When Woolf debuted in 1961, audiences and critics alike could not get enough of Edward Albee's masterful play. A dark comedy, it portrays husband and wife George and Martha in a searing night of dangerous fun and games. By the evening's end, a stunning revelation provides a climax that has shocked audiences for years. With the play's razor-sharp dialogue and the stripping away of social pretense, Newsweek keenly foresaw Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? as "a brilliantly original work of art-an excoriating theatrical experience, surging with shocks of recognition and dramatic fire that will be igniting Broadway for some time to come."

Three-time Pulitzer Prize-winner and recipient of three Tony Awards, Edward Albee was awarded the Gold Medal in Drama from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1980, and in 1996 he received both the Kennedy Center Honors and the National Medal of Arts. Ben Brantley of The New York Times has described him as "one of the few genuinely great living American writers." Now, The Overlook Press is proud to announce publication of the first volume of a three-volume collection of all of this master’s plays, some of which have been out of print for years. Volume I contains the eight plays written by Albee during his first decade as a playwright, from 1958 through 1965. These range from the four brilliant one-act plays with which he exploded on the New York theater scene in 1958-59 ( The Zoo Story, The Death of Bessie Smith, The Sandbox , and The American Dream ) to his early masterpiece, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1961-62). They also include two adaptations from notable American novels ( The Ballad of the Sad Café and Malcolm ) and Albee’s mysteriously fascinating Tiny Alice . The volume includes a new introduction by Mr. Albee.