It was an arduous task indeed, for the problem was that of adapting the essential dualism of the Greek tragedy--its lyric choruses and its active players, its dithyrambs and its dialogue, Dionysius and Apollo--to the arrangement of the modern theater, with its odd-shaped stage, like a box opened toward the side of the spectators. Bakst made the attempt. Once having entered upon the road to Thebes he solved the enigma of the Sphinx without stumbling and forced open the gate. By raising the background of the stage he made the foreground available for the <g>proscenium</g>, with the altar of the god of the tragedy in the middle. On this <g>proscenium</g> the choruses executed evolutions, the choristers chanted the strophes and anti-strophes rhythmically, while the ensemble of supernumeraries scanned certain final verses. At the end the leader of the chorus would ascend the steps which connected the <g>proscenium</g> with the platform in order [Illustration: XXIII STAGE DECORATIONS FOR ACT 4th OF D’ANNUNZIO’S “ST. SEBASTIAN” (GOUACHE)] [Illustration: XXIV THE CZAREVITCH’S COSTUME (“THE BIRD OF FIRE”)] [Illustration: XXV PROJECT OF STAGE DECORATIONS FOR “SLEEPING BEAUTY”] [Illustration: XXVI STAGE DECORATIONS FOR THE VAULT SCENE (“ST. SEBASTIAN”)] to pronounce Fate’s supreme sentence upon the protagonist who had been prostrated by the gods. Thus, for the first time, an attempt was made at a logical dissociation of the rhythmic and dramatic elements of the ancient theater. Years were [Illustration: A BRANCH. SKETCH] to elapse before the German Max Reinhardt invented the monumental staircase and the <g>proscenium</g> of Lysistrata; and still a longer period until that same intrepid pioneer let loose upon the arena of a circus the hysterical multitude of a chorus of wild persons. Bakst was the first, not only in Russia, but in the world, to try to work out a stage and a conventional plastic language that was in accord with our modern conception of ancient art. The Greeks who faced each other in the tragic dilemmas of “Hippolytus” and especially of “Oedipus” were no longer those classical personages [Illustration: A ROAD IN UPPER SAVOY. DRAWING] with rounded gestures, draped in white, blue or red tunics that looked like a schoolboy’s drawing after a plaster=cast relief of Phideas. They displayed the angular shoulders of the warriors on one of Aegina’s bas=reliefs; the conical helmet with a visor protecting the brow and the nose, as well as the metal shin protectors, tended to simplify the lines of the actor. On the other hand the garments were brightcolored; the purple robe of Creon was resplendent with its ornamentation copied from Ionian pottery. The sixth century dispossessed the fifth, archaic art crowded out the classical canons, the intense colors of many hues [Illustration: PROJECT OF LANDSCAPE (UPPER SAVOY). DRAWING]