Chapter XV: The Higher Drama

“If every manager considers it due to himself to produce nothing
cheaper than _The Prisoner of Zenda_, not to mention the
splendours of the Lyceum, then goodbye to high dramatic art.
The managers will, perhaps, retort that, if high dramatic art
means Ibsen, then they ask for nothing better than to get rid
of it. I am too polite to reply, bluntly, that high dramatic
art _does_ mean Ibsen; that Ibsen’s plays are at this
moment the head of the dramatic body; and that though an actor
manager can, and often does, do without a head, dramatic art
cannot.”--G.B.S. in _The Saturday Review_, 1897.

If it takes more than two swallows to make a summer, it certainly takes more than two playwrights to make a dramatic renaissance. That being admitted, no one could say that the plays of Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw constituted in themselves a “new” drama. Such a definite achievement cannot be credited to the period. But what can be credited to the period is the creation of an atmosphere in which a new drama might flourish at the appointed hour. This was done by the art of criticism, and chiefly by Bernard Shaw, William Archer and J. T. Grein, whose example and ideal was Ibsen. These three critics were more than convinced and ardent Ibsenists; they were capable and tireless in propagation of the cause, Bernard Shaw as critic and philosopher, William Archer as critic and translator of the Master’s plays, and J. T. Grein as critic, producer and founder of the Independent Theatre, the earliest definite home of the Higher Drama. And with them, but not of them, was A. B. Walkley, critic pure and simple, pouring oil upon the waters of revolt with irony and intellectual banter born of a capacity for taking an uncompromising middle attitude, and with a common-sense which amounted in itself to genius.

These critics differed from their kind by an avowedly personal approach, and they flaunted their apostasy in the face of those who were content to maintain the old theatrical methods. The appeal to personal taste might easily have been ignored by the upholders of convention had it not been made by critics of undoubted skill and unanswerable certainty of aim. The new critics accepted their own view of the state of the drama with as much deliberation as the old accepted the view of tradition and convention. They were frankly impressionist and autobiographical. Walkley called his first collection of critical essays _Playhouse Impressions_ (1892), and admitted to adventuring among masterpieces in the approved method of Anatole France. The diaries of Marie Bashkirtseff were among the books of the hour, and he coined the verb “to bashkirtseff,” for the purpose, emphasising a method which had also been defended by Oscar Wilde. Shaw was even more autobiographical, but prophecy, and purpose other than the entertainment of a moment or an hour, lurked behind his most indiscreet confession. He did not argue from precedent, it is true, but he sought all the more energetically to establish new precedents, chief among which were a drama of ideas and “a pit of philosophers”--and Ibsen, Ibsen, Ibsen, _toujours_ Ibsen!

The all-or-nothing seriousness of G.B.S. is happily recorded in the following passage from Walkley’s book, which purports to describe the author’s friend, Euthyphro, but whose identity is otherwise obvious:--“A universal genius, a brilliant political economist, a Fabian of the straitest sect of the Fabians, a critic (of other arts than the dramatic), _comme il y en a peu_, he persists, where the stage is concerned, in crying for the moon, and will not be satisfied, as the rest of us have learned to be, with the only attainable substitute, a good wholesome cheese. His standard of taste is as much too high as Crito’s is too low. He asks from the theatre more than the theatre can give, and quarrels with the theatre because it is theatrical. He lumps _La Tosca_ and _A Man’s Shadow_ together as ‘French machine-made plays,’ and, because he is not edified by them, refuses to be merely amused. Because _The Dead Heart_ is not on the level of a Greek tragedy, he is blind to its merits as a pantomime. He refuses to recognise the advance made by Mr Pinero, because Mr Pinero has not yet advanced as far as Henrik Ibsen. Half a loaf, the wise agree, is better than no bread; but because it is only half a loaf, Euthyphro complains that they have given him a stone.”

More than twenty years have passed since the above words were written, and what A. B. Walkley imagined to be a demand for more than the theatre could give has actually produced a new drama, if not a new theatre, and the succeeding generation, in the person of Gordon Craig, is already making demands which even iconoclasts of the Nineties would have considered impossible.

