Front matter (continued 4)

A dramatist should be very careful that what he calls Prologue or Epilogue is not merely an additional act. An act does not cease to be an act, and become a prologue or an epilogue, because its length is shorter than that usual for an act. True it is that most prologues and epilogues are short, but that is not their distinguishing characteristic. If they are brief, it is because the dramatist wants to move as quickly as possible from his induction or prologue to his main story, or knows that when the play proper is ended, he cannot with his epilogue hold his audience long. Not always, however, are prologues, or epilogues short. That of Madame Sans Gêne35 has the same number of pages as Act II, seventeen. The Prologue of The Passing of the Third Floor Back36 fills some sixty-two pages. The Epilogue of the same play covers fifty-six pages. An act in this play makes seventy-eight pages. In A Celebrated Case37 the Prologue covers twenty-one pages; the subsequent acts run from eight to twelve pages each.

Nor is an act changed into a prologue or epilogue because the space of time between it and the other divisions is longer than between any two of them. Does an act cease to be an act and become a prologue or epilogue, when the space of time between it and the other acts is twenty-five years, or should it be thirty? The absurdity of making the use of the words Prologue or Epilogue depend upon the space of time between one division and another is evident. It is true that the Prologue of Madame Sans Gêne takes place nineteen years before the three acts which follow, but it concerns the same people. It might equally well be called Act I. The Passing of the Third Floor Back might just as correctly be announced as a play in three acts instead of “An idle fancy in a Prologue, a Play, and an Epilogue.” Recently A Successful Calamity was stated to be in two acts, each preceded by a Prologue. Except for the novel appearance of the statement in the program, it might more correctly have been called a play in four acts. Little except the will of the dramatist settled that the last division of Pinero’s Letty should be called an Epilogue. It occurs only two years and a half after the preceding act. It presents the same people. Similarly the Prologue to Tennyson’s Becket might just as well be called Act I, except that this nomenclature would give the play six acts. In the stage version by Henry Irving, the four acts and a Prologue might correctly be called five acts.

The anonymous play, The Taming of a Shrew,38 on which Shakespeare founded his farce-comedy of similar title, shows a good use of Prologue and Epilogue. By a practical joke, Christopher Sly the beggar is made to believe he is a Lord. As a part of the joke, the play is acted before him. Now and again, in the course of it, he comments on it. He and his group finish the performance in a sort of Epilogue. When Shakespeare uses Sly, only to let him shortly withdraw for good, the arrangement seems curiously incomplete and unsatisfactory. Romance, by Edward Sheldon, shows right use of so-called epilogue and prologue. As the curtain falls on the brief prologue, the aged Bishop is telling his grandson the story of his love for the Cavallini. Then the play, which is the Bishop’s story, unrolls itself for three acts. In turn they fade into the epilogue, in which the grandson, as the Bishop finishes his story, goes off in spite of it to marry the girl he loves. By means of the epilogue and prologue Mr. Sheldon gains irony and contrast, relates the main play to larger values, and answers the inevitable question of his audience at the end of his third act: What happened to them afterward? Not to have used the so-called epilogue and prologue here would have forced total reconstruction of the material and probably a clumsier result. Such setting of a long play within a very brief play is one of the conditions for the legitimate use of the so-called prologue and epilogue.

Another legitimate use, though perhaps not so clear-cut, is illustrated by the Prologue to A Celebrated Case.39 The play might, perhaps, be written without it, but, if it were, the scene of Act I in which Adrienne recognizes the convict as her father, would be filled with much more exposition, and the present emphasis on the powerful emotions of the moment would be somewhat blurred by the emotions called up by exposition of the past. Clearly, the play gains rather than loses by the presence of the prologue. Obviously the latter stands somewhat apart from the three acts which follow, less definitely related to them than they are to one another. So it may, perhaps, better be called a prologue than an act.

Of course, the distinction between prologue and act is a matter of nomenclature, not of effectiveness in acting. Look at My Lady’s Dress, by Edward Knobloch. Scene 1, Act I, and Scene 3, Act III, have the same setting, a boudoir, and are more closely related to each other than to the rest of the play.40 Indeed, what stands between are one-act plays making the dream of Anne. According to present usage, Mr. Knobloch could have called these scenes Prologue and Epilogue, and treated all that stands between as the play proper. That he did or didn’t makes no difference in the acting. The growing use of the two words, Prologue and Epilogue, merely marks an increasing sense of dramatic technique which tries by nomenclature to emphasize for a reader nice differences which the dramatist discerns in the inter-relations of his material.

To sum up, there is real significance, though present confusion, in recent use of the words, Prologue and Epilogue. The use rests on a fact: that sometimes a play is best proportioned, when it has at the beginning or end, or both, a brief division related to the story and essential to it, but not so closely related to any act as are the acts to one another. The names Prologue and Epilogue should not, however, be used interchangeably for acts. They should be kept for their historical use—verse or prose spoken in front of the curtain before or at an end of the play, in order to win or intensify sympathy for it. We should find different names for these divisions,—perhaps, Induction and Finale?

What should be the length of an act? There can be no rule as to this. Naturally, the work of the first and last acts differs somewhat from the intervening acts, whether one or three in number. While it is the chief business of the intervening acts to maintain and increase interest already created, the first act must obviously create that interest as swiftly as possible, and the last act bring that interest to a climactic close. The first act, because in it the characters must be introduced, necessary past history stated, and the story well started, is likely to be longer than the other acts. The last act, inasmuch as even at its beginning we are usually not distant from the climax of the play, is most often the shortest division, for as soon as the climax is reached, we should drop the curtain as quickly as possible. A glance at certain notable plays of different periods will show, however, that the length of an act most depends, not on any given rule, but on the skill of the dramatist in accomplishing what he has decided the particular act must do. In the Cambridge edition of Shakespeare’s Lear (printed in two columns of fine type) the acts run as follows:

Act I 9½ pages

Act II 7 pages

Act III 6½ pages

Act IV 6¼ pages

Act V 5¼ pages

Kismet, a play modeled on the Elizabethan, shows this division:

Act I 48 pages

Act II 33 pages

Act III 22½ pages

For three plays of Richard Steele it is possible to give the exact playing-time:41

The Funeral The Conscious Lovers The Tender Husband

Act I 30 min. Act I 33 min. Act I 25 min.

Act II 36 min. Act II 28 min. Act II 22 min.

Act III 20 min. Act III 24 min. Act III 14 min.

Act IV 20 min. Act IV 28 min. Act IV 15 min.

Act V 20 min. Act V 31 min. Act V 18 min.

Total, 2 hrs. 6 min. Total, 2 hrs. 24 min. Total, 1 hr. 34 min.

Two recent plays divide thus:

Candida The Silver Box

Act I 27 pages Act I 27 pages

Act II 24 pages Act II 27 pages

Act III 21 pages Act III 21 pages

The plays just cited are of very different lengths: Kismet42 took nearly three hours in performance; Candida43 and The Silver Box44 are so short that they force a manager, if he is to provide an entertainment of the usual length, to a choice: he must begin his performance late, or allow long waits between the acts, or give a one-act piece with the longer play. Yet it is noteworthy that in all these plays except Steele’s, the first is as long as any other act, or longer, and the last act is the shortest. However, the only safe principle is that of Dumas père already quoted: “First act clear, last act short, and everywhere interest.”

In proportioning the whole material into acts, it should be remembered, of course, that the time allowed for a theatrical performance ranges from two hours to two hours and three quarters. Five to fifteen minutes should be allowed for each entr’acte unless the usual waits are to be avoided by some mechanical device. Figure that a double-spaced type-written page takes in acting something more than a minute, though necessary dramatic pauses and “business” make it difficult to estimate exactly the playing time of any page. Speaking approximately, it may be said that a three-act play of one hundred and twenty typewritten pages will fill, with the entr’actes, at least two hours and a half. In apportioning the story into acts the first requisite is, then, that the total, even with the necessary waits between acts, shall not exceed the length of time during which the public will be attentive.

The length of each act must in every case be determined by the work in the total which it has to do. Since pre-Shakespearean days, the artistry of the act has been steadily developing. Until circa, 1595, what dramatists “strove to do was, not so to arrange their material that its inner relations should be perfectly clear, but to narrate a series of events that did not, of necessity, possess such inner relations. It is much to be doubted whether any thought of such relations ever entered their heads.”45 Influenced particularly by Shakespeare, the drama from that time has steadily improved in knowledge of what each act should do in the sum total, and how it should be done. The act is “more than a convenience in time. It is imposed by the limited power of attention of the human mind, or by the need of the human body for occasional refreshment. A play with a well-marked, well-balanced act-structure is a higher artistic organism than a play with no act-structure, just as a vertebrate animal is higher than a mollusc. In every crisis of real life (unless it be so short as to be a mere incident) there is a rhythm of rise, progress, culmination, and solution. Each act ought to stimulate and temporarily satisfy an interest of its own, while definitely advancing the main action.”46 Each act, then, should be a unit of the whole, which accomplishes its own definite work.

Here is Ibsen’s rough apportioning of the work for each act in a play of which he was thinking.

Do you not think of dramatising the story of Faste? It seems to me that there is the making of a very good popular play in it. Just listen!

Act 1.—Faste as the half-grown boy, eating the bread of charity and dreaming of greatness.

Act 2.—Faste’s struggle in the town.

Act 3.—Faste’s victory in the town.

Act 4.—Faste’s defeat and flight from the country.

Act 5.—Faste’s return as a victorious poet. He has found himself.

It is a fine adventurous career to depict dramatically. But of course you would have to get farther away from your story first. You perhaps think this a barbarous and inhuman suggestion. But all your stories have the making of a drama in them.47

In The Princess and the Butterfly,48 Act I not only disposes of preliminary necessary exposition, but depicts different kinds of restlessness in a group of women at or nearing middle age. Act II does the same for a group of men, and in the proposed duel provides what later may be made to reveal to Sir George how much Fay Zuliani cares for him. Act III complicates the story by showing that Fay is not the niece of Sir George, and illustrates the growing affection between the Princess and Edward Oriel. Act IV reveals to Sir George and Fay how much each cares for the other. The fifth act shows how Sir George and the Princess, who have tried to be wise and restrained, impulsively and instinctively choose the path of seeming unwisdom but immediate happiness.

