Published to coincide with the Irish premiere of Alice Trilogy at the Peacock Theatre in the Abbey Theare, Dublin, and the Dublin Theatre Festival in October 2006 All four plays have been produced to critical acclaim Tom Murphy is one of the most distinguished Irish playwrights. 'The most distinctive, the most restless, the most obsessive imagination in the Irish theatre today' Brian Friel 'A superb study of despair - served up in three arresting splinters of a life... Unmissable' - Irish Examiner (on Alice Trilogy)

Murphy Plays: 5 brings together four of the authors recent works: The Wake, Too Late for Logic, The House, and Alice Trilogy. The Wake recounts the story of a woman, returning from the USA to her home town in Ireland. As her family learn of her years as a prostitute, she finds the drewam of her homecoming turning into a nightmare. A homecoming play that is haunting yet fiercely comic. Too Late for Logic: "A major new play...these scenes are beautifully imagined, ache with feeling, and flower into incidents of piercing sadness or absurd laughter" (The Times) The House: "The most compelling indictment of emigration ever committed to the stage" (Irish Times) Alice Trilogy dramatises three stages in Alice's life: 1980, in the afternoon murk of her attic, is Alice losing her grip on reality? 1995, she has summoned a lost love to meet her by the gasworks wall. 2005, at the airport: if the worst has happened, why is it bearable?