Actresses -- Great Britain -- Biography; Siddons, Sarah, 1755-1831
A daughter’s arm, fell monster, strikes the blow!
Yes, _first_ she strikes—an injured daughter’s arm
Sends thee devoted to the infernal gods!
After this she acted Jane Shore. “Mrs Siddons,” as one of the critics
remarked on this performance, “has the air of never being an actress; she
seems unconscious that there is a motley crowd called the pit waiting
to applaud her, or that a dozen fiddlers are waiting for her exit.”
Her “Forgive me, but forgive me,” when asking pardon of her husband,
convulsed the house with sobs. Crabb Robinson, while witnessing this
harrowing performance, burst into a peal of laughter, and, upon being
removed, was found to be in strong hysterics.
After Jane Shore, she appeared as Calista, Belvidera, and Zara. All were
received with the same enthusiasm.
On the 5th June she acted Isabella for the last time that season, having
performed in all about eighty nights, and on six of them for the benefit
of others; and during that short time she may be said to have completely
revolutionised the English stage. Nothing now was applauded but tragedy.
The farces which before had won a laugh, were now not listened to. The
young actress so completely depressed the spirits of the audience,
that the best comic actor seemed unable to raise them. Already she was
preparing the way for the stately solemnity of John Kemble and the
Revival of Shakespearean Tragedy.
The town went “born mad,” as Horace Walpole said, after her. The papers
wrote about her continually, her dress, her movements. Nothing else
seemed to have the same interest. Her salary, originally five pounds a
week, was raised to twenty pounds before the end of the season, and her
first benefit realised eight hundred pounds.
On this latter occasion she addressed a letter to the public:—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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