In The Trail of the Torch,49 Act I states the thesis of the play and offers the first great sacrifice by Sabine for her daughter, Marie-Jeanne. Sabine gives up Stangy in order to be with Marie-Jeanne, only to find that her daughter is in love with Didier. Act II illustrates that a mother will make every sacrifice for her children: Madame Fontenais, the grandmother, when her daughter Sabine begs her to sacrifice her fortune in order that Marie-Jeanne’s anxiety as to the finances of Didier may be set at rest, refuses, thinking to protect Sabine’s future. In turn, Sabine, putting aside all pride, calls Stangy back to her, believing that he will give her the aid she desires for Marie-Jeanne. Act III shows the extremes of sacrifice to which a mother may go,—here the forgery, and the sacrifice by Sabine of her mother to her daughter. Act IV illustrates the retribution for Sabine: the revelation by Stangy that, after Sabine sent him away, he married; Marie-Jeanne’s announcement to her mother that she is to go to America with her father and that Sabine cannot go; and the death of Madame Fontenais caused, at least indirectly, by Sabine.

In all three cases we have only the baldest outline of what the act must do. The illustrative dramatic action by which each act is to accomplish its task is either in hand as part of a clearly defined story in the mind of the dramatist, or must be found immediately. Granted that it has been discovered (see chap. III, pp. 47-72), then as each act is shaped up from this material it should have certain qualities. It should be clear. It should lead the hearer on to the acts which follow: in other words, it should at least maintain an interest already established, and in most cases should increase that interest. To put these requisites more briefly, each act should have clearness and movement. Movement in an act means that, while thoroughly interesting itself, the act leads a hearer on to its immediate successor and, above all, the finale. Good movement depends on clearness and right emphasis. The emphasis in each act and in the whole play should be such that ultimately it accomplishes the purpose of the dramatist. How may these qualities, clearness, right emphasis, and consequent movement be gained?

1 Essay on Comedy, p. 8. George Meredith. Copyright, 1897, by Chas. Scribner’s Sons, New York.

2 The Trojan Women. Translated by Gilbert Murray. G. Allen & Sons, London.

3 Electra. Von Hofmannsthal. Translated by A. Symons. Brentano, New York.

4 Introduction to Miss Julia. Translated by E. Björkman. Copyright, 1912, by Chas. Scribner’s Sons, New York.

5 Hamburg Dramaturgy, p. 370. Lessing. Bohn ed.

6 P. 13. Harper & Bros., New York.

7 Chief Contemporary Dramatists, pp. 517-546. T. H. Dickinson, ed. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston.

8 For all these plays, idem.

9 Belles-Lettres Series. W. Strunk, ed. D. C. Heath & Co., Boston and New York.

10 In the seventh edition, a scene, “The place of execution,” is inserted to replace the original brief final scene which apparently took place in the “room.” Belles-Lettres Series. Sir A. W. Ward, ed. D. C. Heath & Co.

11 Letters of Bulwer-Lytton to Macready, XXVIII. Brander Matthews, ed.

12 The Influence of Local Theatrical Conditions upon the Drama of the Greeks. Roy C. Flickinger. Classical Journal, October, 1911.

13 See p. 83.

14 Introduction to Macbeth. Cambridge ed. Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston.

15 Introduction to Marlowe’s Edward II. Tatlock and Martin. The Century Co.

16 See Play Production in America. A. E. Krows. Henry Holt & Co., New York.

17 Plays, pp. 33, 42. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York.

18 J. W. Luce & Co., Boston.

19 Théâtre Complet, vol. I. Calmann Lévy, Paris.

20 Belles-Lettres Series. Sir A. W. Ward, ed. D.C. Heath & Co., Boston and New York.

21 Not often does a dramatist succeed in making real and supposed time agree as well as does Sir Arthur Pinero in Act III of The Gay Lord Quex. From seven to nine pages of absorbing action come between one chiming of the quarter hour and the next. Though a stopwatch would quickly reveal the somewhat disordered condition of that boudoir clock, an auditor, absorbed in the action of the moment, merely feels his tension increase if he notes the passing of time.

22 See p. 35.

23 Eugène Scribe, adopted by Mrs. Burton Harrison. Dramatic Publishing Co., Chicago.

24 Mermaid Series. Chas. Scribner’s Sons, New York.

25 Letters of Bulwer-Lytton to Macready, LXIII. Brander Matthews, ed.

26 Belles-Lettres Series. C. F. McClumpha, ed. D. C. Heath & Co., Boston and New York.

27 Walter H. Baker & Co., Boston; W. Heinemann, London.

28 Plays. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York.

29 Walter H. Baker & Co., Boston; W. Heinemann, London.

30 Everyman’s Library. Plumptre, ed.

31 Walter H. Baker & Co., Boston; W. Heinemann, London.

32 R. H. Russell & Co., New York.

33 The Influence of Local Theatrical Conditions upon the Drama of the Greeks. R. C. Flickinger. Classical Journal, October, 1911.

34 Troilus and Cressida.

35 Samuel French, New York.

36 Hurst & Blackett, Ltd., London.

37 Penn Publishing Co., Philadelphia.

38 Shakespeare’s Library, vol. VI. W. C. Hazlitt, ed. Reeves & Turner, London.

39 Penn Publishing Co., Philadelphia.

40 Drama League Series. Doubleday, Page & Co., New York.

41 Life of Richard Steele, vol. II, p. 368. G. Aitken. Wm. Isbister, London.

42 Methuen & Co., Ltd., London.

43 Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant. Brentano, New York.

44 Plays. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York.

45 A Note on Act Division as practiced in the Early Elizabethan Drama. Bulletin of Western Reserve University.

46 Play-Making, p. 136. Wm. Archer. Small, Maynard & Co., Boston.

47 Letters of Henrik Ibsen, p. 236; to Jonas Lie.

48 Walter H. Baker & Co., Boston; W. Heinemann, London.

49 P. Hervieu. Drama League Series. Doubleday, Page & Co., New York.

CHAPTER VI

FROM SUBJECT TO PLOT: ARRANGEMENT FOR CLEARNESS, EMPHASIS, MOVEMENT

The chief desideratum of a dramatist beginning to arrange his material within a number of acts already decided on is to create interest as promptly as possible. To that end neither striking dialogue nor stirring situation is of prime consequence. Clearness is. When an audience does not understand who the people are with whom the play opens and their relations to one another, no amount of striking dialogue or stirring situation will create lasting interest. The danger for a later public of allusive reference clear enough at one time is shown by the verses sung when the Helstone Furry, or Flower Dance, takes place in Cornwall. Lines once full of meaning are today so out of date as to be meaningless.

From an early hour the place is alive with drums and fifes, and townsmen hoarsely chanting a ballad, the burden of which conveys the spirit of the festival:

With Hal-an-tow, Jolly rumble O, And we are up as soon as any day O, And for to fetch the Summer home, The Summer and the May O; For the Summer is a-come O, And Winter is a-go O!

The verses of the ballad seem to convey topical allusions that have become traditional. One speaks of Robin Hood and Little John as gone to the fair, and the revellers will go too; another triumphs in the Spaniards eating the gray goose feather while the singers will be eating the roast. Another runs thus quaintly:

God bless Aunt Mary Moses With all her power and might O; And send us peace in merry England Both night and day O. With Hal-an-tow, Jolly rumble O, And we were up as soon as any day O, And for to fetch the Summer home, The Summer and the May O; For the Summer is a-come O, And Winter is a-go O!

Thus singing they troop through the town; if they find anyone at work, they hale him to the river and make him leap across; arrived at the Grammar School they demand a holiday; at noon they go “fadding” into the country, and come back with oak branches and flowers in their hats and caps; then until dusk they dance hand-in-hand down the streets, and through any house, in at any door, out at another; when night falls they keep up the dancing indoors. The character of the dancing is exactly that of the ancient Comus; and the whole spirit of the Cornish Furry is a fair representation of primitive nature festivals, except, of course, that modern devoutness has banished from the flower dance all traces of a religious festival;—unless a trace is to be found in the fact that the dancers at one point make a collection.1

The Greek dramatist, staging religious legends, could assume in his audience common knowledge as to the identity and the historic background of his figures which saved him much exposition. Today, readers of his play demand explanatory notes because of these omissions.

The Choephori, like the plays of Æschylus generally, consists of scenes from a story taken as known. Some indispensable parts of it are represented only by allusions. Others can scarcely be said to be represented at all. The history of Pylades belongs to the second class; that of Strophius belongs to the first. What is evident is that the author presumes us to be familiar with his conception of both, that as a fact we are not, and that our only way of approaching the play intelligently is by the assumption of some working hypothesis.2

Something like the position of these elder dramatists toward exposition is held today by writers of plays on George Washington or Abraham Lincoln. Dealing, as the dramatist ordinarily does, however, with a mixture of historical and fictitious figures or with characters wholly fictitious, he must in most cases carefully inform his audience at the outset who his people are, and what are their relations to one another, where the play is laid, and when.

Examine the first column of what follows: it is not a burlesque, but the beginning of a so-called play. Why is it unsatisfactory?

ORCHIDS

Conservatory of the Strones’ house. Natalie is walking about among the flowers and plants, arranging them for the day in the vases on the near-by table.

