Written in 1982 as a play for radio; adapted for television in 1988

From the BBC audiotape of the radio play: "This award-winning radio play is, on the surface an amusing and skillful spoof on the school of spy story writers headed by John Le Carre; but this is Stoppard and underneath all the characteristic wit and verbal dexterity, lies a serious moral dilemma. Through the character of Rupert Purvis (the spy who has been knowingly recruited by both sides;) and his increasing inability to unravel his true loyalties from those he has assumed, Stoppard investigates the natures of 'official truths' and dogma and treads the ethical minefield between truth and expediency.
Rupert attempts to solve his dilemma by jumping into the river, but his suicidal fall is broken by a barge-dog, and the dog dies instead. After a series of totally improbable and extremely funny events, Rupert finds an answer, not through logic but through the realisation that he feels at home when surrounded by a houseful of mad English people.
Rupert's boss Giles Blair believes all is now well and is dismayed to learn of another and successful suicide bid by Rupert. The subsequent discussion reveals that Rupert was an expendable pawn in a complex game-the 'Dog" of Goldsmith's couplet from which Stoppard took his title - 'The Man recovered of the bite / The Dog it was that died!'" (See below.)
In the television version, Purvis is played by Alan Howard; Blair, by Alan Bates.

The Theatre of Tom Stoppard
by Anthony Jenkins

Cambridge University Press, 1989, Second Edition, 216 pp. Paperback        
ISBN 0-521-37974-1    

DESPITE THEIR box-office success, Tom Stoppard's plays have sometimes aroused academic hostility, his critics accusing Stoppard of cold intellectualism or frivolous showmanship. The purpose of this study is to examine he special problem of Stoppard's use of humor and games in conveying serious ideas.
As an actor and director, Anthony Jenkins is concerned not just with the literary merit of Stoppard's plays, but also with the way they are written and shaped by the formal conventions particular to the media of stage, radio, and television. This book studies the stage space of each play as well as the actor's pauses and inner emotions.
As a lecturer on drama, Jenkins follows Stoppard's career chronologically so that the radio and television plays are woven in with, and support various claims concerning, the major stage works. Unlike similar critical analyses of Stoppard's theater, this volume discusses all the latest plays, including "The Real Thing," "The Dog It Was That Died," and "Squaring the Circle."

Good people all, of every sort,

Give ear unto my song;

And if you find it wond'rous short,

It can not hold you long.

 

In Islington there was a man,

Of whom the world might say,

That still a godly race he ran,

Whene'er he went to pray.

 

A kind and gentle heart he had,

To comfort friends and foes;

The naked every day he clad,

When he put on his clothes.

 

And in that town a dog was found,

As many dogs there be,

Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,

And curs of low degree.

 

This dog and man at first were friends;

But then a pique began,

The dog to gain some private ends,

Went mad and bit the man.

 

Around from all the neighbouring streets

The wond'ring neighbours ran,

And swore the dog had lost his wits,

To bite so good a man.

 

The wound it seems both sore and sad

To every Christian eye;

And while they swore the dog was mad,

They swore the man would die.

 

But soon a wonder came to light,

That showed the rogues they lied:

The man recovered of the bite,

The dog it was that died. |||