It is not without significance that our newspapers, which have a keen
understanding of the public taste, are in the habit of commenting upon
entertainments of the most diverse nature under the general heading of
"Amusements." It matters not whether this entertainment is proffered by
Barnum and Bailey, or by Weber and Fields, by Sophocles or by Ibsen, by
Shakspere or by Moliere, by Wagner or by Gilbert and Sullivan, it is
grouped with the rest of the amusements. And this is not so illogical as
it may seem, since the primary purpose of all the arts is to entertain,
even if every art has also to achieve its own secondary aim. Some of
these entertainments make their appeal to the intellect, some to the
emotions, and some only to the nerves, to our relish for sheer
excitement and for brute sensation; but each of them in its own way
seeks, first of all, to entertain. They are, every one of them, to be
included in the show business.
This is a point of view which is rarely taken by those who are
accustomed to consider the drama only in its literary aspects, and who
like to think of the dramatic poet as a remote and secluded artist,
scornful of all adventitious assistance, seeking to express his own
vision of the universe, and intent chiefly, if not solely, on portraying
the human soul. And yet this point of view needs to be taken by every
one who wishes to understand the drama as an art, for the drama is
inextricably bound up with the show business, and to separate the two is
simply impossible. The theater is almost infinitely various, and the
different kinds of entertainment possible in it cannot be sharply
distinguished, since they shade into each other by almost imperceptible
gradations. Only now and again can we seize a specimen that completely
conforms to any one of the several types into which we theoretically
classify the multiple manifestations of the drama.
Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Barnum and Bailey's Greatest Show on Earth
might seem, at first sight, to stand absolutely outside the theater. But
it is impossible not to perceive the close kinship between the program
of the Barnum and Bailey show and the program of the New York
Hippodrome, since they have the circus in common. At the Hippodrome,
however, we have at least a rudimentary play with actual dialog and with
abundant songs and dances executed by a charging squadron of
chorus-girls; and in this aspect its spectacle is curiously similar to
the nondescript medley which is popularly designated as a "summer
song-show." Now, the summer song-show is first cousin to the so-called
American "comic opera"--so different from the French _opera comique_.
Even if it has now fallen upon evil days, this American comic opera is
a younger sister of the sparkling ballad-opera of Gilbert and Sullivan,
and of the exhilarating _opera bouffe_ of Offenbach, with its libretto
by Meilhac and Halevy.
We cannot fail to perceive that the librettos of Gilbert and of Meilhac
and Halevy are admirable in themselves, that they would please even
without the music of Sullivan and Offenbach, and that they are truly
comedies of a kind. That is to say, the books of 'Patience' and
'Pinafore' do not differ widely in method or in purpose from Gilbert's
non-musical play 'Engaged'; and the books of the 'Vie Parisienne' and
the 'Diva' do not differ widely from Meilhac and Halevy's non-musical
play, 'Tricoche et Cacolet.' 'Engaged' and 'Tricoche et Cacolet' are
farces or light comedies, and we find that it is not easy to draw a
strict line of demarcation between light comedies of this sort and
comedies of a more elevated type. Gilbert was also the author of
'Sweethearts,' and of 'Charity,' and Meilhac and Halevy were also the
authors of 'Froufrou.' Still more difficult would it be to separate
sharply plays like 'Charity' and 'Froufrou' from the social dramas of
Pinero and Ibsen, the 'Benefit of the Doubt,' for instance, and the
'Doll's House.' Sometimes these social dramas stiffen into actual
tragedy, the 'Second Mrs. Tanqueray,' for example, and 'Ghosts.' And
more than one critic has dwelt upon the structural likeness of the
somber and austere 'Ghosts' of Ibsen to the elevated and noble
'OEdipus the King' of Sophocles, even if the Greek play is full of a
serener poetry and charged with a deeper message.
It is a far cry from Buffalo Bill's Wild West to the 'OEdipus' of
Sophocles; but they are only opposite ends of a long chain which binds
together the heterogeneous medley of so-called "amusements." In the eyes
of every observer with insight into actual conditions, the show business
bears an obvious resemblance to the United States, in that it is a vast
territory divided into contiguous States, often difficult to bound with
precision; and, like the United States, the show business is, in the
words of Webster, "one and indivisible, now and forever." There is
indisputable profit for every student of the art of the stage in a frank
recognition of the fact that dramatic literature is inextricably
associated with the show business, and the wider and deeper his
acquaintance with the ramifications of the show business, the better
fitted he is to understand certain characteristics of the masterpieces
of dramatic literature. Any consideration of dramatic literature, apart
from the actual conditions of performance, apart from the special
theater for which any given play was composed, and to the conditions of
which it had, perforce, to conform, is bound to be one-sided, not to say
sterile. The masterpieces of dramatic literature were all of them
written to be performed by actors, in a theater, and before an audience.
And these masterpieces of dramatic literature which we now analyze with
reverence, were all of them immediately successful when represented by
the performers for whom they were written, and in the playhouses to the
conditions of which they had been adjusted.
It is painfully difficult for the purely literary critic to recognize
the inexorable fact that there are no truly great plays which failed to
please the contemporary spectators for whose delight they were devised.
Many of the plays which win success from time to time, indeed, most of
them, achieve only a fleeting vogue; they lack the element of
permanence; they have only theatrical effectiveness; and they are devoid
of abiding dramatic value. But the truly great dramas established
themselves first on the stage; and afterward they also revealed the
solid qualities which we demand in the study. They withstood, first of
all, the ordeal by fire before the footlights of the theater, and they
were able thereafter also to resist the touchstone of time in the
library.
When an academic investigator into the arid annals of dogmatic
disquisition about the drama was rash enough to assert that, "from the
standpoint of the history of culture, the theater is only one, and a
very insignificant one, of all the influences that have gone to make up
dramatic literature," Mr. William Archer promptly pointed out that this
was "just about as reasonable as to declare that the sea is only one,
and a very insignificant one, among the influences that have gone to the
making of ships." It is true, Mr. Archer admitted, that there are "model
ships and ships built for training purposes on dry land; but they all
more or less closely imitate sea-going vessels, and if they did not, we
should not call them ships at all.... The ship-builder, in planning his
craft, must know what depths of water--be it river, lake, or ocean--she
will have to ply in, what conditions of wind and weather she may reckon
upon encountering, and what speed will be demanded of her if she is to
fulfil the purpose for which she is destined.... The theater--the actual
building, with its dimensions, structure, and scenic appliances--is the
dramatist's sea. And the audience provides the weather."