interpreters, about the interpretative arts. Less is understood about
acting, singing, and dancing than about anything else in the field of
aesthetic discussion, the more that is written about them, therefore, the
better. Besides creative artists speak for themselves. Anybody can read
a book; anybody can see a picture, or a reproduction of it. As for
posterity it rejects all contemporary criticism of creative work; it has
no use for it. It goes back to the work itself. So the critic of
creative work entirely disappears in the course of a few years. After
his short day nobody will read him any more.
Now an actor, a singer, or a dancer, can appear in comparatively few
places for a comparatively short time. The number of people who can see
or hear these interpreters is relatively small; consequently they like
to read about them. As for posterity it is absolutely dependent upon
books for its knowledge of the interpreters of a bygone day. That is the
only way it can see the actors of the past. For that reason I am
perfectly sure in my own mind that of such of my books as are devoted to
criticism this is the one most likely to please posterity.
All criticism may not be creative writing, but certainly all good
criticism is. For all good writing should be self-expression and the
subject treated and the form into which it is cast are mere matters of
convenience. There is no essential difference between poetry, fiction,
drama, and essay. An essay may be as creative as a work of fiction,
often it is more so. You will find criticism elsewhere than in the work
of acknowledged critics. Dostoevsky's "The House of the Dead" is
certainly a critical work, but the author chooses to criticize the
conditions under which human beings are compelled to live rather than
the works of Pushkin. Turgeniev once wrote to Flaubert, "There is no
longer any artist of the present time who is not also a critic." He
might have added that while all artists are assuredly critics, all
critics are not artists. On the other hand Walter Pater's famous passage
about the _Monna Lisa_ is certainly creative; it might almost be held
responsible for the vogue of the picture. Before the war, nearly any day
you might find frail American ladies from the Middle West standing in
front of Leonardo's canvas and repeating the lines like so much
doggerel. All artists express themselves as they may but they are not
artists unless they express _themselves_. Only thus may they establish a
current between themselves and their readers; only thus may they arouse
emotion. And if they succeed in arousing emotion we may disregard the
form in which their work is cast and bathe in the essence of spirit and
idea.
Whether you agree with this theory or not you must be compelled to admit
that criticism of interpreters, if it is anything at all, is bound to be
creative. For the art of the interpreter exists in time and space only
for the moment in an arbitrary place. Therefore he who writes about an
interpreter is using him to express certain ideas as a painter uses his
model.
It is a well-established fact that singers and actors in general only
approve of the critics who praise them, but it will readily be apparent
that there is a good instinctive reason back of this peculiarity. Their
work only lives as it exists in criticism and people who dwell in places
where these actors are not to be seen or in times after they are dead
must perforce depend upon the critic for their impressions of these
interpreters. The case of creative work is entirely different. The
creator of genius should never be disturbed by a bad criticism. If his
work is good it will far outlast the criticism. Indeed a bad notice
helps a fine book to find its public sooner than a good notice, because
it attracts attention and stimulates discussion. I think it is likely,
for instance, that the striking collection of bad notices of his
previous books, which James Branch Cabell inserted in the end pages of
"The Cream of the Jest," did as much to advertise that author as the
subsequent publication of "Jurgen."
II
Somewhere in Agnes G. Murphy's vivid but somewhat hysterical account of
the life and adventures of Madame Melba, the diva's Boswell declares
that the singer never permitted herself the pleasure of meeting
newspaper critics lest, it is to be assumed, they should be prejudiced
in her favour through the acquaintanceship. I can assure Madame Melba
that this decision, if strictly adhered to, has cost her many pleasant
hours, for I number certain music critics among my most diverting
friends. I can further assure these colleagues of mine that they have
missed knowing a very amusing woman, for once, not being considered at
the time anything so formidable as a critic, I was permitted to sit next
to the Australian canary while she toyed with her grapefruit and tasted
her _oeuf benedictine_.
Madame Melba's point of view is not held exclusively by her. There are
many singers who believe that a series of dinner invitations will buy a
critic's pen; a few do not hesitate to offer emerald stick-pins and even
substantial cheques. These methods are often entirely successful. On the
other hand there are critics who will rush across the street, though the
mud be ankle deep, to avoid an introduction to an artist. I have been
frequently asked where I stood in the matter, as if it were necessary to
take a stand and defend it.
