Lorca: Three Plays

Three of Federico García Lorca's most famous plays in a single volume, translated from the Spanish and introduced by one of Scotland's finest playwrights, Jo Clifford.

'There's fire burning in my head.

There's an ocean drowning my heart.'

Lorca's passionate, lyrical tales of longing and revenge put the spotlight on the rural poor of 1930s Spain and are considered masterpieces of twentieth-century theatre. These plays exhibit Lorca's intense anger at the injustices of society, and his determination to create art that might remedy it.

The collection contains Blood Wedding, Yerma and The House of Bernarda Alba, in sensitive and playable translations, and a full introduction to Lorca, his times and his work.

The Nick Hern Books Drama Classic Collections series brings together the most popular plays from a single author or a particular period. They offer students, actors and theatregoers a series of uncluttered, accessible editions, accompanied by comprehensive introductions. Where the originals are in English, there is a glossary of unfamiliar words and phrases. Where the originals are in a foreign language, the translations aim to be both actable and accurate – and are made by translators whose work is regularly staged in the professional theatre.



Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca, known as Federico García Lorca (5 June 1898 – 19 August 1936) was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director.

Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27. His major plays include Blood Wedding, Yerma and The House of Bernarda Alba

He was executed by Nationalist forces during the Spanish Civil War.

Jo Clifford (formerly known as John Clifford) is an award-winning playwright, translator, poet and performer, who has also worked as a journalist and academic. She was instrumental in establishing the reputation of the Traverse Theatre Company in the 1980s.

She is the author of about eighty plays, many of which have been performed all over the world. They include: Losing Venice, Every One, Faust and The Tree of Knowledge. Her adaptation of Charles Dickens's Great Expectations makes her the first openly transgendered woman playwright to have had a play on in London's West End.