Natalie. (To herself.) O-oh, I'm sleepy this morning. It's very nice to have your fiancé live in the next house, but when he insists on writing his stories and things until two or three in the morning—well, I don't think it's very thoughtful of him. He might realize that his light shines directly across into my eyes and keeps me awake. Oh, dear, Mary's been putting lilies-of-the-valley in all the vases again. I'll not have those everywhere when we've got orchids instead. Flowers don't need fragrance anyway; they're just meant to be seen. (Dumping the wilted lilies in a basket by her side and arranging the newly-cut orchids in their place.) Tom [Who is Tom—brother or fiancé?] always makes a fuss when I have nothing but orchids, so I suppose Mary put the others about to calm him down. [Who is Mary, then: a maid, a sister, a girl friend, some one engaged to Tom?] Really I've got to speak to him about last night when he comes. The light is bad enough, but I won't have him firing his gun out of the window besides. It must have been at that horrid thin cat that's always clawing Hopeful. [A cat, a dog, or a small sister?] I'm glad she [Hopeful or the thin cat?] was locked up indoors if Tom's going to act that way. Oh, dear, these are the wrong shears again. (Rings bell. Enter maid.) Mary, bring me the other shears—and Mary, where's Hopeful this morning; I haven't seen her? Natalie. (To herself.) O-oh, I'm sleepy this morning. It's very nice to have your fiancé live in the next house, but when (Tom) insists on writing his stories and things until two and three in the morning—well, I don't think it's very thoughtful of him. He might realize that his light shines directly across into my eyes and keeps me awake. Oh, dear, (that maid's) been putting lilies-of-the-valley in all the vases again. I'll not have those everywhere when we've got orchids instead. Flowers don't need fragrance anyway; they're just meant to be seen. (Dumping the wilted lilies in a basket by her side and arranging the newly-cut orchids in their place.) Tom always makes a fuss when I have nothing but orchids, so I suppose Mary put the others about to calm him down. Really I've got to speak to (Tom Hammond) about last night, when he comes. The light is bad enough, but I won't have him firing his gun out of the window besides. It must have been at that horrid thin cat that's always clawing Hopeful. I'm glad (Hopeful) was locked up indoors if Tom's going to act that way (with cats). Oh, dear, these are the wrong shears again. (Rings bell. Enter maid.) Mary, bring me the other shears—and Mary, where's Hopeful this morning; I haven't seen her?

Mary. The kitten, Miss Strone? Mary. The kitten, Miss Strone?

Natalie.. Yes, of course. Natalie. Yes, of course.

Mary. Why—why she hasn’t been in this morning. (Starts away.) Mary. Why—why she hasn’t been in this morning. (Starts away.)

Natalie. Come back, Mary. Don’t run off while I’m speaking to you. Haven’t you seen her at all? Natalie. Come back, Mary. Don’t run off while I’m speaking to you. Haven’t you seen her at all?

Mary. Well—yes, Miss Strone—that is Parkins [another maid, a butler, or a milkman?] found—I mean— Mary. Well—yes, Miss Strone—that is (the butler) found—I mean—

Natalie. (Impatiently.) Well? Natalie. (Impatiently.) Well?

Mary. The shots last night, Miss Strone—that is we think it was—although she was on the other side of the garden when Parkins came on her—and there's the wall and the alley between—still, Mr. Hammond was shooting out of the upper windows and— Mary. The shots last night, Miss Strone—that is we think it was—although she was on the other side of the wall when Parkins came on her—and there's the wall and the alley between—still, Mr. Hammond was shooting out of the upper windows and—

Natalie. (Quickly.) Has anything happened to Hopeful? Natalie. (Quickly.) Has anything happened to Hopeful?

Mary. Why—why, Parkins— Mary.. Why—why, Parkins—

(Enter Parkins.) (Enter Parkins.)

Parkins. (Quietly.) I buried her all right just now, Miss Strone. (Louder.) Mr. Hammond. Parkins. (Quietly.) I buried her all right just now, Miss Strone. (Louder.) (Mr. Hammond.)

(Exit [sic.] Mary and Parkins, enter Tom Hammond.) (Exeunt Mary and Parkins, enter Tom Hammond.)

In the left-hand column practically every one in the cast is unidentified when first mentioned. That is, the text fails in the first essential of clearness: we do not for some time know who the people are and their relations to one another. The very slight changes in the right-hand column do away with this fault.

Identify characters, then, as promptly as possible. Writing, “John Paul Jones enters in full Admiral’s uniform,” a dramatist often runs on for some time before the text itself reveals the identity of the person who has entered. Except in so far as the costume or make-up presents a well-known historical figure, or information carefully given before the figure enters may reveal identity, every newcomer is an entirely unknown person. He must promptly make clear who he is and his relation to the story. The following opening of a play shows another instance of the vagueness resulting when this identification is not well managed:

ANNE—A PLAY IN TWO ACTS

ACT I

Evening of a June day. John Hathaway’s Study. Door at right and at left back. Heavy, old-fashioned library furnishings. Walls lined with shelves of books. General disorder of books to produce the effect of recent using. Large flat-topped desk with a double row of drawers stands at front, half way between center and right wall. Desk is covered with books and loose manuscript. Chair at left front. Stool in front of desk. Other chairs toward back.

When the curtain rises, John Hathaway is seated at desk working. Anne enters at right, bangs the door, and stands with back to it.

Anne. I hate Aunt Caroline. (She hurries forward to stand at opposite side of desk.) Oh, I know what you will say—just preach and preach and call me “Anne” and tell me I must ask her pardon.—Why don’t you begin?

John. (Smiling.) Now, Anne!

Anne. Yes, there’s the “Anne.” I know the rest without your going on:—“Aunt Caroline is a peculiar woman, but is most worthy. Her Puritanism keeps her from understanding your temperament, and you are too young to understand hers,—” and you’ll go on preaching and smiling in that horrid way—you always do—and you’ll make me see how wrong I’ve been and how saintly Aunt Caroline is, and at last I’ll slink out of the room like a good little pussy-cat to find Aunt Caroline and beg her pardon. But it won’t do this time, for I begged her pardon before I lost my temper so that you couldn’t send me back.—Oh, Duke, can’t we send Aunt Caroline away, and just you and me live here always together. (She swings round the desk to sit on the stool at his side, her back to him. He turns a little in his chair, letting a hand fall on her shoulder.) When Dad died, he left me with you because next to me he loved you best in all the world. Hundreds and hundreds of times he told me that.—It would have been very nice, Duke, if Dad hadn’t died, wouldn’t it?

John. Yes, Nan.

Anne. In just that one thing God has not been quite fair to me. Aunt Caroline tries so hard to make me think I am wrong about it.—I know you think so too, but you never argue about it with me. I like you for that, Duke. You see, if Dad had lived, our kingdom would have been complete. Why! a kingdom’s only half a kingdom without a king.

John. That’s true,—but there are still a few of us left. There’s the Prime Minister, and the Countess, and the Slave, every one of them loyal to the Princess. Even the War Department is loyal—in warfare. Perhaps, who knows, some day from out a great foreign land a great king may come riding, and the Princess will place him beside her on the throne—and—live happily ever afterward.

Anne. (Inattentively.) Perhaps. Duke, did you ever think that the Prime Minister was very fond of the Countess?

John. Why, I have thought so at times.

Anne. And did you ever think that perhaps the Prime Minister would like to marry the Countess?

John. Why, yes, now you mention it, that also has occurred to me.

Anne. Well, why doesn’t he?

John. Perhaps the Countess isn’t willing.

Who is this “Anne”? What is her last name? Is she the niece of “Duke”? How could we learn from the text that “Duke” is John Hathaway? It is the stage direction which gives us that information. And what are we to do with this whole Burke’s Peerage,—the Prime Minister, the Countess, the Slave? The author is depending for identification upon a list of dramatis personæ just preceding what has been quoted:

Time, present day.

Characters:

Anne Chesterfield, “The Princess.”

John Hathaway, Anne’s guardian, “The Duke.”

Caroline Hathaway, John’s aunt, “Head of the War Department.”

Doctor Stirling, a friend, “The Prime Minister.”

Katharine Bain, a friend, “The Countess.”

Tommy Bain, Katharine’s young brother, “The Slave.”

Professor Heinrich Adler, “The Foreign Ambassador.”

James, a Servant.

Cut out this list of characters; in the stage directions strike out “John Hathaway,” substituting “A man”; strike out “Anne,” substituting “A young woman.” At once it is clear that the dialogue reveals nothing about these people, except that a young woman who speaks is a niece of “Aunt Caroline.” Yet these substitutions show what the scene looks like to a man entering the theatre without a program. Whenever such substitution of a type name for that of an individual in the titles prefixed to the speeches leaves the speakers unidentified, it is time to re-phrase the material for greater clearness.

Scenery and costume, of course, may show where the opening or later action of a play takes place. If these make clear the nationality of the speakers, or, at most, the province to which they belong, this is in many instances enough for any audience. In some cases, however, the nature of the plot is so dependent on the customs of a particular community that it is necessary or wise to make the text farther particularize any placing of the play by scenery or costumes. Simple interiors, too, are not always easily identifiable as of this or that province, or even country. If province or country at all determines the action of the piece, the text should help out the setting. One reason why the plays of Synge aroused bitter opposition was that some auditors believed them representations of life anywhere in Ireland and not, as they were meant to be, pictures of the manners of Aran Islanders, a group so isolated as to retain much savagery. Also, if the text is clear as to place, suggestion may take the place of realism in the scenery, thus decreasing expense. The emphasis on place in the opening of The Rising of the Moon both permits scenery that merely suggests a quay and plants in the minds of hearers a setting essential to the whole development of the play:

Scene: Side of a quay in a seaport town. Some posts and chains. A large barrel. Enter three policemen. Moonlight.

Sergeant, who is older than the others, crosses the stage to right and looks down steps. The others put down a pastepot and unroll a bundle of placards.

Policeman B. I think this would be a good place to put up a notice. (He points to a barrel.)

Policeman X. Better ask him. (Calls to Sergeant..) Will this be a good place for a placard? (No answer.)

