PRESS RELEASE:
WILDSIDE PRESS is proud to announce its participation in the Washington, D.C. Shakespeare Festival with the release
of the play WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE by Ferdinand Dugue written in 1857 in a modern translation by Frank J. Morlock
Beyond the fact he was born in 1812 and is buried in Pere Lachaise Cemetary, information about the playwright is scarce.Judging by the number of reprints of his works listed in the Bibliotheque Nationale Francaise he had several hits amongst the thirty plus plays he wrote either alone or in collaboration between the 1840's and the 1870's. It's known that he wrote a play especially for Ada Isaacs Mencken when she toured France in 1867. Beyond that even anecdotal information is scarce.
The play, however, speaks for itself. From the little that is known of Shakespeare's life, his marriage, his estrangement from his wife, his two daughters, his friendship with Essex and standing with Queen Elizabeth, Dugue has created a compelling romantic character: not the Shakespeare of history about whom we know so little, but a romantic, embittered poet, experiencing the pangs of divorce, a loyal friend and lover, betrayed by his friend with his lover, and a man capable of taking gallant risks for his friend. It's the Shakespeare we rather wish he had been.
In the near future, Wildside Press will publish a number of plays and translations of plays by Mr. Morlock dealing with Shakespeare in France.
The Man in the Iron Mask (e-book)
Arsène Lupin (e-book) 
Around the World In Eighty Days (e-book) 
Lord Ruthven the Vampyre (paper) 
The Return of Lord Ruthven (paper) 
Arsene Lupin versus Sherlock Holmes the Stage play (paper) 
Frankenstein meets The Hunchback of Notre Dame (paper) 
Sherlock Holmes: The Grand Horizontals (paper) 
Rocambole
Gentleman of the Night & Captain Phantom