The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1913-03-08
!. A. STRONG PROTEST
Hibernians of Pittsbuire Condemn
Presentation of Alleged
National Dramas.
Their Example Will Be Followed
by All lrishmen Through
= g - out This Country.

by All lrishmen Through
= - out This Country.
As protest against the production
in a Pittsburg theater of a repertoire
of plays by the Irish Players company,
the county board Of the Ancient Order
Of Hibernlans passed set Of resolu-
tions denouncing the plays. their au-
tors, the company producing them, the
theater permitting their local presen-
tation and the alleged atheistlc sys-
!. tenn that prompted them.
The committee signing the resolution
says,it represents the opinion and sem
tirnent of 10000 families in Allegheny
county.
: ut has been thought that the ex-
perience Of year and q half ago
would have rendered impossible the
repetition Of the inglorious attempt to
foist these wretched plays upon the
people of this city. Even IL they had
not been the offspring of the most
openly pagan tastes and had not been
written by school of protested and
so.-called Irish atheists; even If they
honestly displayed some genuine dra-
; matte genius that might perhaps in
some way compensate for their vulgar
and loathsome themes, it was expected
that no theater in town would know
ingly expose itself to the certainty Of
directly Offering and deeply outraging
+, the known feelings Of SO large and i'm
..,portant a portion Of its population. for
=. the sake Of pandering to the curiosity
of a few persons who were anxious to
revel in what they knew to be not lit
erature or art, but a low plotless, vul-
gar, false, disgusting caricature of r.
ish peasants, such as we find in the
'Playboy' of Synge. But no! this time
the attempt, foiled on a previous occa-
sion, was put into execution; nor waA
any public protest made in advance by
the Irish societies for the simple rea-
son that they wished to avoid the very
appearance Of unfair discrimination in
advance. as we'll as the probability OF
thus indirectly contributing to an in
crease in patronage, by noisy and pas
rsionate discussion and controversy in
the newspaper columns.
Now, however, that the public who
We're curious to judge for themselves
have seen them. and that these un-.
J, wholesome exhibitions have disap-
peared from our atmosphere, it is only
due to our sense Of propriety and JUS
tice, as we'll as to the interests of true
morality to say an honest word upon
the significance and the character OF
these Irish plays
g.. Not only was Synge-now dead
who was the chief author OF the plays,
a professed pagan of the realistic
French school, but he was lacking in
the, most fundamental sentiments Of
honor and conscience, in his elabora-
ton of these plays. Even the very
preface to his vulgar and loathsome
'Playboy Of the Western World
damns him utterly. Hear his own
words in the said preface: When 1
was writing 1.-The Shadow Of the
Glen some years ago. got more aid
than any learning could have given
me from q chink in the floor of the old
I Wicklow house, where was staying.
: that let me hear what was being said
by the servant girls in the Kitchen
Imagine Syngc lying on the floor, now
listening, now peeping through hole
i In 1t at the poor innocent girls, to get
"a plot for an indecent play that should,
~ Lady Gregory says, represent the
national drama of 1reland!' An caves
r dropper and peeping Tom combined!
1t required a personality as low as
that to write the Playboy.'
s.. Yeats, the youngster, is the least
+ objectionable Of the whole lot-though
,.ahe. is a materialistic dreamer, Of pure
ly pagan ideals and with openly pa
ganizing purposes. His father, the
elder Yeats, declared Gin New York
! , Sun Of Oct. 10. 1910. that the Con-
naught peasants were really pagan,
and that the abominable Playboy'
faithfully represented them. His son
y admitted, in the same paper of Oct.
18th. that his aim was to depict the
Irish peasantry as actually renouncing
their Catholic teaching for pagan NOR
ais and their Catholic heritage for a
: pre- Christian romance which would
place Christ "a mere fabulous and
legendary hero) on the same plane as
Achilles of the Greeks, or Cuchullin OF
the Celts.
"This deliberate perversion of facts