Policeman B. Will we put up a notice here on the barrel? (No answer.)

Sergeant. There’s a flight of steps here that leads to the water. This is a place that should be minded well. If he got down here, his friends might have a boat to meet him; they might send it in here from outside.

Policeman B. Would the barrel be a good place to put a notice up?

Sergeant. It might; you can put it there. (They paste the notice up.)

Sergeant. (Reading it.) Dark hair—dark eyes, smooth face, height five feet five—there’s not much to take hold of in that—It’s a pity I had no chance of seeing him before he broke out of jail. They say he’s a wonder, that it’s he makes all the plans for the whole organization. There isn’t another man in Ireland would have broken jail the way he did. He must have some friends among the jailers.

Policeman B. A hundred pounds reward is little enough for the Government to offer for him. You may be sure any man in the force that takes him will get promotion.

Sergeant. I’ll mind this place myself. I wouldn’t wonder at all if he comes this way. He might come slipping along there (points to side of quay) and his friends might be waiting for him there (points down steps), and once he got away it’s little chance we’d have of finding him; it’s maybe under a load of kelp he’d be in a fishing boat, and not one to help a married man that wants it to the reward.3

The period in which the play is supposed to take place, if of importance to the action, needs careful statement. Helped out by setting and costumes, the following shows that the play is taking place at the time of the French Revolution.

At rise of curtain, drums are heard beating, trumpets sounding the charge in the distance. A report of a cannon as the curtain rises.

Jennie. (R., going up to door C.) Did you hear that? It must be somewhere near the Rue d’Echelle now.

Julie. (L. crossing to R.) My! I’m frightened to death.

Marie. (Carrots—up C.) I only hope they won’t come fighting down our street.

Julie. (Kneeling.) Bless us and save us!

Jennie. (Up C.) Down our street. What should they come here for? It’s the Tuileries and the King they’re after.

(Going to window L.)

First Neighbor and Omnes. (At back.) Of course they are. That’s it.

First Woman. (Up C.) I tell you they’re at the Carrousel.

(Report of cannon.)

Marie. It will be a mercy if they don’t smash every pane of glass in the shop.

Julie. Well I shan’t forget this 10th of August in a hurry.

(At back a National Guard wounded in the leg supported by two other guards enters at L., is taken into the druggist’s shop. All the people move towards the shop.)4

Lapse of time between two acts, if important to the development of the plot, should also be clearly stated. Dramatists like to depend on the programs for such information, but they run the chance that many auditors will not see the printed note. Doubtless a program would give these words from the stage direction at the beginning of the fourth act of Hauptmann’s Lonely Lives: “Time between 4 and 5 P.M.,” but the quick passage of time is so important a fact in the development of the plot that six or seven pages later there is the following dialogue:

Braun. (Looks at telegram.) It is the six o’clock train that Mr. Vockerat is coming by? What o’clock is it now?

Mrs. Vockerat. Not half-past four yet.

Braun. (After a moment of reflection.) Has there been no change in the course of the week?

Mrs. Vockerat. (Shakes her head hopelessly.) None.

Braun. Has she given no hint of any intention to go?5

In The Galloper, by Richard Harding Davis, what the audience hears will place the play in a hotel at Athens, even if the scenery does not:

Before the curtain rises one hears a drum-and-fife corps playing a lively march, and the sound of people cheering. This comes from the rear and to the left, and continues after the curtain is up, dying away gradually as though the band, and the regiment with it, had passed and continued on up the street.

Anstruther is discovered seated on the lower right-end corner of the table, with his right foot resting on the chair at that corner. He is reading the Paris “New York Herald” and smoking a cigarette. He is a young man of good manner and soldierly appearance. He wears gray whipcord riding breeches, tan riding boots, and Norfolk jacket of rough tweed. His slouch hat, with a white puggaree wrapped round it, lies on the table beside him. Griggs stands at the edge of the French window looking off left. In his hand he holds a notebook in which he takes notes. He is supposed to be watching the soldiers who are passing. He is a pompous little man of about forty with eyeglasses. He wears a khaki uniform similar to that of an officer of the British army, with the difference that the buttons are of bone. His left chest is covered with ribbons of war medals. Hewitt, a young man with a pointed beard and moustache, stands to the left of Griggs, also looking off left. He wears a khaki coat made like a Norfolk jacket, khaki riding breeches, and canvas United States Army leggings and tan shoes. On the table are his slouch hat and the khaki-colored helmet of Griggs.

Captain O’Malley enters right. He is a dashing young Irishman, in the uniform of an officer of the Greek Army. He halts to right of Anstruther and salutes.

Capt. O’Malley. Pardon, I am Captain O’Malley of the Foreign Legion. Am I addressing one of the foreign war correspondents?

Capt. Anstruther. Yes.

Capt. O’Malley. (Showing him a visiting card.) Pardon, is this your card?

Capt. Anstruther. (Reading card.) “Mr. Kirke Warren.” No.

Capt. O’Malley. Do you know if Mr. Warren is in this hotel?

Capt. Anstruther. I couldn’t tell you. We arrived in Athens only last night.

Capt. O’Malley. (Saluting and moving off left.) I thank you.

(He exits left.)6

But the dramatist prefaced this with a careful description of the setting. What has just been quoted shows that the dramatist risked no chance that what would probably identify this setting,—“Greek letters of gilt” on the picture frames, and the distant view of the Acropolis,—might fail him. He added what has just been quoted.

This scene shows the interior of the reading room in the Hotel Angleterre at Athens. It is large, cheerful-looking, and sunny, with a high ceiling. Extending nearly across the entire width of the rear wall is a French window, which opens upon the garden of the hotel. Outside it are set plants in green tubs, and above it is stretched a striped green-and-white awning. To the reading room the principal entrance is through a wide door set well down in the left wall. It is supposed to open into the hall of the hotel. Through this door one obtains a glimpse of the hall, where steamer trunks and hatboxes are piled high upon a black-and-white tiled floor. In the right wall there is another door, also well down on the stage. It is supposed to open into a corridor of the hotel. Below it against the wall are a writing desk and chair. A similar writing desk is placed against the rear wall between the right wall and the French window. On the left of the stage, end-on to the audience, is a long library table over which is spread a dark-green baize cloth. On top of it are ranged periodicals and the illustrated papers of different countries. Chairs of bent wood are ranged around this table, one being placed at each side of the lower end. Of these two, the chair to the left of the table is not farther from the left door than five feet. The walls of the room are colored a light, cool gray in distemper, with a black oak wainscot about four feet high. On the walls are hung photographs of the Acropolis and of classic Greek statues. On the black frames holding these photographs appear the names of shopkeepers in Greek letters of gilt. The floor is covered with a gray crash. The back drop, seen through the French window, shows the garden of the hotel, beyond that the trees of a public park, and high in the air the Acropolis. The light is that of a bright morning in May.

The test in deciding whether the place and the time should be stated is not, “Has it been given in the program?” nor, “May it with ingenuity be guessed from the settings and costumes?” but, first, “Does place or time, or do both at all determine the action of the piece?” secondly, “Will any intelligent observer be vague as to place or time, as the play develops?” If the answer to either of these questions is yes, it is wisest to make these matters clear in the text.

Far more troublesome than merely identifying the characters or emphasizing the place and time of the play is showing the relations of the characters to one another. This usually requires exposition of past history which must be clearly understood if the play is to have its full emotional effect. More than one reader has been disposed to believe the theory that Macbeth, as we know it, is a cut stage version because, when Lady Macbeth first enters, she seems less prepared for and less clearly related to the other figures than is Shakespeare’s custom.

SCENE 5. Inverness. Macbeth’s castle

Enter Lady Macbeth, alone, with a letter

Lady Macbeth. (Reads.) “They met me in the day of success; and I have learn’d by the perfect’st report, they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burn’d in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanish’d. Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it, came missives from the King, who all-hail’d me, ‘Thane of Cawdor’; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referr’d me to the coming on of time, with ‘Hail, King thou shalt be!’ This I have thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness, that thou mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promis’d thee. Lay it to thy heart, and farewell.”

Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be What thou art promis’d. Yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great, Art not without ambition, but without The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst highly, That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false, And yet wouldst wrongly win. Thou’dst have, great Glamis, That which cries, “Thus thou must do, if thou have it”; And that which rather thou dost fear to do Than wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither That I may pour my spirits in thine ear, And chastise with the valour of my tongue All that impedes thee from the golden round Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem To have thee crown’d withal.

The Dumb Show, Chorus, and Soliloquy are now outworn devices for setting forth necessary initial expository facts. Today any experienced dramatist knows that such preliminary exposition demands the art which conceals art, for an audience resents a mere recital of necessary facts. Examine the first act of Schnitzler’s The Lonely Way.7 All of it is interesting for characterization and statement of facts essential to an understanding of the play, but it does not grip the attention as do the other acts where drama, not exposition, is of first consequence.

Early steps in advance on the Chorus were the butler and the maid servant, garrulously talking of what each must have known ever since he came into his position. A closely related form is unbosoming oneself to a male or female confidant.

ACT I

(Enter Hippolytus, Theramenes.)

Hippolytus. My mind is settled, dear Theramenes,

And I can stay not more in lovely Troezen.

In doubt that racks my soul with mortal anguish,

I grow ashamed of such long idleness.

Six months and more my father has been gone,

And what may have befallen one so dear

I know not, nor what corner of the earth

Hides him.

Theramenes. And where, prince, will you look for him?

Already, to content your just alarm,

Have I not cross’d the seas on either side

Of Corinth, ask’d if aught were known of Theseus

Where Acheron is lost among the Shades,

Visited Elis, doubled Toenarus,

And sail’d into the sea that saw the fall

Of Icarus? Inspired with what new hope,

Under what favor’d skies think you to trace

His footsteps? Who knows if the king, your father,

Wishes the secret of his absence known?

