Authors, Irish -- 19th century -- Biography; Wilde, Oscar, 1854-1900
Majesty's Theatre, which is crowded, night after night, with audiences
eager to bring a posthumous tribute to the genius of the author.
_Apropos_ of the first act where all the _dramatis personæ_ are seated
in a semicircle engaged only in conversation, and which was likened, on
the occasion of the first production of the play, by an eminent critic
to "Christy Minstrelism Crystallised," it may not be uninteresting to
note, _en passant_, a similar arrangement of characters in a play of Mr
Bernard Shaw's recently performed at the Court Theatre. This is called
"Don Juan in Hell"--the dream from "Man and Superman"--mercifully
omitted when that play was produced. It had nothing whatever to do with
the comedy in which it was included, but is a Niagara of ideas, clumsily
put together, and is more or less an exposition of the Shawian
philosophy.
"Hear the result"--I quote from the critique in one of our leading
journals--"The curtain rose at half-past two on a darkened stage draped
in black. Enter, in turn, Don Juan, Dona Ana de Ulloa, the statue of her
father, and the devil. They sat down, and for an hour and a half
delivered those opinions of Mr Shaw with which we are all so terribly
familiar. Every now and then there was a laugh, as, for example, when
Don Juan said: 'Wherever ladies are is hell,' or, again, when he said:
'Have you ever had servants who were not devils?' It was all supposed to
be very funny and very naughty, of course, especially when the statue
said to Don Juan: 'If you dwelt in heaven, as I do, you would realise
your advantages.' And so on, and so on, _ad nauseum_."
See now, how the parallel scene of "only talk" as written by Oscar Wilde
was noticed upon its revival the other day. I quote from another
journal. "Let all that can be urged against this play be granted. None
the less is it worth watching the _dramatis personæ_ do nothing, so long
as the mind may be tickled by this unscrupulous, fastidious wit. And,
even if all the characters speak in the same accents of paradox, their
moods, the essentials of them, are differentiated with a brilliancy of
expression which condones the lack of dramatic movement. These things,
alone, evoke my gratitude to Mr Tree for reviving so interesting and
individual a comedy.... For even those utterances which seem to be mere
phraseological inversions are fraught with much wisdom, and the major
part of the dialogue reflects the mind of a subtle and daring social
observer." And it was this "mind," keen of observation, and equipped
with no ordinary wit, that dominates an audience and compels them to
sit, as it were, spellbound before the demonstration of the power of its
unique personality. I am informed that, to-day, in Germany, the only two
modern English dramatists who are listened to are Oscar Wilde and
Bernard Shaw--the poet and the proser. Truly may it be remarked: "_Les
extrêmes se touchent_."
The story of "The Woman Of No Importance" is quickly told.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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