I may say that if my profession kept me from knowing anybody I really
wanted to know I should relinquish that profession without hesitation.
It is absurd to feel that you cannot dine with a singer without praising
her performances. Many days in each month I dine with authors whose
works I abhor. I find their companionship delightful. Should I be
deprived of their society because I happen to be a critic? I suppose I
have a price--almost everybody has--but I should like to state right
here and now that it is not a dinner, or a series of dinners, or even an
emerald scarf-pin. I should be inclined, however, I admit frankly, to
say at least gentle things about a lady who made me a present of a
blooded silver cat.
But the crux of the matter lies deeper than this. No mere music critic
can hope to write about singing, violin playing, or piano playing
without knowing singers, violinists, and pianists. He can learn much
from books, from the reviews of other critics, from hearing
performances, but the great critics are those who study from the lips of
the interpreters themselves. The valuable hints, suggestions, and
inspiration that a critic with an open mind can gather from an
interpreter are priceless, and not to be found elsewhere. Not that an
interpreter will always tell the truth, not that he always knows what
the truth is in his particular case. Nevertheless any _virtuoso_ will
always have something of interest to say. It stands to reason that any
man or woman who has devoted his life to his profession will know more
about its difficulties, limitations, and tricks, than a mere critic can
hope to learn in any way except through social intercourse with the
interpreter. A young critic may learn much through reading Chorley,
Burney, Schumann, Ernest Newman, and James Huneker. He can further
prepare himself for his trade by listening with open ears to concerts
and operas (although, in passing, it may be stated categorically that no
critic learns immediately the value of opening his ears, so steeped is
he in the false tradition of his craft), by burying his nose in the
scores of the masters, and by reading all that the composers themselves
may have said about the performances of their works. But he can learn
more in a five-minute conversation with a great orchestral conductor, a
great singer, or a great instrumentalist than he can in all the other
ways combined.
Arturo Toscanini, Mary Garden, Ysaye, Marcella Sembrich, Yvette
Guilbert, Pablo Casals, Fritz Kreisler, Waslav Nijinsky, Marguerite
d'Alvarez, or Leo Ornstein can give any reviewer, young or old,
invaluable lessons. Such as these are their own severest critics and
they teach the writer-critic to be severe--and just. One piece of
advice, however, I would give to prospective critics. Become acquainted
with artist-interpreters by all means, but other things being equal, it
is perhaps better to meet good artists than bad ones!
III
Chaliapine, Nijinsky, Mazarin, and Fremstad[A] have not appeared on the
New York stage since I painted their portraits; nor have I seen them
elsewhere. Consequently any revision I might make in these pictures
would be revision of what I felt then in terms of what I feel now.
Nothing could be more ridiculous. So I let them stand as they are.
With Yvette Guilbert the case is somewhat different. She has been before
the American public almost consistently since the original publication
of this book. Her work at her own recitals is still the fine thing it
was and probably will remain so for a great many years to come. Madame
Guilbert, however, has seen fit to appear in a play at the Neighbourhood
Playhouse in New York, a fourteenth century French miracle play called
_Guibour_.
It is often said of an actress that she is too great to fail even when a
part does not suit her. But this is an utterly fallacious theory. Only
_great_ actresses _can_ fail. A really bad actress always fails and
consequently cannot be considered at all. A mediocre or conventional
actress is neither very good nor very bad in any role, but a great
actress, when she fails, fails magnificently, because she plays with
such precision and authority that she is worse than a lesser person
possibly could be.
Certainly Yvette Guilbert failed magnificently in _Guibour_. I have been
told that her infrequent performances in comedy in Paris have been
equally unsuccessful. When Guilbert sings a song she is forced by the
very nature of her method to make much of little; without setting,
frequently without costume, without the aid of other actors, she is
obliged in a period of three or four minutes to give her public an
atmosphere, several characters, and a miniature drama. Now, taking into
consideration the average low rate of intelligence and the almost entire
lack of imagination of the ordinary theatre audience, she is compelled
to chuck in as much detail as the thing will hold. The result is
generally admirable. In a play, however, this method becomes monotonous,
tiresome, picayune, fussy, overelaborate. One does not want the lift of
an eyelash, a gesture with every line; one does not want emphasis on
every word. The great actors employ broader methods. It was here that
Madame Guilbert failed, by applying the extremely efficacious technique
of her own perfect craft to another craft which calls for another
technique.
