THE WORLD OF BOOKS.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18419, 27 June 1925, Page 13

THE WORLD OF BOOKS.

HALF-HOURS IN A LIBRARY.

(mscui&t maim fob "te« pmss."> By A. H. Gbdcukg. CXIX.—ON SOME MODERN DRAMATISTS. The impetus in poetry manifested before.and during the Great War would seem to have spent itself; in the field of fiction the pre-war writers have written themselves out and the post-war novelists have scarcely settled into their stride. But what of the drama? Is there a ray of hope in this realm of literature? The history of English drama since the days of Shakespeare is a depressing one; and it must be remembered, as Mr Geoffrey Crump points out in his "Guide to the Study of Shakespeare's Plays," that it is only by chance that his plays have become literature. From Shakespeare onward, until the plays of John M. Synge are reached, thero is a.barren dramatic waste, fertilised alone by the brilliance of the comedies of Richard Brinsley Sheridan and of Oscar Wilde. The success .of Shakespeare. as a dramatist rested on the fact that "he wTote solely for the purposes o*f immediate performance under fixed conditions, and without a thought for the future of his plays as literature." The weakness of many of the English writers is that they have written in utter ignorance of the stage and without a thought of stage requirements; they may have produced literature,- but as dramatists, they are absolute failures.

Swinburne is a shining example of this non-success; and so is Shelley. Swinburne's tragedies, Chastelard Bothwell, Mary Stuart and the rest are totally unfitted for stage representation; and the ''same may be said of Shelley's "The Cenci," "Prometheus Unbound" and "Hellas." Tennyson was favoured beyond his fellows in that Sir Henry Irving staged and produced "The Falcon" and "The Cup," and the great actor breathed his last following a performance of "Beeket"; .but save for* the eminence of poet and producer, the plays, as plays, were foredoomed to failure. Eobert Browning was proline in plays, notably ", Pauline," "Paracelsus," and "Strafford," but any.ideas ho may have had of stago' production were speedily dissipated. : Attempts have been made to stage portions of Mi - Thomas Hardy's "The Dynasts," but with only moderate success and that largely owing to war conditions. Indeed, it may be accepted as an axiom that to succeed as a playwright a good knowledge. of the • mechanism of the str.ge and tho possibilities of the drama is an essential condition.

It is just here that tho modern dramatists excel in a sense and to a degree almost unknown since the days of Greek tragedy and comedy. George Bernard Shaw, served a long apprenticeship as dramatic critic on leading; London journals before he tried to become a playwright. John Drihkwater learnt the craft of a dramatist as manager of the Birmingham • Repertory Theatre and this despitetwelve year3'' bondage in an insurance - office. J. M. Syngo and. St. John Ervihe owe their knowledge of the .stage to their connexion' with the Irish Literary Theatre; and, last but by no means least, comes a new star on tho dramatic horizon in the' person of Noel. Coward, whose plays, "The Rat Trap," "The Vortex," "Fallen Angels" and "Easy Virtue", are at once tho talk of London town and the event. of the moment. Without in any way exaggerating the comparison it may be said that -Noel Coward has..this in common -with Shakespeare, via., the unusual gift of combining the- art of the actor with' the skill .of the'playwright. Noel Coward writes his own plays,, produces them and also figures in the cast as one of the actors.

Another notable innovation in the world of modern drama is > the publication of plays as soon as, or even before, they are produced on tho stage. In Shakespeare's day the playhouso authorities deprecated the publishing of plays in the belief that their dissemination in print was injurious, to the receipts of the'theatre and it would seem that Shakespeare himself, had no direct responsibility for the publication of his

plays. In this . connexion Sir Sidney Lee writes:—

Of Shakespeare's plays there wero printed before his death in 1616, only sixteen piece's (all in quarto) .... These quartos, which eold at Svepence or sixpences each, were publishers' ventures, and vrere undertaken without the co-operation of the author. The publication of separate plays was deemed by theatrical shareholders and ever, by dramatists, injurious to their interests But in spite' of the managers' repeated protests, the publishers found ready opportunities of. effecting their purpose. Occasionally a dramatist in . 6elf-defenco against a threat of piracy, sent a piece to press on his own accojnt. But there is no evidence that -Shakespeare assumed any personal responsibility for the printing of any of his drama 3, or that any play in bis own handwriting reached the press. Oyer the means of access to plays which were ■usually open to publishers, the author exerted no control. As a rule, the publisher seems to have bo-ight of an ector one of the copies of the play -which it was necessary {or the manager to, provide for the company. »

