Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1874-08-14
THE sIMON.PURE AMERICAN

We published recently an outline of
Boucicault's new American drama. 1t
was brought out at Booths, for the
first time, on Monday plight, and APP
pears to have been well reeeived. The
author was called before the curtain
four times and made one of his grace
full little speeches, that never fail to
take with an audience. Belle Lamar" is
Boucicault's first attempt at producing
play based on purely American ias-
dents and characteristics. His genius
for it may be called such-has been
heretofore confined to adapting the
masterpieces of French dramatists
with nameless skill that has won him
fame, fortune and any amount of abuse.
The critics have, all along, bantered
him to give the world something thor
oughly original, and he has at last
Yentured upon the hazardous expert
ment.
OF Belle Lamar" the cautious, as
tute critic of the Tribune says: cit
is Symmetrical, pure, well-written,
snowy drama; it is also in some re-
spects the work of the artisan rather
than the artist. 1t rests on an affect
ing episode in the lore experience of a
husband and wife, who were temporar-
lily parted in society, but never in
heart, by disagreement as to the cali and
duty of patriotism. This is trying, but
it is also trite. The moral lesson-that
civil war parts the dearest of friends,
and is always an abborrent calamity
is relied on for significance of dramatic
and literary results. This also is true.
and Belle Lamar" may thus be said
to concern the civil war pretty much
as smoke concerns the chimney it has
left. Mr.. Boucicault deity finds in
that soil place for the thin roots of his
story; bat it is to the foliage and
not the roots that he asks attention.
That foliage is startling situation and
distressing emotion. The play has this
demerit-in art-that It is one tissue,
almost unmitigated, Of heartrending
misery. There is too much Dixie to
suit Union zealois, and too much Uni
ionismto suit Dixie devotees. The hero
Inc is hateful part, because aspy; but
it is the str INCEST character in the play.
Whatever questions il may arouse, and
whatever strifes of feeling and opin-
ION 1t may cause, it must be recorded
as one Of the best Of Mr.. Boucicalt's
works, in that strong, elaborate vein of
Snowy popular fabric. which is not bis
best VEN. though perhaps his most sue
cessful one; and likewise rs a drama
which because Of the felicity of its
construction and the peculiarly vital
elements of which It is CON-
posed, will ran like wild-fre
from one end of the country to the other.
The NslV York Herald critic grows en-
phatic over the play and does not mea-
sure his terms of praise. 1t touches,
he says, chords Of the national heart
that, though quiescent now, must Vi
brate as the scenes and passions of the
civil strife that has scarcely died away
are recalled by the dramatist. With
curious skill the author has succeeded
in presenting what was noblest and
best in both sides, without giving cause
for offence to any. Even the men who
met in deadly fight can look at this war
picture with a sad kind of pleasure,
without having any of their suscepti-
bilities offended. What Mr.. Boucicault
seeks is to build up drama
that will give him telling and powerful
situations. Manipulating his materi-
ais with this object, he has made a
play that will probably be as successful
as any that he has written. 1t required
considerable boldness to deal with a
war which has left so many bitter
memories. Every question involved in
the late unpleasantness is touched on
forcibly, but delicately, by many a
happy epigram, but always with a
tendency to heal and cover up the
wounds inflicted by the suicidal strife.
So far as the war is concerned, if
Boueieault's play develops but half the
soothing tendency guaranteed by the
critics, he viii prove himself worthy of
enduring fame not as dramatist alone,
but also as patriot whose pen is in
deed mightier than the sword.