Perchance, while we are trembling for his life,

The hero calmly plots some fresh intrigue,

And only waits till the deluded fair—

Hippolytus. Cease, dear Theramenes, respect the name

Of Theseus. Youthful errors have been left

Behind, and no unworthy obstacle

Detains him. Phædra long has fix’d a heart

Inconstant once, nor need she fear a rival.

In seeking him I shall but do my duty,

And leave a place I dare no longer see.

Theramenes. Indeed! When, prince, did you begin to dread

These peaceful haunts, so dear to happy childhood,

Where I have seen you oft prefer to stay,

Rather than meet the tumult and the pomp

Of Athens and the court? What danger shun you,

Or shall I say what grief?

Hippolytus. That happy time

Is gone, and all is changed, since to these shores

The gods sent Phædra.

Theramenes. I perceive the cause

Of your distress. It is the queen whose sight

Offends you. With a step-dame’s spite she schemed

Your exile soon as she set eyes on you.

But if her hatred is not wholly vanish’d,

It has at least taken a milder aspect.

Besides, what danger can a dying woman,

One too who longs for death, bring on your head?

Can Phædra, sick’ning of a dire disease

Of which she will not speak, weary of life

And of herself, form any plots against you?

Hippolytus. It is not her vain enmity I fear;

Another foe alarms Hippolytus.

I fly, it must be owned, from Aricia,

The soul survivor of an impious race.

Theramenes. What! You become her persecutor too!

The gentle sister of the cruel sons

Of Pallas shared not in their perfidy;

Why should you hate such charming innocence?

Hippolytus. I should not need to fly, if it were hatred.

Theramenes. May I, then, learn the meaning of your flight?8

Another device is an intensely inquisitive stranger just returned from foreign parts who listens with patience not always shared by an auditor to any needed preliminary exposition.

The Opportunity,9 by James Shirley, shows an ingenious adaptation of the device of the inquisitive stranger newly come to some city. Aurelio, a gentleman of Milan, coming to Urbino with his friend Pisauro, is mistaken for Borgia, who has been banished from Urbino. As one person after another, greeting Aurelio as Borgia, naturally talks to him of his past, his family, and what is to be expected of him now that he is returned, they identify and relate clearly to one another the chief people whom Aurelio is to meet in the play. A hearer would take in almost unconsciously the needed exposition, so amused would he be at the increasing bewilderment of Aurelio.

Such ways and means as these three—the servant, the confidant, the stranger—Buckingham ridiculed in the late seventeenth century in his Rehearsal:

Enter Gentleman-Usher and Physician

Physician. Sir, by your habit, I should guess you to be the Gentleman-Usher of this sumptuous palace.

Usher. And by your gait and fashion, I should almost suspect you rule the healths of both our noble Kings, under the notion of Physician.

Physician. You hit my function right.

Usher. And you mine.

Physician. Then let’s embrace.

Usher. Come.

Physician. Come.

Johnson. Pray, sir, who are those so very civil persons?

Bayes. Why, sir, the Gentleman-Usher and Physician of the two Kings of Brentford.

Johnson. But, pray, then, how comes it to pass that they know one another no better?

Bayes. Phoo! that’s for the better carrying on of the plot.10

Another method, talking back to people off stage, as one enters, in such a way as to bring out necessary facts, erence both used and ridiculed centuries ago. This is his use of the device:

Enter Mysis

Mysis. (Speaking to the housekeeper within.) I hear, Archilis, I hear: Your orders are to fetch Lesbia. On my word she’s a drunken reckless creature, not at all a fit person to take charge of a woman in her first labour: am I to fetch her all the same? (Comes forward.)11

In the last lines of the following he ridicules this very use:

Re-enter Lesbia

Lesbia. (Speaking through the doorway.) So far, Archilis, the usual and proper symptoms for a safe delivery, I see them all here. After ablution give her the drink I ordered and in the prescribed quantity. I shall be back before long. (Turning round.) Lor’ me, but a strapping boy is born to Pamphilus. Heaven grant it live, for the father’s a noble gentleman and has shrunk from wronging an excellent young lady.

(Exit.)

Simo. For example now, wouldn’t any one who knew you think you were at the bottom of this?

Davus. Of what, sir?

Simo. Instead of prescribing at the bedside what must be done for the mother, out she plumps and shouts it at them from the street.12

Lately the telephone, the stenographer, and most recently the dictaphone have seemed to puzzled dramatists the swift road to successful initial exposition. To all these human or unhuman aids some overburdened soul has felt free to say anything the audience might need to hear. Probably this use of the telephone has come to stay, for daily there is proof that nothing is too intimate for it. There are, however, more ambitious workers who, weary of servants, confidants, telephones, stenographers, and dictaphones, want to set forth necessary information so naturally that no one may question whether it might have come out in this way. Also, they want the information to be so interestingly conveyed that an auditor thinks of what is happening rather than merely of the facts.

In the first act of The Second Mrs. Tanqueray,13 the audience must hear a narrative setting forth Aubrey Tanqueray’s position in society, his first marriage, his relations with his daughter, and the nature of his proposed second marriage. What complicates the task is that the narrative must be told to old friends, so that much of it is to them well known. What device will make the narrative, under the circumstances, plausible? Here is where a modern dramatist sighs for the serviceable heralds, messengers, and chorus of plays of decades long past or for the freer methods in narrative of the novelist. How easy to tell much of this in your own person, as have Thackeray or Meredith, in comparison with stating it through another so placed that he will be glad to hear again much which he already knows! The necessity creates with Sir Arthur the device of the little supper party in Aubrey Tanqueray’s chambers in the Albany, to which he has invited four of his oldest friends. The moment chosen for the opening of the play is when the old friends, over the coffee, fall quite naturally into reminiscent vein. What helps to freer exposition is their chance to talk of Cayley Drummle, who, even yet, though bidden, has not appeared. Before the chat is over and Cayley enters, much needed information is in the minds of the audience. Cayley brings news of a terrible mésalliance in a family known to all the supper party. In his efforts to advise and comfort the distracted mother he has been kept from the meeting of old friends. The news leads Aubrey Tanqueray to avow his quixotic scheme for a second marriage. Through the contrasting comments of the friends, even through their reservations, the audience becomes perfectly informed as to the view the world will take of this second marriage. Indeed, as the supper party breaks up, all the audience requires in order to listen intelligently to the succeeding acts, is a chance to see Paula herself. Her impulsive visit to Tanqueray, just after the supper party ends, provides the information needed, for in it her character is sketched in broadly as it will be filled out in detail in the succeeding acts. Evidently device, the ingenious discovery of a plausible reason for exposition necessary in a play, is basal in the best stage narrative. Without it, character is sacrificed to mere necessary exposition; with it, the spectator, absorbed by incident or characterization, learns unconsciously that without which he cannot intelligently and sympathetically follow the story of the play. In other words, successful discovery of devices for such exposition clearly means that disguising which is essential to the best narrative in drama.

The first quality of good expository device is clearness. Secondly, it should be an adequate reason for the exposition it contains: i.e., it must seem natural that the facts should come out in this way. Thirdly, and of the utmost importance, the device must be something so interesting in itself as to hold the attention of an auditor while necessary facts are insinuated into his mind. Lastly, the device should permit this preliminary exposition to be given swiftly. It is hard to conceal exposition as such if the movement is as slow as in the first two scenes of Act I of The Journey of Papa Perrichon.

ACT I

The Lyons railway station at Paris. At the back, a turn-stile opening on the waiting-rooms. At the back, right, a ticket window. At the back, left, benches, a cake vender; at the left, a book stall.

SCENE 1. Majorin, A Railway Official, Travelers, Porters

Majorin. (Walking about impatiently.) Still this Perrichon doesn’t come! Already I’ve waited an hour.... Certainly it is today that he is to set out for Switzerland with his wife and daughter. (Bitterly.) Carriage builders who go to Switzerland! Carriage builders who have forty thousand pounds a year income! Carriage builders who keep their carriages! What times these are! While I,—I am earning two thousand four hundred francs ... a clerk, hard-working, intelligent, always bent over his desk.... Today I asked for leave ... I said it was my day for guard duty.... It is absolutely necessary that I see Perrichon before his departure.... I want to ask him to advance me my quarter’s salary.... Six hundred francs! He is going to put on his patronizing air ... make himself important ... a carriage builder! It’s a shame! Still he doesn’t come! One would say that he did it on purpose! (Addressing a porter who passes, followed by travelers.) Monsieur, at what time does the train start for Lyons?

Porter. (Brusquely.) Ask the official. (He goes out at the left.)

Majorin. Thanks ... clodhopper! (Addressing the official who is near the ticket window.) Monsieur, at what time does the through train start for Lyons?

The Official. (Brusquely.) That doesn’t concern me! Look at the poster. (He points to a poster in the left wings.)

Majorin. Thanks.... (Aside.) The politeness of these corporations! If ever you come to my office, you...! Let’s have a look at the poster.... (He goes out at the left.)

SCENE 2. The Official, Perrichon, Madame Perrichon, Henriette

(They enter at the right)

Perrichon. Here we are! Let’s keep together! We couldn’t find each other again.... Where is our baggage? (Looking to the right; into the wings.) Ah, that’s all right! Who has the umbrellas?

Henriette. I, papa.

Perrichon. And the carpet bag? The cloaks?

Madame Perrichon. Here they are!

Perrichon. And my panama? It has been left in the cab! (Making a movement to rush out and checking himself.) Ah! No! I have it in my hand!... Phew, but I’m hot!

Madame Perrichon. It is your own fault!... You hurried us, you hustled us!... I don’t like to travel like that!

Perrichon. It is the departure which is tiresome ... once we are settled!... Stay here, I am going to get the tickets.... (Giving his hat to Henriette.) There, keep my panama for me.... (At the ticket window.) Three, first class, for Lyons!...

The Official. (Brusquely.) Not open yet! In a quarter of an hour!

Perrichon. (To the official.) Ah! pardon me! It is the first time I have traveled.... (Returning to his wife.) We are early.

