Christopher Hampton : Dramatic Ironist

Hampton established his credentials in the theatre with highly polished, witty plays, such as Total Eclipse, The Philanthropist and Tales from Hollywood. His adaptation of Laclos'' novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses was one of the most successful productions of the 1980s and he won an Oscar for his screenplay for the film version, Dangerous Liaisons. With the award-winning Carrington in 1995 Hampton made his debut as a film director and he now looks set to establish a second reputation in the cinema.
Despite the many prizes he has won, and the fact that he has written some of the most popular and widely performed plays of the last thirty years, there has been no full-length study of Hampton''s work published in Britain until now. Christopher Hampton: Dramatic Ironist is a comprehensive study of his stage plays, television plays, films and translations, and is the fullest account yet presented of his achievements.