If the Elizabethans had formulated nihilism, George F. Walker's Zastrozzi: The Master of Discipline could very well have graced the stage 400 years prior to its original 1977 production. Set in late 19th-century Europe, the work is filled to the brim with revenge, rape (or attempted rape), swordplay, and the requisite pile of corpses. The only thing marking it as a thing of our time is the author's wicked awareness of the emptiness of all the machinations
Criminally Sane
