is in a very old sense, a temple of art, a temple of
peace, a stillness, a refuge from the noise of motor
traffic and the current advertisements.

Mr. Jean Saltas in his preface to the new edition
of Alfred Jarry's "Ubu Roi" informs us that the work
contains "The satiric simplicity of Aristophanes, the
good sense and truculence of Rabelais, and the lyric fantasy
of Shakespeare." This statement is, to my mind contrary
to fact. Jarry's juvenile puppet play, with a wooden
Falstaff cast for a wooden Macbeth, is a work of admirable
verve, and in view of the direction in which theatrical
matters have moved or stayed since 1896, Jarry's letter to
J. P. G. L. date to Lugne-Poe is extremely interesting. He recommends :

1. Mask for the principal personage, Ubu...

2. Horse's head in card-board to hand from
the neck, as in "L'ancien theatre anglaise", for the two
equestrian scenes, all of these details being in the spirit
of the piece, since I wanted to make a "guignol" (Punch
and Judy show).

3. Use of a single decor, or rather a background,
suppressing the raising and lowering of the curtain during
the whole act. Someone in ordinary clotting should come, as in
puppet shows, and hang up a placard stating where the action
takes place. (I am quite sure of the "suggestive" superiority of a written placard to a painted scene. Neither a painted scene nor a mass of supers will give "The
Polish army on the march through Ukrainia".)

4. Suppression of crowds, which are always bad on
the stage, and are an insult to the intelligence. Thus,
one soldier in the review scene, and one in the hurly-burly
where Ubu says "What a mass of people, what a
flight...,"

5. Adoption of an "accent" or rather of a
special "voice" for the chief character.

6. Costumes with as little local or chronological
colour as possible (this gives a better idea of something
permanent) they should be modern for preference, since the
satire is modern; and sordid, since the play will then
seem more wretched and horrible.

Thus Jarry at the age of twenty-three
making suggestions as to the presentation of the work