William Archer is the father of modern dramatic criticism in this country, and he was introducing ideas and an intelligent seriousness into this disappointing and most thankless branch of criticism as far back as the middle eighties, with such books as _About the Theatre_ (1886) and _Masks or Faces?_ (1888). He shared the honours of being one of the earliest translators of Ibsen with Edmond Gosse, Eleanor Marx Aveling (daughter of Karl Marx), and his own brother, Charles Archer, who collaborated with him in several translations now in the complete English edition.[4]

On 7th June 1889 Charles Charrington began the dramatic renaissance by producing _A Doll’s House_ at the Novelty Theatre, with Janet Achurch in the part of Nora. The play had been called the _Hernani_ of the new dramatic movement in England, and the title has been justified to the full. An interest was aroused such as had not been known in artistic circles since the first performances of Wagner’s operas, and the appearance of the Impressionist painters; and it was increased a thousandfold by the production of _Ghosts_ and _Hedda Gabler_, in 1891, when the new manifestation of drama turned the opposition of the older critics into indignation and reduced their criticism to a wild display of invective and vituperation. It was, as William Archer said at the time, “probably the most obstinate and rancorous prejudice recorded in the history of the stage.” Bernard Shaw’s account of Clement Scott’s criticism of _Ghosts_ in _The Daily Telegraph_, and the famous leading article in the same issue (14th March 1891), recalls the anxiety of the older generation when confronted with this frank drama. The leading article, he wrote, compared the play to an open drain, a loathsome sore unbandaged, a dirty act done publicly, or a lazar-house with all its doors and windows open. Bestial, cynical, disgusting, poisonous, sickly, delirious, indecent, loathsome, fetid, literary carrion, crapulous stuff, clinical confessions: all these epithets were used in the article as descriptions of Ibsen’s work. One passage in the same leader said: “Realism is one thing; but the nostrils of the audience must not be visibly held before a play can be stamped as true to nature. It is difficult to expose in decorous words,” the writer continued, “the gross and almost putrid indecorum of this play.” And as more than one critic called upon the law to protect the players against such dramas, some idea may be formed of the righteous indignation aroused at the inception of the new drama.

After the first experiment with _A Doll’s House_, Charles Charrington took his company on a world tour, and Janet Achurch played the part of Nora over one hundred and fifty times in Australia, New Zealand, India and Egypt. This tour took something like three years, and when the pioneers returned to London they found Ibsen engaging the interest of all the more thoughtful playgoers. _A Doll’s House_ was therefore revived at the Avenue Theatre (now the Playhouse) on 19th April 1892, and the same year saw the first stage performance of plays by Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw. The following year, however, was more memorable in the dramatic renaissance, for it saw the production of no less than six plays by Ibsen--_The Master Builder_, _Rosmersholm_, _Hedda Gabler_, _Brand_ (Fourth Act), _An Enemy of the People_, and _A Doll’s House_, and the Independent Theatre produced five modern plays, one adaptation and one translation, and, more important still, three by modern British playwrights: _The Strike at Arlingford_, by George Moore (his first play), _The Black Cat_, by John Todhunter, and _A Question of Memory_, by “Michael Field.” Besides these came _The Second Mrs Tanqueray_, by Pinero, _A Woman of No Importance_, by Oscar Wilde, and _The Bauble Shop_, by Henry Arthur Jones, all of which were in the modern movement and contributing to the newly awakened intelligent interest in the theatre.

The appetite for a new drama thus created might have encouraged managers and propagandist promoters to venture further afield, but it did nothing of the sort. After 1893, and for practically seven years, there was very little encouragement for those who stood for the higher drama. It is true that plays by advanced foreigners as important as Björnson Björnstjerne, Maurice Maeterlinck, Sudermann and Echegaray, and a number of classical dramas managed to get produced; but Bernard Shaw could find only occasional chances of production for his own plays, and the younger school, since evolved out of his teaching and criticism, was not yet born. The new drama was in the main an occasional affair, highly experimental, and appealing only to a small and seriously minded group of “intellectuals” in London. They very largely belonged to the literary fringe of the Fabian Society and other reform and revolutionary organisations, and these were practically the sole supporters of the efforts of the Independent Theatre, the Stage Society and the New Century Theatre.

