Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1914-01-03
Tendencies Of
FRENCH stage
Seen IN U, 5,
Ideals Of "6y Plee' Being
Realized Il 6Othsm
1heatelS

| aA4tt 49, . F.
1heatelS
Paris, Jan. 2.-"Shalr we go to SCI
the cabaret? Paris. you know. has a rea
one now, faithfully copied from the one
in New York"
These were proud words of a native
Partisan with whom l have atched the
passing show of Paris for many a year.
@"Shall we see the Apache dance also?'
Not yet, but it may come later. Some
Of the performers who do it in New York
are coming to teach US. 1t will fill a
long-felt a in Paris. Americans who
come over find they do not realize their
ideals of Paris without it,"
what will the Paris Apaches do about
it?"
"Oh, they will come with the rest to
gasp and stare"
Americans seem to believe that Paris
Apaches can be recognized by their dress
and manners, which, to say the least,
would be inconvenient for them with the
police. Until now. when Americans have
insisted on being shown the real Apache
Of Paris, we have had to take them to
some Out-of-the.way theatre and point
to the bicycle boys and office clerks in
the cheap gallery at the top. We have
been a little behind New York, but the
change has come. Americans will now
be able to realize on the spot the ideals
Of Paris which they have formed at
home.
Other Signs Of Change In Paris.
The opening Of the season was mark
ed by other signs of change in the
amusements Of Paris. They were particu.
larry noteworthy in drama and opera,
where native Parisians pay less attention
to foreign .preconceptions and respond
more sensitively to genuine French opin-
ion. In country where the stage plays so
leading q part in worldly life, this is sen.
timenta1ly equal to a political revolu-
ton. and politics are not without their
part in it. 1t might seem strange in
Washington that g President Wilson
should have to interfere in theatricals:
but it has just been Premier Barthou's
executive business in the French Repub-
lie to name state officeholders for one
of the two State theatres and for bot,
Of the two State opera houses. He has
the mateer-for the French will have
their republic Athenian, or not have it
at oil.
a sign Of deep change in French opln-
ion vas the comparatice failure at i
Boulevard theatre. not of the state, Of
the seasons chief production, Henry
Bataille's new play lie Phalene." The
title Of the piece means moth to or.
binary people, and the word is feminine
by grammatical gender. A first aston
ishment OF. the ''bourgeola'' is that the
author should placard it as masculine
and vet it means his heroine This oh.
scure 'symbolisf would be but a mo-
ment's fiutter for PhiIistines, had she
not been identified with poor Marie
Bashkirtseff transfigured here in her de-
spair at dying into a follower OF Remains
erotic Abbesse de Jauarre. 1t may be
that a playwright has to take his inspira-
tion where he finds it, but no "intellec.
tuef' has done SO before with such con-
tempt for common people.
Sign OF Having Gone Too Far.
HI AIVCn al llAS HICCCS lIlOSL 1IlSOlCkL- 10 lIus
mainly. and last season in his "Flam-
bean, Henry Bataille has had at least
9 Success d''estime." This time there was
not. more than a success de curiosite"
with open yawning and disgust toward
the end. It Is clearer than ever that the
Intellectuels have wantoned enough with
French feeling-it is time for them t.
60.
This very genuine feeling thus sudden
~ flares up In a dissolute generation
never SO dissolutc as 1t ~seems-because
the feeling issues straight from the Chris
lar civilization common to those who.
believe and those who do not. 1t is that
even conventional chastity supposes
something more than mere physical con-
Thence, and that, even in life's doubt
and despair, there is left some hadow
Of craving for purity OF heart. Now ii
Henry Bataile's plays, in the 'Amau.
reuse Of Porto Rico, which has just
been staged again, in the savage trag-
edies Of Bernstein. and the untroubled
comedies OF Tristan Bernard, this feel
ing is wanting painfully.
It Is not now as before when hearers
asked simply-Where do these authors
pick up their people? The Paris public
may be de- hristianized and Indifferent
to many things, but at last i thas baked
at q play representing sudden ~sex,obses-
sion in q maiden when she learn that she
is to die prematurely without hope of
cure. The silence and evident discom-
fort with which the two last acts of La
Phalene" were received should be counted
to the credit Of genuine French thought
and feeling, SO misunderstood abroad and
cruelty confused with literature. For no
one will deny that here as elsewhere
Henry Bataille shows himself at inter-
walls a superb lyric poet and dramatist.
A Mothers Protest.
The mother of Marie Bashkirtseff was
reused to write to the author of the play
from the retreat of her childress age:
MY daughter during her short life was
the very opposite Of your personage-shc
was 4 young maiden iii every sense. in
freshness and grace and lofty tenderness.
1t lis not possible that you should
have wished such a confusion to be made
bringing desolation to me. I would gladly
see the confusion destroyed, that those
who have dared to make it may acknowl-
edge their error and that they have as
signed intention to YOU which were
neither in your work nor in your mind"