The sun., 1903-10-18
QUALITIES OUR PLAYS LACK.
WHY THE REAL PUBLIC GRAVES
49,. DOSES or IDSEN.
His Message at Least One or Great Art
Contrast Ot the Principal New Plays
Or the Past Week-<;OOd and BAD In
"Old Heiqielber9''-Mr. SOthern m
'sTne Proud Prince''-The ''Nfnrts."

"Old Helalelber9"-Mr. sothern m
'"The Proud Prince'-The ''Marta."
Nov. 1.-In reading Victor Hugo ] seem
to feel a separation. q wide gulf between the
artist and the public Of our day. In former
days a man liks Moliere represented his
public. and was. so to speak. on the same
level. To-day the great writer's are on
higher. the public on a lower. plane.
These words were written by the Con-
court brothers, Nov. 81. 1855. They do
not hold good in New York. The boot is
on the other leg nowadays. 1t is our public
that is superior to its authors, dramatic
and otherwise. There is no need Of minc-
ing words. After securing all dramatic
Europe am confronted on my return
with collection Of plays that might have
been written d. 1900 for all the connec-
ton they have with modern life and its
social, artistic conditions. Shakespeare,
master ironist, was fooling future genera
tiohs 70 the top Of his bent when he put
such futile words In Hamiet's mouth about
the stage holding up the mirror to life,
A trick mirror it must he. Any escape
from the true and the beautiful, no matter
the cost to authentic art, is the evident
effort Of English and American playwrights,
II the majority possessed the fantasy OF
Barrie, the irony Of Shaw or the supernal
cleverness of Pinero, that escape might be
transmitted into something Of interest.
But dulness reigns, mediocrity is crowned.
and the public forced to accede to condi-
ton it by no means indorses.
Take the Ibsen case. I, for one, can
conceive OF no more terrible thing than
steady course OF Ibsen plays We know
humanity is a mixed quality; that good
does not prevail: that badness seems to
rule. We know that average life, with its
dulness, its vulgarity, its cheapness, fat
ness, sends many souls to consoling mys-
ticism, to alcohol or even to politics
that last refuge for enfeebled dotards.
The average tendency is to lie about life;
lie Bordryisme, Jules de Gaultier has beau
tifully named it, after Emma and Charles
Bovary, the deluded couple who became
bankrupt because they failed to recognize
the dues Of reality. Ibsen is the illusion
shatterer among latter day thinkers; not
Flaubert, arCh-pessimist as he was, had
Ibsen's uncompromising habit Of regard
ing life steadily and as wholly evil. But
what mental diet for daily consumption
is a cycle Of Ibsen plays! What pro-
found disgust of life, of its daily decep-
tions. his words engenderl AS prophy-
lactic-yes; for the one who is to be worn
next the heart, like an a Kempis Oheir
outlook is not so vastly differently, Goethe,
an Emerson, Ibsen would prove a sorry
substitute.
Yet the real public Graves Ibsen az a sick
man Graves a cure. Doses are doled out
and eagerly swallowed. not because, as
some believe, his message is hopeless, but
because there is fibre In 1t because his mes
sage is the message Of great art. And great
art is always an evocation. 1t proves
nothing, The Ibsenites tried to prove their
idol superior to Shakespeare, which is mere
incoming. II people thronged the Man.
haitian Theatre when "Hedda Gabler" was
played. it only means that there is a suffi-
oiently intelligent minority in this city
rhEt 4,ss revolted at the sentimental mush.
the pious pap, the cheap vulgarities Of cur
rent plays. 1t does not mean In the least
that there is reaction in Ibsen's favor. Half
the time we use his name to bludgeon fools
and knaves, and the rest Of the nonentities
clinging to the skirts Of theatrical mana
gers And bless their innocent CONNER
cial souls! they don't care hang whether
Ibsen or Clyde Fitch, Pinero or Peekaboo
draws. The main thing is to fill their
theatres, and you can't blame them. They
pay the bills use Mr.. Fitch's name not at
all In depreciatory sense, for, after all.
he means something he is attempting some-
thing; and If I have not worshipped at his
shrine, it is simply because I don't care for
his sweets and syllabubs. That he is to be
counted upon in the future. there is no
doubt-when he discards the musk and dolls
of the drama.
No, Ibsen will always be in the minority,
as he once put the words in the mouth Of
his own Brand. He serves az a good criti-
cal bogey to scare away some of the more
timid idiots who aspire to playwriting with
out having studied elementary rules, the
language. life itself
Again / repeat, at the risk Of tiresome
reiteration, that Ibsen would not be healthy
In more than monthly doses. He tells
the truth, and the mirror Of self-approbation
would soon crack if exposed to his trenchant
and reverberating candor. IL is the re-
habilitation of the drama of high flown
nonsense, the drama Of cheap historic
fiction, the drama of social inanities before
which we balk And the public really does
not admire them-entr 'acte criticism re-
yeals that fact. If one-tenth OF these out
spoken opinions Of the man in the lobby
we're published theatrical managers would
sue for libel or put up the shutters on their
shops. Rotten" is the adjectve--if it
is one-that is usually heard. And rotten"
is happy coinage, an expressive coinage,
despite the unpeasantncss of the term.
When George Moore, who is still very much
alive and kicking, used the word "guts,'
he offended a great number of people who
did not know their Shakespeare, or the
good, old Saxon connotations of the brisk
phrase, Yet IL Is just this same quality
WHICH is lacking in most modern playwrt-
ing-not heart, not soul, not stomach, but
-guts." There's Saxon saiutation for
you in your Saxon slop, a. NercrtiO would
ray II the gallant gentleman but lived in
these parlous and pallid times. The white
oorpuslle wins in literature. and a dozen
men OF the genius of Rabelais, Fielding
and Moliere could not displace il. The
one man in England to-day who writes
like a man unafraid is George Moore, and
as We all know, George Moore is voted
coarse In circles where the pure minded
utter refined and corseted phrases
However, it Is not place for plain speak
ing that we are entering. Plain speaking
and high thinking have gone out OF fashion.