Madame Perrichon. There! When I told you we should have time. You wouldn’t let us breakfast!

Perrichon. It is better to be early! ... one can look about the station! (To Henriette.) Well, little daughter, are you satisfied?... Here we are, about to set out!... A few minutes yet, and then, swift as the arrow of William Tell, we rush toward the Alps! (To his wife.) You brought the opera glasses?

Madame Perrichon. Of course!

Henriette. (To her father.) I’m not criticizing, papa, but it is now two years, at least, since you promised us this trip.

Perrichon. My daughter, I had to sell my business.... A merchant does not retire from business as easily as his little daughter leaves boarding school.... Besides, I was waiting for your education to be ended in order to complete it by revealing to you the splendid spectacle of nature!

Madame Perrichon. Are you going on in that strain?

Perrichon. What do you mean?

Madame Perrichon. Phrase-making in a railway station!

Perrichon. I am not making phrases.... I’m improving the child’s mind. (Drawing a little notebook from his pocket.) Here, my daughter, is a notebook I’ve bought for you.

Henriette. For what purpose?

Perrichon. To write on one side the expenses, and on the other the impressions.

Henriette. What impressions?

Perrichon. Our impressions of the trip! You shall write, and I will dictate.

Madame Perrichon. What! You are now going to become an author?

Perrichon. There’s no question of my becoming an author ... but it seems to me that a man of the world can have some thoughts and record them in a notebook!

Madame Perrichon. That will be fine, indeed!

Perrichon. (Aside.) She is like that every time she doesn’t take her coffee!

A Porter. (Pushing a little cart loaded with baggage.) Monsieur, here is your baggage. Do you wish to have it checked?

Perrichon. Certainly! But first, I am going to count them ... because, when one knows the number ... One, two, three, four, five, six, my wife, seven, my daughter, eight, and for myself, nine. We are nine.

Porter. Put it up there!

Perrichon. (Hurrying toward the back.) Hurry!

Porter. Not that way, this way! (He points to the left.)

Perrichon. All right! (To the women.) Wait for me there! We mustn’t get lost!

(He goes out running, following the porter.)14

The first scene undoubtedly helps to create the atmosphere of a large railway station, but everything in it could be brought out in what is now Scene 2. Even the way in which Majorin is passed from one employee to the other could be transferred to Perrichon. Every fact in Majorin’s soliloquy is either repeated in the scenes which follow, or could easily be brought out in them.

What has made necessary this swifter preliminary exposition is, probably, the growing popularity of three or four acts as compared with five. Less space has forced a swifter movement. Contrast, in the five-act piece Une Chaine15 by Scribe, the slow exposition in a first act of thirty-two pages with the perfectly adequate re-statement in six and a half pages in the one-act adaptation by Sidney Grundy, In Honour Bound.16

It is easy, however, to overload a first act with what seems needed exposition but is not. Careful consideration may show that some part may be postponed for “later exposition.” Here is the history which lies behind Act I of Sudermann’s Heimat, or Magda.17 The famous singer, Dall’Orto, who was Magda Schwartze, has returned to her native place for a music festival. Ten years before she was driven from home by her father, an army officer, because she would not marry the man of his choice, Pastor Hefferdingt. Going to Berlin to train her voice, she was betrayed by young von Keller, a former acquaintance. After six months he deserted her. A child was born to whom she is passionately devoted. Von Keller is now a much respected citizen of the home town, who lives in awe of public opinion. He and Magda have not met since their Berlin days and he does not know there was a child. Since his return to the town he has kept away from the Schwartzes. Hefferdingt has remained single, devoting himself to good works. Magda’s father nearly lost his mind from an apoplectic shock when he learned of her flight, but he has won back some part of his health through the wise and tender aid of Hefferdingt. There has been no communication between Magda and her family in the ten years. Now the younger sister Marie is engaged to the nephew of von Keller, Max, but the young people have not enough money to marry. They have been hoping that an aunt, Franziska, who caused Magda much unhappiness in the old days, will aid them. The narrow life of the town and the subservience of the Schwartzes to it had much to do with the rebelliousness of Magda as a girl. Through hard work and much bitter experience, she has won a supreme place in the world of music. She has developed a somewhat cynical philosophy of life which calls for complete self-expression, at any cost to others. She craves sight of her family again, and especially of Marie, a mere child when Magda left home.

Somewhere in the course of the play an audience must learn all these facts. How many of them must be set forth in Act I, and how many may be set apart for “later exposition”? Sudermann decided to postpone till Act II any detailed statement of the past relations between Magda and Hefferdingt. In Act I we learn only that he wished to marry Magda, and that there is anger in the family because of the way in which she refused him. What that was is not stated. Thus by giving mystery to these past relations of Magda and Hefferdingt, curiosity and interest are aroused and suspense created.

Of Magda’s relations with von Keller we really learn nothing in Act I. We are, it is true, made to suspect that his admitted meeting with her in Berlin covers more than he is willing to reveal, and that his avoidance of the Schwartzes means something, but we learn nothing clearly until Act III. Not till then do we know a child was born and is still alive. In other words, postponing detailed exposition of these matters provides the most important scene of Act II, that of Hefferdingt and Magda, and the central scene of Act III between von Keller and Magda. Note that deciding what shall be preliminary and what later exposition has much to do here, as always, with creating Suspense, a subject which will be treated under Movement. A difficult task for the dramatist is this determining what in the historical background of his play must be treated as preliminary exposition, and what may be postponed for later treatment, when the real action of the play is well under way.

Even when it is clear just what must go into preliminary exposition the ordering of the details chosen is very important. Look again at Magda. It is love for Marie which, in large part, draws Magda to her home, and at first keeps her there. The love affair which Magda fled from seemed to her conventional. Sudermann opens his play, therefore, with a picture of the thoroughly conventional engagement of Max and Marie, but remembering that the sooner a dramatist creates interest the better, he starts with the mysterious bouquet, far too expensive if sent by Max to Marie and wholly unacceptable if sent by any one else. When Max, entering, says that the flowers are not from him, there is a chance to emphasize two points of importance: the lovers’ lack of money, and their fear of gossip. Meantime the fact has been planted that there is a music festival in the town. As the two young people talk of their need and the people who might help them, we learn that the father thinks Magda’s departure was for some reason a “blot” on the family, and that Hefferdingt wished to marry her. The call of von Keller shows that since his return home he has been distant toward the Schwartzes; that he is afraid of public opinion; and that he met Magda in Berlin, “but only for a moment, on the street.” With the entrance of the father and mother we have the petty social ambitions of the latter, and the tyrannical attitude of the former toward his family. The scene with von Klebs and Beckmann not only illustrates social conditions in the town, but begins to connect Dall’Orto with the lost daughter by showing the extraordinary interest of Hefferdingt in meeting the singer. The coming of Aunt Franziska with her announcement that the Dall’Orto is Magda ends the preliminary exposition, for with the arrival of Hefferdingt and his effort to bring Magda home, the real action of the play begins. Obviously much thought and care have gone into the re-ordering of these details, so that the facts which must be first understood are stated first and so that there shall be growing interest through the creation of more and more suspense.

In one of the early drafts of Rosmersholm, the opening page ran as follows. Note that there is no mention of any “white horses.”

(Mrs. Rosmer is standing by the farthest window, arranging the flowers. Madam Helset enters from the right with a basket of table linen.)

Madam Helset. I suppose I had better begin to lay the tea-table, ma’am?

Mrs. Rosmer. Yes, please do. He must soon be in now.

Madam Helset. (Laying the cloth.) No, he won’t come just yet; for I saw him from the kitchen—

Mrs. Rosmer. Yes, yes—

Madam Helset.—on the other side of the millpond. At first, he was going straight across the foot-bridge; but then he turned back—

Mrs. Rosmer. Did he?

Madam Helset. Yes, and then he went all the way round. Ah, it’s strange about such places. A place where a thing like that has happened—there—. It stays there; it isn’t forgotten so soon.

Mrs. Rosmer. No, it is not forgotten.

Madam Helset. No, indeed it isn’t. (Goes out to the right.)

Mrs. Rosmer. (At the window, looking out.) Forget. Forget, ah!

Madam Helset. (In the doorway.) I’ve just seen the rector, ma’am. He’s coming here.

Mrs. Rosmer. Are you sure of that?

Madam Helset. Yes, he went across the millpond.

Mrs. Rosmer. And my husband is not at home.

Madam Helset. The tea is ready as soon as you want it.

Mrs. Rosmer. But wait; we can’t tell whether he’ll stay.

Madam Helset. Yes, yes. (Goes out to the right.)

Mrs. Rosmer. (Goes over and opens the door to the hall.) Good afternoon; how glad I am to see you, my dear Rector!18

In this version the “white horses” appear, definitely explained, after some sixteen pages:

Rosmer. ... My former self is dead. I look upon it as one looks upon a corpse.

Mrs. Rosmer. Yes, but that is just when these white horses appear.

Rosmer. White horses? What white horses?

(Madam Helset brings in the tea-urn and puts it on the table.)

Mrs. Rosmer. What was it you told me once, Madam Helset? You said that from time immemorial a strange thing happened here whenever one of the family died.

Madam Helset. Yes, it’s true as I’m alive. Then the white horse comes.

Rosmer. Oh, that old family legend—

Mrs. Rosmer. In it comes when the night is far gone. Into the courtyard. Through closed gates. Neighs loudly. Launches out with its hind legs, gallops once round and then out again and away at full speed.

Madam Helset. Yes, that’s how it is. Both my mother and my grandmother have seen it.

Mrs. Rosmer. And you too?

Madam Helset. Oh, I’m not so sure whether I’ve seen anything myself. I don’t generally believe in such things. But this about the white horse—I do believe in that. And I shall believe in it till the day of my death. Well, now I’ll go and—

(Goes out to the right.)19

In the final draft, Ibsen put the “white horses” into his opening page. The beginning of this draft emphasizes particularly a grim, unexplained tragedy. The most mysterious touch in the new arrangement is given by the “white horses,” here treated referentially, not in definite explanation.