[Illustration: GERALDINE FARRAR AS ZAZA
_from a photograph by Geisler and Andrews (1920)_]
Geraldine Farrar has been seen and heard in a number of impersonations
at the Metropolitan Opera House (she has also enlarged her cinema
repertoire), since I wrote my paper about her, Orlanda in _La Reine
Fiamette_, Lodoletta, Thais, Suor Angelica, and Zaza, but I can add very
little to what I have said. Orlanda, Lodoletta, and, naturally enough,
Thais, she has permanently dropped, I think, after a short period of
experimentation. In Zaza, however, it seems possible, although it is too
early to predict with certainty, as I am writing these lines a month
after her assumption of the part, that she has found a role in which she
will meet popular satisfaction for some years to come. On the whole,
however, I must leave the case as I pleaded it originally, withal it is
probably a trifle rosier than I would plead it now. Nevertheless I must
state in fairness that Madame Farrar has probably never sung so well
before as she is singing this winter (1919-20) and that she retains the
admiration of opera-goers in general. It seems apparent to me now that
in exploiting herself as a "character" actress she has perhaps made a
mistake. Her best work has not been done in operas like _Thais_,
_Carmen_, and _Zaza_, but as Elisabeth in _Tannhaeuser_, as the Goosegirl
in _Koenigskinder_, and as Rosaura in _Le Donne Curiose_. Usually,
indeed, she is charming in what are called "ingenue" roles. It may
therefore be considered unfortunate that these are the roles in her
repertoire to which she is most indifferent. However it must be admitted
that it seems impertinent and even stupid to storm and fret about a
career which has been so evenly successful. The public must admire
Madame Farrar or it would not go to see her, and at the Metropolitan
Opera House it is a recognized fact that she is one of two singers in
the company who is always sure of drawing a full house.
IV
We come to Mary Garden. I never can resist the temptation to write about
Mary Garden. I never even try to. Other subjects intrigue me for a time,
but I usually pass them by in the end and go on to something new, new to
me, at least. But I always feel that I have left something unsaid about
this singing actress. It is probable that I always will feel this way
for Miss Garden in her performances constantly suggests some new idea or
awakens some dormant emotion. As a result, although I may write about
coleoptera, the influence of cobalt on the human mind, or a history of
Persian miniatures, I shall probably always find occasion to insert a
few remarks about this incomparable artist.
The paper devoted to her in this book seems to me at present pitifully
weak, absurdly inadequate. I have gone farther in "The New Art of the
Singer," which you will find in "The Merry-Go-Round" (1918), and in my
study of _Carmen_ in "The Music of Spain" (1918). This seems a good
place to state, however, that Miss Garden's Carmen was only seen to its
best advantage when she appeared with Muratore. The nature of her
interpretation of this role is such that it depends to a great extent on
satisfactory assistance from her fellow singers. Her Carmen is a study
of a cold, brutal, mysterious gipsy, who does not seek lovers, they come
to her. When, as at some recent performances, the tenors and baritones
do not come (it is obvious that some of them might take lessons to
advantage in crossing the stage) her interpretation loses a good deal of
its intention. I offer this explanation to any one who feels that my
enthusiasm for her in this role is exaggerated. To fully understand the
greatness of Miss Garden's Carmen one must have observed it in fitting
surroundings. I hope this environment may soon be provided again.
On the whole I feel that the most enthusiastic of Miss Garden's admirers
have so far done the woman scant justice. Most of us are beginning to
realize that she is the greatest of living lyric artists, that she has
done more to revive the original intention of the Florentines in
inventing the opera to recapture the theatre of the Greeks, than any
one else. She has made opera, indeed, sublimated speech. And she is
certainly the contemporary queen of lyric sigaldry.
