In the past half-century the men of letters of our language have seen a great light. They have no contempt for the dramatic patterns of approved popularity; and of these there are now a great many, suitable for every purpose and adjustable to every need. They have found out how to be theatrically effective without ceasing to be literary in the best sense of the word,—that is to say, they are not relying on “fine writing” but on clear thinking and on the honest presentation of human nature, as they severally see it.
(1921)
VI
DID SHAKSPERE WRITE PLAYS TO FIT HIS ACTORS?
VI
DID SHAKSPERE WRITE PLAYS TO FIT HIS ACTORS?
I
In his consideration of the organization of the Elizabethan dramatic companies Professor Alwin Thaler pointed out that the company of the Globe Theater in London, to which Shakspere belonged, continued to contain the same actors year after year, the secessions and the accessions being few and far between; and he explained that this was “because its members were bound to one another by ties of devoted personal friendship.” He noted that he had “emphasized the influence exerted upon Shakspere the playwright by his intimate knowledge of the men for whom his work was written, and there can be no doubt that in working out some of his greatest characters he must have remembered that Burbage was to act them.” Then Professor Thaler filed a caveat, so to speak.
But the Shakspere muse was not of that sorry sort which produces made-to-order garments to fit the tastes and idiosyncrasies of a single star. Far from being one-man plays, the dramas were written for a great company of actors.... And Richard Burbage, I imagine, would have had little inclination to surrender his place among his peers for the artificial and idolatrous solitude of modern starhood.