{"product_id":"2026200013715-secondhand-a-sleep-of-prisoners","title":"A Sleep Of Prisoners","description":"\u003cp\u003eEdition: Second Impression\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good\u003cbr\u003eJacket: Wear and tear with damage\u003cbr\u003ePages: Yellowed\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWar strips humanity bare, and it is within the cold stone walls of a church-turned-prison that Christopher Fry's A Sleep of Prisoners wages its most profound battle — not with weapons, but with the soul. Four British soldiers, confined together as prisoners of war, fall into a series of interconnected dreams, each one drawing upon the great dramatic narratives of the Old Testament — Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Abraham and Isaac, David and Absalom — as the men wrestle, in sleep, with questions of violence, sacrifice, and moral reckoning that their waking minds cannot resolve.\n\nFirst performed in 1951 as a commission for the Festival of Britain, this short but luminous verse play stands as one of the most original works in the English theatrical canon, illustrating Fry's mastery of elevated, rhythmically rich language that manages to feel simultaneously ancient and urgently modern. Unlike conventional war dramas, it argues not for despair but for the hard-won possibility of human transcendence, with Fry's characteristic blend of lyricism and theological depth asking whether mankind is truly condemned to repeat its oldest sins — or whether even the darkest sleep might end in waking.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49160901099739,"sku":"2026200013715-SECONDHAND","price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/0c9fc1ae-3da5-4ded-86f6-b3395ce70f15.png?v=1787188356","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026200013715-secondhand-a-sleep-of-prisoners","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}