It is said by some who do not stop to think, or who do not know what
singing is, that Mary Garden is a great actress but that she cannot
sing.[B] These misguided bigots, who try to make it their business to
misunderstand anything that approaches perfection, remind me of the
incident of Lady Astor and the American sailor. She met the youth just
outside the Houses of Parliament and asked him if he would like to go
in. "I _would_ not," were the words he flung into her astonished face.
"My mother told me to avoid women like you." Some day a few of the most
intelligent of these sacculi may realize that Mary Garden is probably
the greatest living singer. It is, indeed, with her voice, and with her
_singing_ voice that she does her most consummate acting. Indeed her
capacity for colouring her voice to suit the emergencies not only of a
phrase but of an entire role, might give a hint to future interpreters,
were there any capable of taking advantage of such a valuable hint.
But, good God, in such matters as phrasing, _portamento_, _messa di
voce_, and other paraphernalia of the singing teacher's laboratory, she
is past-mistress, and if any one has any complaints to make about the
quality and quantity of tone she used in the second act of _l'Amore dei
Tre Re_ I feel that he did not listen with unprejudiced ears.
There is, perhaps, nothing that need be added at present to what I have
already said of her Sapho, Marguerite, Melisande,[C] Chrysis, Jean,
Louise, and Thais, except that such of these impersonations as still
remain in her repertoire are as clean-cut, as finely chiselled as ever;
probably each is a little improved on each subsequent occasion on which
it is performed. Some day I shall have more to say about her marvellous
Monna Vanna. I am sure I would understand her Salome better now. When I
first saw her in Richard Strauss's music drama I was still under the
spell of Olive Fremstad's impersonation, and was astonished, and perhaps
a little indignant at Miss Garden's divagations. But now I know what I
did not know so well then, that an interpreter must mould a part to suit
his own personality. It is probable that if Mary Garden should vouchsafe
us another view of her nervous, unleashed tiger-woman I would be
completely bowled over.
It seems necessary to speak of the portraits she has added to her
gallery since the fall of 1917. Since then she has been seen in
Fevrier's _Gismonda_, Massenet's _Cleopatre_, and Montemezzi's _l'Amore
dei Tre Re_. The first of these is a very bad opera; it is not even one
of Sardou's best plays. The part afforded Miss Garden an opportunity for
the display of pride, dignity, and authority. Her gowns were very
beautiful--I remember particularly the lovely Grecian drapery of the
convent scene, which she has since developed into a first-act costume
for Fiora; she made a handsome figure of the woman, but the thing itself
was pasteboard and will soon be forgotten. The posthumous _Cleopatre_
was nearly as bad, but in the scene in which the queen, disguised as a
boy, visits an Egyptian brothel and makes love to another boy, Mary was
very startling, and the death scene, in which, after burying the asp in
her bosom, she tosses it away with a shudder, sinks to the ground,
then crawls to Antony's side and expires below his couch, one arm waving
futilely in the air in an attempt to touch her lover, was one of her
most touching and finest bits of acting. Her pale face, her green
eyelids combined to create a sinister make-up. But, on the whole, a dull
opera, and not likely to be heard again.
[Illustration: MARY GARDEN AS CLEOPATRE
_from a photograph by Moffett (1919)_]
But Fiora! What a triumph! What a volcano! I have never been able to
find any pleasure in listening to the music of Montemezzi's _l'Amore dei
Tre Re_, although it has a certain pulse, a rhythmic beat, especially in
the second act, which gives it a factitious air of being better than it
really is. The play, however, is interesting, and subtle enough to
furnish material for quibble and discussion not only among critics, but
among interpreters themselves. Miss Bori, who originally sang Fiora in
New York, was a pathetic flower, torn and twisted by the winds of fate,
blown hither and thither without effort or resistance on her part. It
was probably a possible interpretation, and it found admirers. Miss
Muzio, the next local incumbent of the role, fortified with a letter
from Sem Benelli, or at least his spoken wishes, found it convenient to
alter this impersonation in most particulars, but she was not, is not,
very convincing. Her intentions are undoubtedly good but she is no
instrument for the mystic gods to play upon.
