THE LADY'S NOT FOR BURNING

The plays of this new English playwright, soon to be produced here, are a breath of fresh air in the stifling melange of the glittering word game of his contemporaries. In the first place, there is an abundance of beautiful English -- rich, full of color and depth -- in fact a re-vitalizing of the connotative powers of English speech. In this play Fry uses his range and versatility in language to project the true comic spirit, in a delightfully ironic and sly tale of a beautiful young ""witch"", a man who wanted to be hung, a damp-eyed cleric who plays the viol, a horrid pair of twin boys joined in desire, yet fighting apart like a two-headed creature, some caricature officials and others- each one a sparkling, incisive comic creation. As for the theme it seems nothing more than the ironic mushrooming confusion when human beings, wildly wheeling in desire for this and that, indulge in a witch hunt. The sale may be limited now to an academic group, but production of the plays may help this. Vaguely medieval setting.