Such a poor result from early efforts towards a new drama ought not to have been, and, in fact, was not, unexpected. The new movement was so radical in its demands that it had first to create conditions in which it could exist. Everything was against rapid progress. It was not a mere question of art, dramatic or theatrical; it was a question also of economics, of professional interests, and of theatrical habit and public indifference to anything that did not entertain by laughter or tears. The new drama already existed on the Continent in the plays of Ibsen, Hauptmann, Maeterlinck, Sudermann, Strindberg and others; and both theatres and audiences were coming into existence in support of it. But here, save for Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde, we possessed no native plays at all comparable with these foreign ones, and until there was a certainty of such plays being produced few authors could be expected to go on writing them. For that reason the new movement was forced to be mainly critical. Its chief material objects of attack were the dominance of the actor manager and his demand for plays written around himself, and the general theatrical custom of seeking only plays that promised a “long run.” These two conditions stood in the way of a new drama because the modern drama, being impressionist and realist, did not see life as an episode dominated by an attractive personality more or less resembling some popular actor manager; it only offered such eminence by accident, as in the case of Dr Stockmann in _An Enemy of the People_, which was produced with considerable popular success, and the minimum of Ibsenism, by Beerbohm Tree, in 1893. And, secondly, the only chance of promoting variety of plays of the new type, actors in sufficient numbers to perform them, and audiences of sufficient intelligence and sufficient interest to maintain them, was by a return to the repertory system. Abnormal rents for theatres, abnormal salaries for principal actors, and the absence of small and convenient theatres were also among the first obstacles to the realisation of these ambitions.

But these were not all the seemingly insurmountable difficulties; the greatest stumbling block was the creation of an audience large enough to make the newer plays a financial possibility. This was no easy matter. At no time are there many people in this or perhaps any country who can be relied upon to show much enthusiasm for ideas and psychological and social problems, especially in a theatre which has for generations been looked upon as a place of idle amusement. The advocates of the higher drama were serious and purposeful persons. With the exception of Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde, there was no laughter in them. They and their followers could laugh, but they preferred the mental smile. Their demand was for dramatic literature: dramas which represented a personal point of view, expressed in impressionistic terms revealing the play of temperament in conflict with convention, and will in conflict with circumstance, and always indicating by implication the ideas underlying the theme. Such plays were not only to be playable; they were to be readable as well--they were to combine the good stage play and the good book. As we know, the higher dramatic movement did produce plays answering these demands. But it was not always so easy to reveal the idea behind the play. Bernard Shaw had to write _The Quintessence of Ibsenism_ to show what Ibsen’s plays meant, and long prefaces and appendices to show what his own plays meant. Endless were the discussions as to the meaning of _The Master Builder_ (Israel Zangwill called it “The Master Bewilderer”); and intellectuals of all kinds yearned for the prefaces Ibsen might have written but didn’t. But the old Norwegian dramatist let them yearn. With the plays of Shaw the higher drama became a drama of discussion. It was realistic only incidentally; in inception it was problematic, and in effect argumentative, without any definite conclusion. Ideas were generally left very much in the air until the play was printed, when the author told you all about his aims in a long, idea-laden and entertaining preface. This argumentative tendency developed in his art until the action of his later plays became entirely conversational; and to prevent any illusions as to his intentions he called these plays discussions.

Out of the discussion of plays and ideas the new drama ultimately came. Translations of good foreign plays began to appear frequently, and they were read by a select but ever-growing public. Interest also was aroused in the older dramatists, and both Henry Irving and Beerbohm Tree drew large audiences to their highly decorated revivals of Shakespeare; a still more genuine enthusiasm was created by the excellent Shakespearean Repertoire Company of F. R. Benson, in the provinces. But with all this activity the main line of the modernist advance was diverted by a characteristic compromise on the part of the public. Ibsen did not pay; but it was felt that realism in a modern setting, if the themes in themselves were likeable and capable of a sentimental response, might be popular. Obviously, the game would be to hearten realism with a dash of sentimentalism; in short, to water down Ibsen; not to declare that “it is right to do something hitherto regarded as infamous” (_vide_ G.B.S.), but to treat seriously, in a play with no specific purpose, something hitherto considered as naughty and therefore only deserving of facetious comment, and to call it a “problem play.” And if you could provoke a tear at the naughtiness out of which a Labiche would have raised a laugh, so much the better--you would be both modern and popular.

