Burning Bright: A Play in Story Form

The last of John Steinbeck’s play-novelettes and his final attempt, after 1937’s Of Mice and Men and 1942’s The Moon is Down, to create what he saw as a new, experimental literary form

A Penguin Classic

Four scenes, four people: the husband who yearns for a son, ignorant of his own sterility; the wife who commits adultery to fulfill her husband’s wish; the father of the child; and the outsider whose actions will affect them all. In this turn on a medieval morality play, Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck casts an unwavering light on these four intertwined lives, revealing in their finely drawn circumstances the universal contours of vulnerability and passion, desperation and desire. This edition features an introduction and notes for further reading by Steinbeck scholar John Ditsky. 

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.