The Threepenny Opera (1928), by German playwright Bertolt Brecht, is an operatic social satire by one of the most influential playwrights of the twentieth century.

The Iceman Cometh (1939), by American playwright Eugene O'Neill, was first produced in 1946. O'Neill, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1936, was a central figure in elevating American theater to the quality of literature in the first half of the twentieth century. The Iceman Cometh, one of his greatest works, is a tragic play that takes place over the course of one day in the life of a family whose lives are wracked by alcoholism, drug abuse, illness, and personal failure.

Captain Jan, by Jan de Hartog (original title: Hollands Glorie, published in 1940; English translation published in 1976), is based on the author's experiences as a tugboat sailor. The novel became a symbol of Dutch resistance during...