Lady Susan is Jane Austen's female rake. Selfish, greedy, scheming, cruel and unscrupulous - but charming when it suits her purposes - she manipulates other people entirely in her own interest.
A play Broadway producer Robert Moss adapted from Austen's first and unfinished novel, Lady Susan is being staged at the Globe Theatre on June 13 and 14.
Some say Lady Susan was based on Austen's flirtatious cousin Eliza de Feuillide; others point to her literary predecessors, Lovelace in Richardson's Clarissa and Madame de Merteuil in Dangerous Liaisons, by Laclos.
Like these conniving characters, Lady Susan reveals different aspects of herself in letters to victims and to confidantes.
Austen also wrote her first drafts of Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility, originally called ''First Impressions'' and ''Elinor and Marianne,'' in letters, but perhaps when Anna Letitia Barbauld pointed out the disadvantages of writing in the epistolary style, she abruptly broke off Lady Susan (1805) to develop her own distinctive brand of dramatic and interior narration.
One critic describes Lady Susan as ''a cruising shark in her social goldfish pond,'' but another declares Lady Susan is Austen's ''first completed masterpiece.''
Its clever and energetic heroine is an ''ultimate tragic victim,'' he says.
''The world defeats Lady Susan, not because it recognises her vices, but because her virtues have no place in it.''
Struck by the dramatic potential of Lady Susan, Moss created a script from Austen's unfinished manuscript.
In 2012, he directed a performance at the Pierpoint Morgan Library, New York, for the annual meeting of the Jane Austen Society of North America.
Moss has generously given permission for the Globe to use his script for only the second time, and the first outside New York.
Though Lady Susan is short, this romantic dark comedy is sharp and full of potential.
Terry MacTavish, Elsa May, Jocelyn Harris and Ross Johnston, under the direction of Louise Petherbridge, will perform Lady Susan at the Globe Theatre, 104 London St, Dunedin, on June 13 and 14 at 8pm.
Patrons are asked to wear Regency clothing if possible (members may hire costumes from the Globe free of charge).
Non-alcoholic mulled ''wine'' and food dainties will be served.
Tickets are $25 including refreshments. All proceeds will go to the repair of the Globe roof.
See it
Lady Susan, Globe Theatre, Dunedin, June 13 and 14
