The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1891-04-03
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.
A TRIBUTE BY ROBERT G. NIGER
SOIL To THE GREATEST DRAMATIC
GENIUS OF THE WORLD.
"Not For a Day, But For All Time"

recently at the Broadway Theatr
Shakespeare and his Work." the
ture being for the benefit of the -.
club building fund.
Previous to his lecture he paid trib
ute to the late Lawrence Barrett in the
following beautiful words:
MY heart tells me that on the TIRES
hold of my address it will be appropriate
| for me to say a few words about the
! that sleep we call death. Lawrence
Barrett was my friend and l was his.
He was an interpreter, of Shak-
speare to whose creation she gave
| flesh and blood. He be
gan at the foundation of his profession,
and rose until he stood next to his
| friend-next to one who is regarded as
the greatest tragedian of our time,
next to Edwin Booth. The life of Law
renee Barrett was a success. because he
honored himself and added glory to the
stage. He did not seek for gain by
pandering to the thoughtless, irnorant,
or base. He gave the drama in its high
| est and most serious form. He shuned
| the questionable, the vulgar and impure
and gave the intellectual, the pathetic,
the manly and the tragic. He did not
stoOp to coneuor-he scared. He was
| fitted for the stage. He had thought
| full face, a vibrant voice and the pose OF
chivalry, and besides he had patience,
| industry, courage and the genius OF
success. He was graceful and strik-
ing Bassanio, thoughtful Hamlet, an
| intense Othello. a marvellous Harebell
and the best Cassius of the country.
In the drama of human life all are act
Ors and no one knows his part. In the
| great play the scenes are shifted by I'M
| seen forces, and the commencement,
plot and end sire still unknown, are I'M
guessed. One by one the players leave
| the stage and others take their places.
There is no pause. The play goes on.
No prOmpter's voice is heard, and no
one has the slightest cue as to what the
scene is to be. Will this drama have
an end? Will the curtain fall at last?
Will it rise again upon some other
stage? Reason says perhaps, and hope
whispers yes. Sadly bid my friend
farewell. l admired the actor and |
loved the man.
The lecture on Shakespeare was read
from manuscript and required an hour
and half for its delivery. His chief
points were as follows:
THE LECTURE.
We have met to pay tribute to the
great genius of the world. He gave to
us the treasure of the rarest sort that
ever lived, and wrought by words the
statues, pictures and tombs of thought.
Shakespeare was so great that l feel as
though am endeav6ring to grasp a
globe so large that can not obtain any
hold. More than three centuries ago
this greatest intellect of the human
race was born. He was not of super
natural origin. His father and mother
both lived in the world. There was no
drop of royal blood. There was moth
ing that we know connected with his
birth or ecucation that can account for
him. Ignorant people are apt to over
rate the value of education. They be-
lieve that wealth is the mother of JOY.
On the other hand, the children of the
rich find that gold does not purchase
happiness, and they are apt to under
rate the value of wealth. The children
of great authors rarely become writer's.
Possibly differences in culture right
themselves in the centuries. Possibly
the eras that lie fallow gather strength.
1t is said that his father came under
the ban of the church. That is good
as far as it goes. OF his mother we
know little, but her beautiful name of
Mary. In those days little Of women
was written except that they were born,
married and died. When men became
great no one thought of hunting up
their ancestry on the mothers side.
They looked after the fathers and the
grand-fathers. Yet the mother of
Shakespeare endowed her son with
passion and imagination, with the
highest quality of the soul, higher than
any other man ever possessed 1t has
been said that men of genius must
select their ancestors with great care.
Laughter. Yet there does not seem
to be so much in heredity as people
think. So far as we know Shaks-
peare was not sired by noble, or soldier
or priest He lived at time when the
poet was subordinate to the theologian.
Happily he had no intimate friend to be
his biOgrapher and to write reminis-
cences of him, so the trivialitieS about
only the best. All that is known of
he was not unknown to his contempt
raries. He is mentioned in the lists
that were made of the great writers OF
the day before his name had become
worldwide, and yet there has survived
him no letter written by him to any
man, or by any man to him.
| have found it difficult to ex-
plain the epitaph on his tomb
1t is so disreputable that the only rea-
son | can give for it is that it was
put there to reconcile the ignorant peO-
pie of Avon to the idea of having an
actor buried in church. 1t was then
to be disreputable to be an
actor or dramatist. l do not believe
that Shakespeare wrote his own epitaph
because some one else wrote it as an
apology for placing his remains in that
church that has been made immortal by
the fact that his body lies there.
We find mention of Shakespeare in
1895, in 1898, 1906. 1907 by various auth |
Ors about this time, and twelve years
after he began to write: he was we'll |
known in England. 1t his been re-
marked as curious that in all his works /
made no mention of any of |
his contemporaries. 1t has been urged |
by some that he was patronized by ,
Queen Elizabeth and that he referred to .
her in the lines ending I'm maiden
meditation fancy free" but this is
doubtful. 1t has been said that he men,
toned her in the second act Of Henry
the Eighth. Some people think that
Bacon wrote Shakspeare's plays. But
that part of the play of Henry the VIII
was written by Fletcher, so that Shak
speare could not have written it. At
the time of Shakspeare's birth, Europe
was emerging from the darkness of the
Darbarious and middle ages There