But Miss Garden's Fiora burned through the play like a flame. She
visualized a strong-minded mediaeval woman, torn by the conflicting
emotions of pity and love, but once she had abandoned herself to her
passion she became a living altar consecrated to the worship of
Aphrodite and Eros. Such a hurricane of fiery, tempestuous love has
seldom if ever before swept the stage. Miss Garden herself has never
equalled this performance, save in Melisande and Monna Vanna, which
would lead one to the conclusion that she is at her best in parts of the
middle ages, until one reflects that in early Greek courtesans, in
French cocottes of several periods, in American Indians, and Spanish
gipsies she is equally atmospheric. Other Fioras have been content to
allow the hand of death to smite them without a struggle. Not this one.
When Archibaldo attempts to strangle her she tries to escape; her
efforts are horrible and pathetic because they are fruitless. And the
final clutch of the fingers behind his back leave the most horrible
blood-stains of tragic beauty in the memory.
V
What is to become of Mary Garden? What can she do now? What is there
left for her to do? Those who complain of some of the dross in her
repertoire can scarcely have considered the material available to her.
In _Pelleas et Melisande_, _Louise_, and _Salome_ she has given much to
the best the contemporary lyric stage has to offer. On other occasions
she has succeeded in transfiguring indifferent material with her genius.
_Monna Vanna_ is not a great opera, but she makes it seem so. But where
is there anything better? Can she turn to Puccini, whose later operas
seem bereft of merit, to Mascagni, to Strauss, to any other of the
living opera composers?
Ravel's one opera is not particularly suited to her, but why, I might
ask, does not Ravel write something for her? Why not Strawinsky? Why not
Leo Ornstein? Why not John Carpenter? The talented composer of _The
Birthday of the Infanta_ might very well write an opera, in which her
genius for vocal experimentation might have still further play.
In the meantime I can make one or two suggestions. I have already begged
for Isolde and Isolde I think we shall get in time. But has it occurred
to any one that the Queen in _The Golden Cockerel_ is a part absolutely
suited to the Garden genius? Not, of course, _The Golden Cockerel_ as at
present performed, with a double cast of singers and pantomimists but as
an opera, in the form in which Rimsky-Korsakow conceived it. And I hope
some day that she will attempt Gluck's _Armide_, perhaps one of the
Iphigenies, and Donna Anna. Why not? Of all living singers Miss Garden
is the only one who could give us the complete fulfilment of Mozart's
tragic heroine. Oscar Hammerstein, whose vision was acute, once
considered a performance of _Don Giovanni_ with Maurice Renaud in the
title part, Luisa Tetrazzini as Zerlina, Lina Cavalieri as Elvira, and
Mary Garden as Anna. It was never given. But I hope at the next revival
of the work at the Opera-Comique Miss Garden will undertake the part,
and I see no reason why the opera should not be added to the already
extensive repertoire of the Chicago Opera Company.
Her stride, her lithe carriage, her plastic use of her arms and her
body, give Mary Garden a considerable advantage over a sculptor, who can
in the course of a lifetime only capture perhaps ten perfect examples
of arrested motion, while in any one performance she makes her body a
hundred different works of art. Of course, some of us, fascinated by the
mere beauty of the Garden line, more slender now than it was even in her
most youthful past, delighted with her irreproachable taste in dress,
would rest content to watch her walk across the scene or form exquisite
pictures in any part, in any opera. But unless one of the best of the
moderns writes a great role for her, it would be a great satisfaction to
see her in one of the noble classic parts of the past, and that
satisfaction, I hope, will be vouchsafed us.
_March 18, 1920._
_New York._
On the following pages you will find descriptions of two other
interesting books by Mr. Van Vechten.
THE MERRY-GO-ROUND
(12mo., 343 pages, $2.00 _net._)
CONTENTS: In defence of bad taste; Music and supermusic; Edgar Saltus;
The new art of the singer; Au bal musette; Music and cooking; An
interrupted conversation; The authoritative work on American music; Old
days and new; Two young American playwrights; De senectute cantorum; The
Land of Joy; The new Isadora; Margaret Anglin produces As You Like It;
The modern composers at a glance.