The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-10-18
By NATHANIEL RucHwALp.


mirals and generals who tried to sup
press the play. In all fairness, Rear
Admiral Pluncket, who so vehement
ly denounced the play as a piece of
pacifist propaganda, full of nasty cuss
words, is entitled to a rake-off on the
box office receipts. No amount of
paid press-agenting could have &C
complished half as much.
But the professional wits in the
New York dailies are giving the adj
miral the razz and poking fun at the
whole affair Which is vigorously stu
pid, for the attempt to censor this
war play is not merely within of a
single militaristic patriot, but a
Characteristic expression of the bully
ing temper of the imperialist gang
that lords over us. Still worse are
the editorial hypocrites who are con-
graduating themselves upon having
won a victory over military censor
ship of public morals. They know
damned well that they have won moth
ing of the kind and that the stage,
the screen and the printed fiction will
continue to truckle under the stand
ards imposed by our lords of war and
imperialism.
For the time being, the particular
gang of brass-buttoned DULLES who
tried to gag the play, appears to be
licked. what Price Glory?" minus
some of it's best swear-words, will
stay on, much to the delight Of the
producer and the edification of our
American liberties.' But the very
fuss raised about this play shows that
it is a rather novel thing for a play
wright to dare tell the truth about
war and the men who make it. Verify,
the exception proves the rule, and the
rule is for our staged, screened and
written fiction to conform to the I'M
written code of lies about the glamor
of soldiery and the glories of war So
long as an author conforms to this I'M
written law, he is free to lie in his
own way about the army, the navy
and the romance of the battlefelds.
But no sooner he attempts to por-
tray the hellish truth of the murder
profession than hue and cry is rails
ed against him. The fact that so few
pieces of. war fiction have aroused
the ire of the militarists simply shows
that there has been little attempt at
artistic truth and honesty about the
war Militaristic censorship of peace
time art and literature, is not a men
acct is an insidious fact, stink
ing element that pollutes our spirit
ual life at its source, a corruptive
devil that guides the pen Of every
purveyor of popular fiction. Militar-
ism is the watchdog or capitalism,
and part of its duty is to foster alIur-
ing lies about the sordid business, to
instill in the mob a sense of glamour
and glory about the insignia and the
symbols of war, Of killing for profits
and markets. Whether directly or by
implied terrorism, the brass-button
lords see to it that capitalist art re-
mains capitalist.
Yet the attack of the militarists up
on what Price Glory?" Unanswered
many OF us into the awkward position
Of defending a play that really is not
much as piece of theatrical art 1t
was not this play that he meant when
Hamlet, the prince Of blues, said, ''the
play is the thing" Even before the
piece achieved its pacifst notoriety
it was more a riot Of peppery soldier
slang and humding cuss-words than
serious significant drama. To be sure,
the spicy lines were not put into the
play with the idea Of bringing down
the house. The untidy language of
the American soldiers is of the very
essence of the play and serves as an
effective means of portraying the sol
diers as they really are. Nor is the
unseemly conduct Of the men toward
their officers and the officers toward
women and booze portrayed with a
view of furnishing either delicious
thrills or pacifsm. But the audience
manages to pick out from this rather