TY  - BOOK
AU  - Dix,Beulah Marie
TI  - Moloch
T2  - The Borzoi plays ; 2
AV  - PS 
PY  - 2026///
CY  - Salt Lake City, UT
PB  - Project Gutenberg
KW  - American drama -- 20th century
KW  - War -- Drama
N1  - Release date is 2026-04-08; Carla Foust, Chris Miceli and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive); Originally published; New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1916
N2  - "Moloch" by Beulah Marie Dix is a play written in the early 20th century. It is a wartime domestic drama that charts how a comfortable household is consumed by the machinery of modern conflict, invoking the figure of Moloch as a metaphor for war’s demand for the young and the best. The story centers on Katherine and her husband Robert, their little boy Roland, Robert’s mother Lydia, his siblings Gertrude and Basil, and their friend Philip, a foreign-born physician whose loyalties become a flashpoint when war arrives.

The opening of the play presents a peaceful country house where family members argue about the likelihood and nature of war—Basil and the Professor eager, Katherine skeptical, Gertrude thoughtful—until news breaks: war has been declared, and suspicion falls on Philip despite his having saved Roland’s life. Ten days later in town, patriotic bustle fills the streets; Basil, newly commissioned, marches off as Robert reveals he has taken a captaincy and departs as well, while Philip briefly returns to plead with Gertrude to escape with him—she refuses in a surge of wounded patriotism and he leaves under threat. Nine months on, winter and invasion have brought deprivation and grief: Margaret flees a bombed hospital, Martha returns shattered after losing her family, and foreign troops billet in the house; Katherine’s quiet care for an exhausted young enemy lieutenant humanizes both sides, and a chance revelation that he is Philip’s cousin prompts Gertrude to reclaim her love and write to Philip, learning he now fights as an aviator. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
UR  - https://archive.org/details/molochprologue00dixbrich/page/n5/mode/2up
UR  - https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78389
ER  -