(Sitting-room at Rosmersholm; spacious, old-fashioned, and comfortable.)

(Rebecca West is sitting in an easy chair by the window and crocheting a large white woolen shawl, which is nearly finished. Now and then she looks out expectantly through the leaves of the plants. Soon after, Madam Helseth enters from the right.)

Madam Helseth. I suppose I’d better begin to lay the table, Miss?

Rebecca West. Yes, please do. The Pastor must soon be in now.

Madam Helseth. Do you feel the draught, Miss, where you’re sitting?

Rebecca. Yes, there is a little draught. Perhaps you had better shut the window.

(Madame Helseth shuts the door into the hall, and then comes to the window.)

Madam Helseth. (About to shut the window, looks out.) Why, isn’t that the Pastor over there?

Rebecca. (Hastily.) Where? (Rises.) Yes, it’s he. (Behind the curtain.) Stand aside, don’t let him see us.

Madam Helseth. (Keeping back from the window.) Only think, Miss, he’s beginning to take the path by the mill again.

Rebecca. He went that way the day before yesterday, too. (Peeps out between the curtains and the window frame.) But let us see whether—

Madam Helseth. Will he venture across the foot-bridge?

Rebecca. That’s what I want to see. (After a pause.) No, he’s turning. He’s going by the upper road again. (Leaves the window.) A long way round.

Madam Helseth. Dear Lord, yes. No wonder the Pastor thinks twice about setting foot on that bridge. A place where a thing like that has happened—

Rebecca. (Folding up her work.) They cling to their dead here at Rosmersholm.

Madam Helseth. Now I would say, Miss, that it’s the dead that clings to Rosmersholm.

Rebecca. (Looks at her.) The dead?

Madam Helseth. Yes, it’s almost as if they couldn’t tear themselves away from the folk that are left.

Rebecca. What makes you fancy that?

Madam Helseth. Well, if it weren’t for that, there would be no white horse, I suppose.

Rebecca. Now what is all this about the white horse, Madam Helseth?

Madam Helseth. Oh, I don’t like to talk about it. And, besides, you don’t believe in such things.

Rebecca. Do you believe in them?

Madam Helseth. (Goes and shuts the window.) Now you’re making fun of me, Miss. (Looks out.) Why, isn’t that Mr. Rosmer on the mill path again—?

Rebecca. (Looks out.) That man there? (Goes to the window.) No, it’s the Rector!

Madam Helseth. Yes, so it is.

Rebecca. How glad I am! You’ll see, he’s coming here.

Madam Helseth. He goes straight over the foot-bridge, he does, and yet she was his sister, his own flesh and blood. Well, I’ll go and lay the table then, Miss West.

(She goes out to the right. Rebecca stands at the window for a short time; then smiles and nods to some one outside. It begins to grow dark.)

Rebecca. (Goes to the door on the right.) Oh, Madam Helseth, you might give us some little extra dish for supper. You know what the Rector likes best.

Madam Helseth. (Outside.) Oh yes, Miss, I’ll see to it.

Rebecca. (Opens the door to the hall.) At last! How glad I am to see you, my dear Rector.20

How a dramatist opens his play is, then, very important. He is writing supposedly for people who, except on a few historical subjects, know nothing of his material. If so, as soon as possible, he must make them understand: (1) who his people are; (2) where his people are; (3) the time of the play; and (4) what in the present and past relations of his characters causes the story. Is it any wonder that Ibsen, when writing The Pillars of Society, said: “In a few days I shall have the first act ready; and that is always the most difficult act of the play”?21

What has just been said as to ordering the details in preliminary exposition is equivalent to saying: Decide where, in this exposition, you will place your emphasis. What a dramatist is trying to do will not be clear throughout his play unless he knows how properly to emphasize his material, for it is above all else emphasis which reveals the meaning of a play. Right emphasis depends basally on knowing what exactly is the desired total effect of the piece,—a picture, a thesis, a character study, or a story. Remember that Dumas fils said: “You cannot very well know where you should come out, when you don’t know where you are going.” Often, too, a play is either meant to set people thinking of undesirable social conditions, or to state a distinct thesis. With these two kinds particularly in mind, Mr. Galsworthy has said: “A drama must be shaped so as to have a spire of meaning.”22

Whatever we make prominent by repetition, by elaborate treatment, by the position given it in an act or in the play as a whole, or by striking illustration, we emphasize, for it stays in the memory and shapes the meaning of a play for an auditor. In Othello, why does Shakespeare bring forward Iago at the end of an act as chorus to his own villainy? In order that the audience may not go astray as to the purposes of Iago and the general meaning of the play. Hence the soliloquies: “Thus do I ever make my fool my purse,” as well as “And what’s he, then, that says I play the villain?” It might almost be said that good drama consists in right selection of necessary illustrative action and in right emphasis.

Even though the general exposition of a play be clear, it is sure, without well-handled emphasis, to leave a confused effect. When a play runs away with its author, its emphasis is always bad. The cause of this trouble usually is that the author drifts or rushes on, as the case may be, lured by an idea which he tries to present dramatically; or by the development of some character who, for the moment, possesses his imagination; or by the handling of some scene of large dramatic possibilities. In a recent play meant to illustrate amusingly a series of situations arising from the gossip of a small town, Act I so ended that a reader could not tell whether the school principal, a woman dentist, or the atmosphere of gossip was meant to be of prime importance. Nor was this poor emphasis ever corrected anywhere. Result: a confusing play.

A story-play in some respects of great merit failed in its total effect because the author never really knew whether it was a study of the deterioration of a young man’s character or of a mother’s self-sacrificing and redeeming love, a mere story-play, or a drama intended to drive home a central idea which, apparently, always eluded the author. Fine realism of detail, good characterization in places, and genuine if scattered interest could not carry this play to success.

In another play, Act I ended with the failure of a well-intentioned friend to take a child from her father for her better bringing-up. Apparently, we were entering upon a study of parental affection. In Act II, however, this interest practically disappeared, and we were asked to give all our attention to the way in which a son-in-law was bringing ruin upon this same parent. In Act III, another cause for anxiety on the part of the parent appeared, the other disappearing. At the end of the play, however, we were expected to understand that the fond parent was in sight of calm weather. Proper emphasis which would have brought out the central idea illustrated by each of the acts was missing.

In The Trap, a four-act play developed from a vaudeville sketch, lack of good emphasis went far to spoil an interesting play. In the original sketch, a woman, induced by lies of the villain, comes to the apartment of a man who has at one time been in love with her. She is determined to know whether what the villain has told her is true or not. All is a trap which the villain has set for her. From it the astuteness and quick decision of her former admirer rescue her. In the vaudeville sketch, it was the former lover who was the active person,—advising, scheming, and controlling the situation. When this was made over, in Act I the heroine was the central figure; in Act II the villain took this position away from her; in Act III the hero, as in the original sketch, had the centre of the stage; in Act IV there was an attempt to bring the heroine back into prominence, but she divided interest with the hero. As a result of this uncertain emphasis, the play seemed intended for the heroine but taken away from her by the greater human appeal of the hero. Just as the lecturer keeps clear from start to finish the main theme of his discourse and the bearing upon it of the various divisions of the work, the dramatist keeps his main purpose clear and also the relations to it of scenes and acts. This he does by well-handled emphasis. Othello, for instance, must have some proof which the audience will believe conclusive for him of Desdemona’s infidelity. This is the handkerchief which Iago tells Othello that Desdemona gave to Cassio. Notice the iteration with which this handkerchief is impressed upon the attention of the public just before it is used as conclusive proof of Desdemona’s guilt.

Othello. I have a pain upon my forehead here.

Desdemona. Faith, that’s with watching; ’twill away again:

Let me but bind it hard, within this hour

It will be well.

Othello. Your napkin is too little; (Lets fall her napkin.)

Let it alone. Come, I’ll go in with you.

Desdemona. I am very sorry that you are not well.

(Exeunt Othello and Desdemona.)

Emilia. I am glad I have found this napkin;

This was her first remembrance from the Moor.

My wayward husband hath a hundred times

Woo’d me to steal it; but she so loves the token,

For he conjur’d her she should ever keep it,

That she reserves it evermore about her

To kiss and talk to. I’ll have the work ta’en out,

And give it to Iago. What he will do with it

Heaven knows, not I;

I nothing but to please his fantasy.

(Re-enter Iago)

Iago. How now! what do you here alone?

Emilia. Do not you chide; I have a thing for you.

Iago. A thing for me? It is a common thing—

Emilia. Ha!

Iago. To have a foolish wife.

Emilia. Oh, is that all? What will you give me now

For that same handkerchief?

Iago. What handkerchief?

Emilia. What handkerchief!

Why, that the Moor first gave to Desdemona;

That which so often you did bid me steal.

Iago. Hast stolen it from her?

Emilia. No, faith; she let it drop by negligence,

And, to the advantage, I, being here took’t up.

Look, here it is.

Iago. A good wench; give it me.

Emilia. What will you do with’t, that you have been so earnest

To have me filch it?

Iago. (Snatching it.) Why, what is that to you?

Emilia. If it be not for some purpose of import,

Give’t me again. Poor lady, she’ll run mad

When she shall lack it.

Iago. Be not acknown on’t; I have use for it,

Go, leave me. (Exit Emilia.)

I will in Cassio’s lodging lose this napkin,

And let him find it. Trifles light as air

Are to the jealous confirmations strong

As proofs of holy writ; this may do something.

The Moor already changes with my poison,

Dangerous conceits are, in their natures, poisons,

Which at the first are scarce found to distaste,

But with a little act upon the blood,

Burn like the mines of sulphur.23

Five times the handkerchief is mentioned. The first time the action is such that Othello specially notices the handkerchief. The second time we find another reason why the Moor should specially remember the handkerchief, and learn that Iago wants it for some reason of his own. The third time appears the iteration,

... that same handkerchief?

