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A prolific playwright and successful actor and director, Noël Coward has had a significant impact on culture in the English-speaking world. ''Time'' magazine said that he had a unique "sense of personal style, a combination of cheek and chic, pose and poise".〔("Noel Coward at 70" ), 26 December 1969, accessed 8 February 2009〕 Coward wrote over 50 published plays and many albums of original songs, in addition to musical theatre (including the operetta ''Bitter Sweet''), comic revues, poetry, short stories, a novel and three volumes of autobiography. Books of his song lyrics, diaries and letters also have been published. Some of his plays, such as ''Hay Fever'', ''Private Lives'', ''Design for Living'', ''Present Laughter'' and ''Blithe Spirit'', have entered the regular theatre repertoire. His stage and film acting and directing career spanned six decades, and his cabaret performances were very popular in the 1950s and 1960s. Coward won an Academy Honorary Award in 1943 for his naval film drama ''In Which We Serve''. Many of Coward's plays were adapted for film.〔(''Contemporary Authors Online'' ), Thomson Gale, 2004, accessed 30 December 2008: requires subscription; and (Noel Coward ) at the IMDB database, accessed 12 March 2009〕 Coward was knighted in 1969 and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.〔("Noël Coward", ) ''Contemporary Authors Online'', Thomson Gale, 2004, accessed 30 December 2008〕 A statue of Coward was unveiled by the Queen Mother in the foyer of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in 1998.〔("Coward statue unveiled" ), BBC news, 8 December 1998, accessed 8 February 2009〕 The Noël Coward Theatre in St Martin's Lane, originally called the New Theatre, was renamed in his honour in 2006. ==Critical reputation and legacy== The playwright John Osborne said, "Mr Coward is his own invention and contribution to this century. Anyone who cannot see that should keep well away from the theatre."〔("Noel Coward" ), Introduction page to NoelCoward.com, accessed 8 February 2009〕 Kenneth Tynan wrote in 1964, "Even the youngest of us will know, in fifty years' time, exactly what we mean by 'a very Noel Coward sort of person'."〔Tynan, pp. 286–88〕 ''The Times'' said of him, "None of the great figures of the English theatre has been more versatile than he," and the paper ranked his plays in "the classical tradition of Congreve, Sheridan, Wilde and Shaw".〔''The Times'', 27 March 1973, p. 18〕 In praise of his versatility, another admirer said, "There are probably greater painters than Noël, greater novelists than Noël, greater librettists, greater composers of music, greater singers, greater dancers, greater comedians, greater tragedians, greater stage producers, greater film directors, greater cabaret artists, greater TV stars. If there are, they are fourteen different people. Only one man combined all fourteen different labels – The Master."〔(Seventieth birthday tribute to Coward by Lord Mountbatten ) Quotations, NoelCoward.com, accessed 3 February 2009〕 A symposium published in 1999 marked the centenary of Coward's birth and listed some major productions of Coward shows scheduled for the year in Britain and North America, including ''Ace of Clubs, After the Ball, Blithe Spirit, Cavalcade, Easy Virtue, Hay Fever, Present Laughter, Private Lives, Sail Away, Song at Twilight, The Young Idea'' and ''Waiting in the Wings'', with stars including Lauren Bacall, Wendy Craig, Fenella Fielding, Derek Griffiths, Rosemary Harris, Michael Jayston, Penelope Keith, Anton Lesser, Geraldine McEwan, Ian McKellen, Marie McLaughlin, Corin Redgrave, Greta Scacchi, Juliet Stevenson and Elaine Stritch.〔Kaplan, pp. 217–21〕 Tim Rice said of Coward's songs: "The wit and wisdom of Noël Coward's lyrics will be as lively and contemporary in 100 years' time as they are today,"〔Kenrick, John. ("Noel Coward 101: Cowardy Quotations" ), Musicals101.com, The Cyber Encyclopedia of Musical Theatre, TV and Film, accessed 8 February 2009〕 and many have been recorded by Paul McCartney, Sting, Elton John, Robbie Williams, Pet Shop Boys, The Divine Comedy, Vic Reeves, Ian Bostridge, Damon Albarn, Michael Nyman, and others.〔Hoare, Philip. ("Coward, Sir Noël Peirce (1899–1973)", ) ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, September 2004; online edn, January 2008, accessed 30 December 2008〕〔("Noel Coward", Music ) Listing of works at Amazon UK]〕〔For example, in the 1998 album ''Twentieth-Century Blues: The Songs of Noel Coward'', Coward's songs are performed by Sting, Elton John, Pet Shop Boys, The Divine Comedy, Vic Reeves, Paul McCartney and others.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Cultural impact of Noël Coward」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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