To all stage presentations there are limits. If Macduff were to stab
Macbeth, the spectacle would be intolerable; and even the pretence
which we allow on our stage is ridiculously destructive to the illusion
of the scene. Yet pugilists and gladiators will actually fight and kill
in public without sham, even as a spectacle for money. But no sober
couple of lovers of any delicacy could endure to be watched. We in
England, accustomed to consider the French stage much more licentious
than the British, are always surprised and puzzled when we learn, as we
may do any day if we come within reach of such information, that French
actors are often scandalized by what they consider the indecency of the
English stage, and that French actresses who desire a greater license
in appealing to the sexual instincts than the French stage allows them,
learn and establish themselves on the English stage. The German and
Russian stages are in the same relation to the French and perhaps more
or less all the Latin stages. The reason is that, partly from a want of
respect for the theatre, partly from a sort of respect for art in
general which moves them to accord moral privileges to artists, partly
from the very objectionable tradition that the realm of art is Alsatia
and the contemplation of works of art a holiday from the burden of
virtue, partly because French prudery does not attach itself to the
same points of behavior as British prudery, and has a different code of
the mentionable and the unmentionable, and for many other reasons the
French tolerate plays which are never performed in England until they
have been spoiled by a process of bowdlerization; yet French taste is
more fastidious than ours as to the exhibition and treatment on the
stage of the physical incidents of sex. On the French stage a kiss is
as obvious a convention as the thrust under the arm by which Macduff
runs Macbeth through. It is even a purposely unconvincing convention:
the actors rather insisting that it shall be impossible for any
spectator to mistake a stage kiss for a real one. In England, on the
contrary, realism is carried to the point at which nobody except the
two performers can perceive that the caress is not genuine. And here
the English stage is certainly in the right; for whatever question
there arises as to what incidents are proper for representation on the
stage or not, my experience as a playgoer leaves me in no doubt that
once it is decided to represent an incident, it will be offensive, no
matter whether it be a prayer or a kiss, unless it is presented with a
convincing appearance of sincerity.