The Toast Explains 'How To Tell If You Are In A Tom Stoppard Play'

When it comes to making American audiences feel inadequate about their public school educations, no British playwright hits the mark quite as consistently as Tom Stoppard.

From quirky early works like ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN ARE DEAD and JUMPERS to full-out intellectual exercises like ARCADIA and THE INVENTION OF LOVE, Stoppard has never been one to underestimate his audience's literary and historical frames of reference. Heck, he even wrote a play called ROCK 'N' ROLL that left Americans baffled about about rock 'n' roll.

But even if you can't tell THE REAL INSPECTOR HOUND from THE REAL THING, you're sure to get some good laughs out of Marissa Skudlarek's essay for The Toast on "How To Tell If You Are In A Tom Stoppard Play."

All of your friends are named Nicholas and half of them are dying of tuberculosis.

You encounter a troupe of thespian funambulists. They are glib, and not to be trusted.

How odd! The events of your daily life exactly parallel the obscure scientific theory that you're researching!

Your desk is a mess, heaped with books and papers. Luckily, your pet tortoise makes an excellent paperweight.

You are a brilliant and high-spirited woman, and therefore you are doomed to a tragically early death.

You have found all the mysteries and lost all the meaning, and now you are alone on an empty shore.

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