” (Low-Speed Society)
The titles indicate the range of comic subjects: a would-be or mock “superman,” an anecdote, a politician on the run, a bomb, and a society or club. Together they present five variations on farcical satire written for the amateur stage. Beyond these titles and the dramatic form of the pieces, the volume does not disclose a unifying plot or protagonist; the collection is held together by genre and intended performance context rather than by narrative continuity.
Themes and ideas
The farces share a satirical orientation rather than a story. Their titles point to a set of comic targets: inflated self-conception (“Superman”), the scandalous anecdote, political evasion (“The Fugitive Politician”), the dramatic charge of “Bomb,” and organized social life (“Low-Speed Society”). Read together, they show farce being used to expose pretension, ideological pose, and social absurdity through comic situation and reversal. The collection’s idea of comedy is public and performative: it stages recognizable types and slogans for an audience rather than exploring private psychology.
Significance
The book’s significance lies in its combination of satire with amateur performance. By writing short, independent farces for non-professional actors, the volume treats theatre as an accessible, participatory medium for comic critique. Its lack of a unifying protagonist or continuous plot makes it a repertoire of separable pieces, each capable of standing alone in performance. The collection thus demonstrates farce as a flexible form for social and political satire outside the professional stage, while its very looseness—five separate comic works—is integral to its design for amateur production.