This theatrical convention, which deprecated the publishing of plays, would seem to have persisted from Shakespeare's day until quite recent times;. There was a perceptible division between plays written as literature, and not intended for the stage, and plays written for the stape and not deemed to be literature. Mr "ToTm Masefield, himself a poet and playwright of repute, in an address delivered in October last before the first general meeting of the Scottish Association for the Speaking of Verse, insists that poetry from tho beginning was intended to bo spoken rather than read, and he points out the loss that has ensued owing to the wrong way in which poetry is ordinarily introduced to children. Mr Masefield, after enlarging on tho fact that- poetry is one of the great delights in life in which all should share, said:—■

The poets who spoke, sang, and acted their poems were encouraged by Kings and Chiefs. The Reformation, which was largely the woTk of Kings and Chiefs, made many changes in life, through professional change in teaching. As one of the results of .the changes there came a. great body of poetry made and spoken by actors in theatrrs. This was of a.ll sorts and lands, scone of it the most beautiful that has ever been made in English, and some of it devised by commonplace' minds to show their f-kill as actors. But whether good or bad, it was of the people and for tho people, and such a wild delight to the populace throughout these islands that "Industry paused arid Commerce held her breath," wherever the player, spoke. Some of the success of these plays was due to their topical satire, personal • allusions and mimicking, which gave pleasure to those who knew the events mentioned and the people niccked. They teem exceedingly dull and dead to us who come to a knowledge of them from the footnotes of the learned. The theatre then •h-id about it something of the music-hall, something of the revue,' and a, good deal of the newspa-per. But making every allowance for all these points, a very large part of the popularity of the plays was due to the poetry in them, and to _ the speaking of tho actors who were either poets or in the company ■ of poets or under the command of the poets. The speaking of the verse was one of tho gieat attractions; indeed, it must have been so: the actcr then had no help from lights and paints; he acted in daylight, close to his audience, and hold them, by what was in himself: his voice that could perhaps compel, and the poet's rhythm that ' could always charm.

Tlien came the Civil Wars, when, as Mr Masefiekl states, the actors were scattered and beggared and the theatres were closed. After the Restoration when the theatres were at length reopened, a, very different state of affairsi prevailed. In the nineteen years' in terval the democratic theatre had ceased to function, and the nobles who had returned with the King brought back to. England foreign tastesand ideas, which, according to Parisian methods, they dispensed through their servants. The change thus brought about is.described by Mr Masefield:—

Poetry and' the speaking: 'of: poetry became arts, imposed upon thos* beneath by those above. Those beneath did not care m'uchfor theg^ft; it.never took.: root among them, but its presence choked any natural growth' within themselves. The theatre which had been the home of all that was passionate in the nation's mind :became- a political instrument in which the poet no longer set the standards. •- The lords set the standards until ; tho. actors were .strong enough to' oust them. The bost poets began to be'squeezed out of the-theatre, only the.worser poets continued to supply pompous for the French declamatory methods in use. In timo a poet wrote the famous line, 'CO Sophonisba, Sophonisba 0." . After this', playwrights thought it useless, to pretend .further, and took to writing in'prose, to the great henefit of their plays, but with deplorable- results to poetry. ' The greatest of _the . channels by which poetry could reach the hearts.of men was thenceforth-to be closed, or almost closed, ■to.the poets of this land.

A signal mark of the. modern drama is that this' greatest channel is once again opening, the poets' are writing for : the stage again; not'only so, but their ■ plays are being • produced and published. The time is not yet when an enlightened Government willincludo stage •representation of the best dramatic 1 literature as an part of the"educational curriculum.: In days to"come' New Zealand will have a municipal theatre, in every centre of any size, with, two or three repertory companies, State subsidised, travelling up and down the Dominion, performing with- capable actors all that) is best and most characteristic in English, and foreign drama, ancient and modern; and all this at prices lower than those' charged for. the moving picture shows; and unless* the national dramatic taste is to be -hopelessly corrupted, the sooner the thing is taken in hand the better for tho young New Zealander. While working for this great educational reform something has been, and more can.be, done by the practical use of the published plays in the hands of locally formed play-reading circles. Mr' Alexander Woollcott, a critic who, has an intimate acquaintance with the British and American stage, in his book of dramatic criticism called f Shouts and Murmurs," has a paragraph headed "The' Swarming Amateurs," in which he says:— ■',•''•"'

