As to the fun, however, of making puppets and of tinkering with the mechanical contrivances, the total absorption with such problems and the elation in overcoming absurd but seemingly insurmountable technical difficulties; the delight in carving and cutting, in designing costumes and then in sewing, glueing, painting, patching them into proper semblance of the original design: the art required properly to conceive a setting for dolls, the ingenuity exerted to decorate the stage, the delicious Lilliputian proportions of things, the charming effects contrived out of almost anything or nothing at all; and, in manipulating, the thrill of acquiring after long effort a full control of the doll at the end of the wires, of telegraphing one’s emotions down into the responsive little body; and the whimsical delight in writing for puppets (one dare be so impudent, being so impersonal and unpretentious!)--who shall say that such an aggregate of wholesome, creative enjoyment to an entire group of childlike grown-up folk is not sufficient vindication for Polichinelle and his kind? With so much bubbling enthusiasm behind the scenes, how can a proper audience be altogether bored? If they are bored it is a sure sign they are no proper audience! WRITING FOR THE PUPPETS “The life of man to represent And turn it all to ridicule, Wit did a puppet-show invent, Where the chief actor is a fool.” JONATHAN SWIFT. No one appreciates how funny people are until he has written a play for puppets. There’s nothing any person has ever said which isn’t amusing, honestly and truly amusing, when transferred to the mouth of a marionette. Try it and see. Take any conversation you may have overheard. Take as many puppets as there were people talking. Dress them to indicate the characters, try to imitate the most pronounced gestures and postures of your people ... and let them speak, verbatim, the words that have been spoken. It is simply funny, a sort of unconscious, undeniable criticism of the manners of men. There will always be a _point_, too, a sort of moral at the minimum. No one can fail to see it, either in the words or the gestures or the situations. The puppets will find it and bring it out. Produce the puppets and try it! I frankly confess I shudder to imagine myself _done in puppet_. What a cure for idiosyncrasies and affectations! A REHEARSAL OF TINTAGILES In all the lack-luster of realism we “stood on the bridge at midnight.” Four of us stood on the bridge and we were very weary. It was the bridge of our marionette stage over which we had been bending for hours. From out in front somewhere the director spoke: “Now, once more the third act ... and remember they must lean _against_ the door when it opens as if they were trying desperately to hold it. See that the strings do not catch. Readers, please watch the figures and give them plenty of time.... Ready?” We were, tensely so.