Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, March 1885Various
History
Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, March 1885
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Literature -- Periodicals
There is one sort of girl to whom all this does no harm, and that is
the girl who comes of a hard-working professional theatrical family,
who has been decently brought up in the middle of it all from a child,
whose father and mother are in the theatre, thoroughly respectable
people, and as careful of their daughter s morals as though she were
the niece of a bishop. Such a girl as this, if she remain on the
stage, will be a tolerable actress, always sure of an engagement.
She will marry a decent, respectable actor, of some one connected
with theatricals, will bring up a family excellently, will be really
religious without ostentation, will never lose her self-respect, and
in her own way be perfectly domesticated, happy and contented. Or she
may marry some one in a good social position: if so, she will quit
the stage without regret, because she is not of the stuff of which
great actresses are made; but she will look back on her theatrical
experience with affection for her parents to whom she owed so much.
She is neither Esther, nor Polly Eccles, nor is she in the position of
the well-brought-up young lady we have been considering. But she is an
admirable woman, in whatever station of life her lot may be cast, and
not a bit of a snob.
For a young lady, travelling with a company would be simply impossible,
unless accompanied by her mother, or by some trustworthy relative.
A manageress might undertake the guardianship and execute the trust
conscientiously. But this is an exceptional case.
There is another point, and a very important one, to be considered,
and that is the artistic temperament. If a young lady of attractive
personal appearance possesses histrionic talent, then in proportion to
her talent will be her temperament. She will be impulsive, passionate,
impressionable, self-willed, impatient of control, simple, confiding,
and vain, but artistically vain, and desirous of applause. She will be
illogical, inconsistent, full of contradictions, fond of variety, and
unable to exist without excitement. It only requires her to be a genius
to be duped by the first schemer that throws himself in her way.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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