The Stonemason: A Play in Five Acts Book

I sought out and read The Stonemason for completeness, really (now I've read all of McCarthy's novels and plays), but I was pleasantly surprised - this is probably one of his better dramatic works. I haven't seen this performed, so I'm evaluating it more or less as a written piece only. There are some interesting dramatic elements, like the lead character, Ben, narrating his dialogue from a separate area of the stage (his character's representation in the drama is a mute "double"). I'm not sure how this would come across when performed, but the idea is interesting enough. Here is an extract from the stage directions, which explains the use of the double - I enjoyed McCarthy's little philosophical asides here:

"What must be kept in mind is that the performance consists of two separate presentations. One is the staged drama. The other is the monologue - or - chautauqua - which Ben delivers from the podium. And while it is true that Ben at his podium is at times speaking for - or through - his silent double on stage, it is nevertheless a crucial feature of the play that there be no suggestion of communication between these worlds. In this sense it would not even be incorrect to assume that Ben is unaware of the staged drama. Above all we must resist the temptation to see the drama as something being presented by the speaker at his lectern, for to do so is to defraud the drama of its right autonomy. One could say that the play is an artifact of history to which the audience is made privy, yet if the speaker at his podium apostrophizes the figures in that history it is only as they reside in his memory. It is this which dictates the use of the podium. It locates Ben in a separate space and isolates that space from the world of the drama on stage. The speaker has an agenda which centers upon his own exoneration, his own salvation. The events which unfold upon the stage will not at all times support him. The audience may perhaps be also a jury. And now we can begin. As the mathematician Gauss said to his contemporaries: Go forward and faith will come to you."

The play deals with themes like death, purpose, loss, pride, family, self-destruction and redemption, with which readers of McCarthy's other works will be familiar. These central ideas are elusive enough that they can be contemplated, but not cleanly resolved at the play's completion.