The Washington herald., 1911-11-12

Washington is an event Of the highest
import to those who sincerely believe
in the theater as a vehicle of art, and
who rightly assign it a higher post of
honor in the future than it occupies at
present. 1t would require much space
to give any adequate conception of what
these players from the Dublin Abbey
have done. They are not professional
actors in the strict sense of the word
they are peasants and plain Irishmen
and Irishwomen; all OF them gifted, SIM
pie of heart and manner, and strong
CROUCH to scorn the mummer's bag Of
tricks and petty stage business which
grow like barnacles in the topsy-turvy
world of the footlights. They play with
the sincerity, the directness, the un-
affestedness of amateurs, with but little
of the amateurs rawness and crudeness.
The fact that they have been accepted
at the Court Theater, in London, by
the most exacting theatrical public in
the world, is sufficient proof Of their
ability.
There are no stars in this company of
players, and hardly the name of a single
actor precedes their coming to Wash
ington. The magnitude of their achieve
ment is hardly realized even by them
selves. Lady Augusta Gregory, who is
now in the city, and who contrives to
remain more or less in the background
even though she has literally been
founder, patroness, and godmother for
the organization, modestly deprecates
any effort to lonize her plays or her
players. What this Irish band has done
has been to popularize some of the finest
contemporary dramas in English, dramas
11Elr rN.a1
quality. dramas which are as different
from the common or garden variety Of
playhouse product as day is from night
1t is much too early to fix the place OF
William Butler Yeats or John NJ. Synge
in the modern literature of the stage; all
that We know is that both have written
plays full of poetry and charm and in
tellectuaI significance, including 'Kath-
leen nj Houlihan" The Well of the
Saints" and The Playboy of the West
ern World" The last-named comedy
seems to be destined for immortality,
for 1t is the center of endless controversy
among the Irish. and, indeed, among all
who see it.
One of the most effective pieces pre-
scented by these players is Bernard
Shaw's The Showing Up of Blanco
Posnet." 1t is a characteristic one-act
piece of his, hard, glittering, and bril-
liant in dialogue, epigrammatic, paradox
ical, and, according to some, blasphe-
nous. The locale Of the play is a Ne
vada mining camp in the Bret Harte
days, but the scene might as we'll be in
Yorkshire or Australia, for all the diff
ference it would make in the vitality Of
the play.
BIanco Posnet is a horse thief, who has
lived in defiance of God man, and the
devil in strange, spiritual, Schopen-
haueTish independence of the world and
its works When hanging by the vigi-
laiTtes stares him in the face, as a re- |
suit of his theft. Blanco says:
The Almighty hasn't finished with |
you yet, Booty. He always has a trick |
or two up His sleeve. He's a sly one |
He's mean one. He plays cat and |
mouse with you. He lets you run loose |
until you think you're shut of Him; and |
then, when you least expect it, He's got !
you. Who taught you your reverent |
cant? Not the Bible. 1t says He cometh |
like thief in the night-aye, like a |
thief-a horse thief-and it's true. That's
how He caught me and put my neck
into the halter. To spite me because 1 |
mad no use for Him-because 1 lived my
own life in my own way, and would |
have no truck with His don't do this |
and you mustn't do that and you'll go |
TO h if you do the other I gave |
Him the go-by and did without Him all !
these years. But He caught me out at |
last The laugh is with Him so far as !
hanging me goes"
That large element of the Irish-Amer- |
leans find the plays of Yeats. Synge, and |
Shaw unpalatable, it would be useless 10
deny. There has been abundant proof of !
that in Boston, New York. and else
where. 1t should be remembered that
many of these plays present the Irish
peasantry as they were centuries ago,
and have no possible bearing on either
the social or political conditions of the
Emerald Isle of the present day. There
has been a tortuous fostering of misun-
Outstanding regarding The Playboy of
the Western World" and other dramas
since the Irish Players arrived in the
United States. 1t will be the aim in
these columns to treat the Irish plays
solely from an artistic and dramatic
point or view. A. NJ. J.