Drama Books

INTRODUCTION The first two or three of these "plays" (I retain the word for lack of a better one) began themselves as short stories, but in each case I found that the dramatic element, speech, tended to absorb the impersonal element of comment and description, so that it proved easier to go on by allowing the characters to establish the situation themselves. As I grew conscious of this... more...

REMARKS. There seems to be required by a number of well meaning persons of the present day a degree of moral perfection in a play, which few literary works attain; and in which sermons, and other holy productions, are at times deficient, though written with the purest intention. To criticise any book, besides the present drama, was certainly not a premeditated design in writing this little essay; but... more...

Actus PrimusScena Prima Enter Gaspero, and Melitus MelitusSir, you're the very friend I wish'd to meet with,I have a large discourse invites your earTo be an Auditor. GasperoAnd what concerns it? MelitusThe sadly thriving progress of the lovesBetween my Lord, the Prince, and that great Lady,Whose insolence, and never-yet-match'd Pride,Can by no Character be well exprest,But in her only... more...

MEMORANDUM The Sacred Legends touched by this Trilogy would be familiar, in outline, to the Auditors: e. g.: The woes of the House of Atreus: the foundation of them laid by Atreus when, to take vengeance on his brother Thyestes, he served up to him at a banquet the flesh of his own sons; His grandsons were Agamemnon and Menelaus: Menelaus' wife, Helen, was stolen by a guest, Paris of Troy, which... more...

BOOK I PHŒBE BARRASFORD Krindlesyke is a remote shepherd’s cottage on the Northumbrian fells, at least three miles from any other habitation. It consists of two rooms, a but and a ben. Ezra Barrasford, an old herd, blind and decrepit, sits in an armchair in the but, or living-room, near the open door, on a mild afternoon in April. Eliza Barrasford, his wife, is busy, making griddle-cakes over the... more...

ACT I SCENE FIRST (A richly decorated drawing-room; on the walls are portraits of Napoleon I. and his son. The entry is by a large double glass door, which opens on a roofed veranda and leads by a short stairway to a park. The door of Pauline's apartments are on the right; those of the General and his wife are on the left. On the left side of the central doorway is a table, and on the right is a... more...

This comedy excites that sensation, which is the best security for the success of a drama—curiosity. After the two first acts are over, and pleasantly over, with the excellent drawn characters of Ashfield and his wife, and the very just satire which arises from Sir Abel's propensity to modern improvements—the acts that follow excite deep interest and ardent expectation; both of which are so... more...

ACT I. Outside the Stuart home, May, 1864. The large beautiful lawn of a typical Southern home. On the left and partly at the back stands the house, of colonial build, a wide porch running the entire length of the house, with three broad, low steps leading down to the garden. Many vines, mostly wisteria, in full bloom, cover the walls and some climb around the banisters. The porch has four white... more...

INTRODUCTION.* The anecdotic history of John Gabriel Borkman is even scantier than that of Little Eyolf. It is true that two mentions of it occur in Ibsen's letters, but they throw no light whatever upon its spiritual antecedents. Writing to George Brandes from Christiania, on April 24, 1896, Ibsen says: "In your last letter you make the suggestion that I should visit London. If I knew enough... more...

BRONSON HOWARD (1842-1908) The present Editor has just read through some of the vivacious correspondence of Bronson Howard—a sheaf of letters sent by him to Brander Matthews during a long intercourse. The time thus spent brings sharply to mind the salient qualities of the man—his nobility of character, his soundness of mind, his graciousness of manner, and his thorough understanding of the dramatic... more...