This actually happened. Oscar Wilde did it with _A Woman of No Importance_; Henry Arthur Jones did it with _The Case of Rebellious Susan_, and Arthur Wing Pinero did it with _The Second Mrs Tanqueray_. It is not to be doubted that these playwrights were pioneers of the new movement, but it should not be forgotten that they were pioneers by compromise. Henry Arthur Jones was an upholder of realism, but his plays of this time do not approximate to the realism of Ibsen or Tolstoy or Strindberg; they are realistic only in so far as realism is consistent with the conviction that the artist is an interpreter of dreams, a translator of real life into imaginative concepts. Quite seriously, logically and successfully, Wilde, Pinero and Jones worked along these lines, and by so doing placed themselves in the direct tradition of the established drama, upon which they succeeded in doing little more than graft some new branches. Now Ibsen possessed only the most elementary connection with traditional drama. He was as distinct from the current trend of European drama that had preceded him as Euripides was from the Greek drama, as Molière was from the French drama, and as Shakespeare was from the English drama, which had preceded them. Ibsen discovered theatrical reality, and he made it so real that half the opposition to his drama was due to the discomfort most people experience when brought face to face with a new revelation of facts or ideas. Those who compromised achieved no such effect; they were merely illusionists, using reality to further illusion, rather than illusion to further reality.

Bernard Shaw was not deceived by this quasi-modernism. In 1895 he wrote: “The unfortunate new dramatist has ... to write plays so extraordinarily good that, like Mozart’s operas, they succeed in spite of inadequate execution. This is all very well for geniuses like Ibsen; but it is rather hard on the ordinary purveyor of the drama. The managers do not seem to me yet to grasp this feature of the situation. If they did, they would only meddle with the strongest specimens of the new drama, instead of timidly going to the old firms and ordering moderate plays cut in the new style. No doubt the success of _The Second Mrs Tanqueray_ and _The Case of Rebellious Susan_ seemed to support the view that the new style had better be tried cautiously by an old hand. But then _Mrs Tanqueray_ had not the faintest touch of the new spirit in it; and recent events suggest that its success was due to a happy cast of the dice by which the play found an actress[5] who doubled its value and had hers doubled by it.” William Archer took a more lenient view of the situation. He referred to the play in 1893 as “the one play of what may be called European merit which the modern English stage can yet boast,” and he went on to advise Pinero’s fellow-craftsmen to follow the lead set by _The Second Mrs Tanqueray_, because Pinero had “inserted the thin end of the wedge,” and “I firmly believe,” he said, “that not only the ambition but the material interests of our other dramatists will prompt them to follow his lead, and that, therefore, we are indeed on the threshold of a new epoch.”

That proved to be true. _The Second Mrs Tanqueray_, although it was not of the “advanced movement,” was really a part of the movement. It was the first effect on the English stage of the influence of Ibsen and the propagandists of the modern drama. And even its faults as a play are faults only in comparison with the Ibsen standard. It is a play possessing both intelligent idea and problem, but above all it possesses a masterly stage technique which alone makes it worthy to be considered with the works of great modern masters. There is little doubt again that the modernist plays of Pinero and Henry Arthur Jones, and certain productions of R. C. Carton and Sydney Grundy, did tone up the moribund popular stage, and so aided the revolutionists by teaching the average playgoer to tune his brain to a higher seriousness than had hitherto been his habit.

But the real expression of the new movement, the main tendency, did not find an outlet during the Nineties. That was not possible until the close of the decade, when, in the person of H. Granville Barker, the Stage Society found the medium for the realisation of the decade-old dreams of the leaders of the modern movement. Dramatist, actor and producer, Granville Barker was the man whom the moment and the movement required, and after several successes within the Stage Society he took a daring leap on to the regular stage by engaging, with C. E. Vedrenne as business partner, the Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square. By doing so he proved that the plays of Bernard Shaw had immense popular and, as a natural outcome, financial possibilities of success; that it was also possible, within certain limits, to run a repertory theatre, and, perhaps most important of all, that we had a growing native school of modern dramatists of power and distinction. This new school included John Galsworthy, St John Hankin, John Masefield, Frederick Fenn, and Granville Barker himself, whose play, _The Voysey Inheritance_, stands among the finest products of the dramatic renaissance. These plays have since been performed, along with others which follow in the new tradition, at modern repertory theatres in Glasgow, Manchester and Liverpool, and by touring companies appealing to just such audiences as the men of the Nineties desired to create.

The development of the movement on the regular stage as patronised by the average playgoer is not so marked. But even here the new spirit has had its effect, for though melodrama, facetious comedy and musical farce still maintain preposterously long “runs,” showing that their place, as it is bound to be, is as secure as ever, it is no longer impossible to find intelligent entertainment at any time of the year in one or another of the London theatres. The higher dramatic activity born in the last decade of the old century has lived thus far into the new, justifying the energy which supported its inception.