Act 1

Most of the action in Travesties takes place in Zurich in 1917, during World War I, and focuses on three revolutionaries: the communist leader Lenin, the dadaist poet Tristan Tzara, and the modernist writer James Joyce. Henry Can', a minor British official, relates the trio's actions and dialogue through his memories of that time period. Carr claims that he met Lenin at the Zurich library and Tzara and Joyce during a production of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. The play is set in two locations: the Zurich Public Library, where the principle characters interact, and Carr's apartment in Zurich, where the now-elderly man recalls the past.

The dialogue focuses on the revolutionaries' politics and philosophies at a turning point in each man's life: Joyce's writing of his novel Ulysses, published in 1922; Tzara's creation of the principles of dada, a nihilistic movement in art and literature; and...