Iago. What handkerchief?

Emilia. What handkerchief!

and emphasis on the ideas already stated:

Emilia. Why, that the Moor first gave to Desdemona;

That which so often you did bid me steal.

The next time, the action, as Iago snatches the handkerchief and Emilia tries to get it back, holds it before our attention. Finally, Iago, left alone, tells us his malicious scheme in regard to it. Surely, after all this, the audience has been properly prepared for the scenes in which Iago deceives and enrages Othello by means of this very handkerchief.

In the first few minutes of the play, Lady Windermere’s Fan, the attention of the audience is drawn to the fan:

Lady Windermere. My hands are all wet with these roses. Aren’t they lovely? They came up from Selby this morning.

Lord Darlington. They are quite perfect. (Sees a fan lying on the table.) And what a wonderful fan! May I look at it?

Lady Windermere. Do. Pretty, isn’t it! It’s got my name on it, and everything. [Note the emphasis here.] I have only just seen it myself. It’s my husband’s birthday present to me. You know today is my birthday?

Lord Darlington. No? Is it really?24

Just before the close of the first act, it is with this fan that Lady Windermere points her threat against Mrs. Erlynne:

Lady Windermere. (Picking up fan.) Yes, you gave me this fan today; it was your birthday present. If that woman crosses my threshold I shall strike her across the face with it.

That Lady Windermere owns a fan; that it bears her name; that, as a gift chosen by her husband and recently given her, he must recognize it on sight: all these important facts have been planted by neat emphasis when Act I ends. Even in Act II, the fan is kept before the public. Just before Mrs. Erlynne enters, we have:

Lady Windermere. Will you hold my fan for me, Lord Darlington? Thanks.

·········

Lady Windermere. (Moves up.) Lord Darlington, will you give me back my fan, please? Thanks.... A useful thing, a fan, isn’t it?

When Mrs. Erlynne enters, Lady Windermere “clutches at her fan, then lets it drop on the floor”:

Lord Darlington. You have dropped your fan, Lady Windermere. (Picks it up and hands it to her.)

Such careful emphasizing makes sure that Lord Windermere’s instant recognition of the significance of finding the fan in Lord Darlington’s rooms, in the critical scene of the third act, will be immediately shared by any audience.

Mr. Augustus Thomas, in Act II of As a Man Thinks, wishes his audience to feel instantly the full significance of the opera libretto picked up by Hoover, as he watches Elinor enter the apartment of De Lota. Therefore, earlier in the act he emphasizes as follows:

Elinor. (To Burril.) Here’s a libretto of Aida. Find that passage of which you spoke.

Burril. There were several.

Mrs. Seelig. Our coffee won’t interfere with your cigars.

De Lota. Do you mind?

Elinor. This room is dedicated to nicotine. (To Mrs. Seelig.) Besides, we’re going to take Dr. De Lota to the piano.

De Lota. Are you?

Elinor. (To Vedah.) Aren’t we?

Vedah. We are.

Burril. Here’s one place. (His pencil breaks.) Ah!

Clayton. (Offering a pencil attached to his watch chain.) Here.

Burril. (Giving libretto to Clayton.) Just mark that passage—“My native land,” etc. (To Elinor.) Now follow that when Aida sings Italian and note how the English stumbles.25

Two pages later, as Elinor goes out to the automobile, in order that the audience may see the libretto of which we have heard so much pass into the hands of De Lota, we have this:

Elinor. Take this for me. (Hands libretto to De Lota.)

Later in the act, when Judge Hoover is telling Clayton that he saw some woman with De Lota as he was entering the apartment, the dialogue runs:

Clayton. You spoke to him?

Hoover. Called to him.

Clayton. Called?

Hoover. Yes—I was forty feet away.

Clayton. Had your nerve with you.

Hoover. The girl dropped something—I thought it was a fan.

Clayton. Well?

Hoover. ’Twasn’t—but that’s why I called De Lota.

Clayton. How do you know it wasn’t?

Hoover. I picked it up.

Clayton. What was it?

Hoover. A libretto.

Clayton. What libretto?

Hoover. Don’t know—but grand opera—I remember that and libretto—

Clayton. You threw it away?

Hoover. No—kept it.

Clayton. Where is it?

Hoover. Overcoat pocket.

Clayton. (Pause.) I’d like to see it. Think I could have some fun with De Lota.

Hoover. (Going up the hallway.) My idea too—fun and word of caution. (Gets coat and returns, feeling in pocket for libretto.)

Clayton. Caution—naturally.

Hoover. Here it is. (Reads.) Aida.

Clayton. (Taking libretto savagely.) Aida—let me see it.

Hoover. What’s the matter? (Puts coat on a chair.)

Clayton. (In sudden anger, throws book.) The dog! Damn him—damn both of them!

Hoover. What is it? See here—Who’s with Dick?

Clayton. Not his mother—no! (Points to libretto on the floor.) Marked. I did that myself, not an hour ago, and gave it to her.

Hoover. To Elinor?

Clayton. (Calling as he rushes to the hall.) Sutton! Sutton!

Hoover. Hold on, Frank—there’s some mistake.

Clayton. Get me a cab—never mind—I’ll take Seelig’s machine. (Disappears.) Here! Doctor Seelig says to take me to—

(He goes out. Door bangs.)

Sutton enters from the dining-room

Sutton. Is Master Dick in danger, sir?

Hoover. (Nervously.) I don’t know, Sutton. Where’s his mother?

Sutton. Opera, sir.

Hoover. With whom?

Sutton. Mr. De Lota.

Because of the emphasis given the libretto in the first quotation, the audience’s suspicions are roused at the same time as Clayton’s and his emotions are theirs. Yet, even in this last scene, note the care of Mr. Thomas to make all absolutely clear. He does not stop when Hoover says “A libretto,” and “Of grand opera,” but he lets the audience see the same libretto which passed from Elinor to De Lota pass from Hoover to Clayton, the latter identifying it in his cry, “Aida.” That there may be absolutely no doubt in the evidence piling up against Elinor, he has Clayton point to the marked place with the words: “I did that myself.”

Emphasis, as in these three instances, may come on some detail—handkerchief, fan, libretto—which is to be made important later in the development of the plot. It may come within a scene or act, or at the end of either to emphasize a part or the whole of the scene or act. The soliloquies of Iago referred to on page 183 are of this sort. Emphasis may stress little by little or with one blow what the play means. The significance of the whole play Strife—the utter uselessness of the conflict chronicled—is thus emphasized in the last lines of the play:

Harness. A woman dead; and the two best men both broken!

Tench. (Staring at him—suddenly excited.) D’you know, sir—these terms, they’re the very same we drew up together, you and I, and put to both sides before the fight began? All this—all this—and—and what for?

Harness. (In a slow, grim voice.) That’s where the fun comes in!

(Underwood without turning from the door makes a gesture of assent.)

The curtain falls26

The Second Mrs. Tanqueray27 illustrates the play in which emphasis little by little brings out the meaning of the whole piece. Examine even the first act. It is full of the feeling: “It cannot nor it will not come to good.” Tanqueray himself says frankly, “My marriage is not even the conventional sort of marriage likely to satisfy society.” Drummle coming in declares that George Orreyed is “a thing of the past,” because he has married Mabel Hervey. The group of old friends show anxiety, and it is clear that to the mind of Cayley Drummle Tanqueray is but repeating the rash step of Orreyed. The whole act prepares for the finale of the play.

Hervieu’s The Trail of the Torch shows the emphasis which strikes one hard blow and leaves to the rest of the play illustration of what has been clearly stressed. About one third of the way through Act I, Maravon explains to Sabine the thesis which the entire play illustrates:

Sabine. (Pointing to the two who have just gone.) Ah, my dear Maravon, what an absurd friend I have there!

Maravon. Mme. Gribert, you mean?

Sabine. Haven’t you noticed that she is beginning to look like a governess? I suppose it’s because she has been doing a governess’ work for so long that she has ceased to have any personal existence. She no longer cares to possess anything of her own, everything belongs to her daughter, and her husband works his fingers to the bone to pay for Beatrice’s dresses, while Beatrice lords it over both of them in a way that is beginning to be just a trifle odious.

Maravon. I’m afraid I don’t agree with you, Madame. With naively natural beings, like these, I enjoy watching the family wheels function with such simplicity. People of this kind conform to the law which begins by demanding of the mother the flesh of her flesh, often her beauty, her health, and, if need be, her life, for the formation of the child. And then, for the profit of the newer generation, Nature exerts herself to despoil the old. She exacts without stint from the parents in the shape of labors, anxieties, expenses, gifts, and sacrifices, all of their vital forces to equip, arm, and decorate their sons and daughters who are descending into the plain of the future. Take my own case, for instance. There was the question of my son’s position in life. Didier was able to persuade me very quickly that my property would be better placed, for the future, in his hands. To show you that Mme. Gribert and her daughter are merely following out a tradition of the remotest antiquity, if you can endure the pedantry of an old college professor, I will give you an example from the classics.

Sabine. Oh! Please do.

Maravon. You have probably never heard of the “Lampadophories,” have you? Well, on certain solemn occasions the citizens of Athens placed themselves at regular intervals, forming a sort of chain through the city. The first one lighted a torch at an altar, ran to the second and passed to him the light, and he to a third who ran to the fourth and so on, from hand to hand. Each one of the chain ran onward without ever looking back and without any idea except to keep the flame alight and pass it on to the next man. Then, breathlessly stopping, each saw nothing but the progress of the flaming light, as each followed it with his eyes, his then useless anxiety, and superfluous vows. In that Trail of the Torch has been seen a symbol of all the generations of the earth, though it is not I, but my very ancient friend Plato, and the good poet Lucretius, who made the analogy.