This collection can be hard to find, but if you can find it, I would recommend it for the first of the three plays alone. It's important to note the plays are actually in the reverse order they were written with the first play you read being the last one Abe wrote, and I think you can tell.

The last play you read (the first of the three he wrote) is marked very much by his earlier style when he was always writing about metamorphosis. The title says it all: The Man Who Turned into a Stick. A man literally turns into a stick, and two characters from hell explain quite straightforwardly why it happens, which to me kills some of what makes it intriguing. I for one loved his later novels when he returned to absurdities like these, but they never felt like thin metaphors, so this play gives me mixed reactions, though I liked it overall.

The middle play features only one visible character, a boxer. It is unfortunate for the western world because we can't see this in action, and since Abe directed his own troupe, he puts in no hint as to the action in the script. Is the boxer shadowboxing, or is he just presenting his soliloquy directly to the audience? I've seen a picture that he is in fact wearing his gloves and all, but he is slumped in his chair, so I'm not sure. Maybe this is a great play, but I was a bit unsure what to make of it.

The first play though, The Suitcase, is wonderfully weird in that ambiguous way that readers of his later novels should love. Two women are debating whether to open a suitcase or not... only, the suitcase is represented not by a suitcase but by an actor who makes noises constantly and occasionally speaks. They talk as if he is a suitcase, but they know there is something strange inside, something the owner of the suitcase told them simply were his "Ancestors." It's bizarre, puzzling, and just great. I enjoyed it as much as Friends, his most popular play available in translation.

I imagine anyone who finds a review of this obscure play (at least, obscure in the English-speaking world) is already a fan of his fiction, so you can't really go wrong with this, as the first play is more of what we already love about his work, and readers owe it to try out what little of Abe's drama is available in English since he considered his theater career at least equally as important as his novels -- and rightfully so! ( )