Chapter XIII

My opinions on the theatre. What I have always found most beautiful in the theatre, in my childhood, and still to-day, is _lustre_,--a beautiful object, luminous, crystalline; complex, circular, symmetrical.

However, I do not absolutely deny the value of dramatic literature. Only, I should like the actors to be mounted on high pattens, to wear masks more expressive than the human face, and to speak through megaphones; finally, I should like the female parts to be played by men.

After all, lustre has always seemed to me the principal actor, seen through the large or the small end of the glass.