Amateur activity in dramatic work has in> the last ten or fifteen years increased to a mo3t astonishing degree. The American theatre,- still directed, ' however helplessly, from New York, has fallen ludicrously behind in its task of keeping pace with the expansion of the country, and from- many a thriving community has retreated altogether, leaving the citizens to darkness and the movies. In such places, amateur societies of staggering ambitiousness, have sprung up to satisfy an ancient and, fcr all the Puritan hostility, an ineradicable appetite. There has been an entirely new interest stage decoration, so that one can. mention cycloramaa and amber spots without causing. bewilderrn6ci. There has been a great reading and conning of new plays. Publishers, who in 1910 would have fainted at the mere suggestion that they publish a play, have since taken to putting out contemporary dramatic literature in abundance. The works of Eugene 0'N?ill, for instance, few of which have found the.professional stages outside Jvew York, have in'book form penetrated to tho remotest nook 3 cf America, and his name, probably, has more meaning in its generation—conveys more", that is, to mosi . .the incomparably more successful Clyde Fitch's did in his. It is-the Eame- with tho aspiring Susan Glaspell. Hor plays have had only brief and: experimental production in Sew York, but they have been published, and the amateurs, from Savannah to Seattle, have revelled in.them.

.Tho publication of playa by contemporary . authors has become . popular, not only.; in America but -in England

(Continued at foot of next column.)

and throughout the, British Empire. When in London in the early part ot--1914, before the war, I called one day upon a publisher who had made a new departure in. the issue of plays by British and foreign authors, but, alas, as he hastened to assure me, with but scant success. The plays for, the most' part remained upon his shelves; there was little or mo" demand for them. Today all that has changed, publishers vie the one. with the other an the publication of plays until the multiplicity bewilders and.it becomes dimcult to keep up with the supply.. In addition to the" plays of well-known writers, like" Bernard _ • fehaw, Arnold Bennett, John Dnnkwater, liord Dunsany, Lady Gregory, &'t. John Envine, J. M. Barne, and others, a new feature is the issue of series of plavs by lesser, known hands. Among these may be mentioned ''The British Drama League Library of Modern British Drama," and the "Contemporary British Dramatists," not forgetting the "Repertory Plays" published by Gowans, and Gray, of Glasgow. All .of which goes to show that the demand for plays by modern authors is sufficient to' justify the publishers in this comparatively new departure; as also the fact that authors are increasingly devoting their attention to the writing of plays.

Quantity, however, does not necessarily mean quality; but, a survey of the dramatic fields reveals the remarkable fact that the divorce between the poets and the theatre is ■ being healed, and that poetry is taking, its place, in th e British drama once more. Of this two outstanding examples are John Drinkwater and Gordon Bottomley, both genuine poets, and men whose most; striking successes have been in the writing of plays. As the writer of poetical plays which reflect the spirit of the old Greek drama, Mr Drinkwater is entitled to attention. He served his apprenticeship as dramatist with the Birmingham Repertory Theatre for which he wrote five short plays, beginning with "Cophetua'.' .and ending with "X-O," with "Rebellion," ''The Storm," and "The God of Quiet" in between, all written and produced between the years 1911 and 1917. In his book on "Some Contemporary Dramatists" Mr E. Graliam Sutton says:—

In five years Mr Drinkwater far. outstripped 'Cophetua' with X-O, then ceased to write verse plays. "X-O" mav thus be regarded as a turning point. The "last of the vcrae-plays; it was also in some sort the first of the Chronicles —an embryonic "Lincoln" or "Lee." And in chosing Chronicle,- Mr Drink-water proceeded . to apply the lesson he had learnt from the Greeks: namo? ]y, that in drama ' one of the interesting things, the' T>ig things,' is the sense of history's continuity—the sense that great men may rise and'fall, but that mankind goes on; side by side with this, the sense of our, own fellow-humanity with bygone greatness. Chronicle again invok€s the very potent stage appeal of remembered glory, recreated for the physical eye. Lamb speaks of it: "Hero wns the Court of Persia. It wa3 being admitted in a sight of the past. ... I" heard the word Davius, and I was in the midst of Daniel. All. feeling was absorbed, in v«ion." True "X-O" presents no great eponymous hero; though we hear the word Helen ind the name of Troy stirs our imagination •us ""''Chevy Chase" did Sidney's, like'a trumpet call. But in the full dress Chronicles this appeal is used to the utmost. It is used in—

President is coming up the stairs, sir."

Or irr "What time is John Hampden coming?" "By nightfall," he said. "Henry . Iretoh i 3 coming with him." '

Or in ■ "Mr Xlilton was reading to me this after- ■ noon." Or best of all in the' Mayor of Ely's open- , ing words: "At Edgehill in Warwickshire, I hear?" • Simple and casual" as such line 3 are, they arouse a thrill which. makes them in each oase- memorable 'in 'the plays where they occur.