Lately the telephone, the stenographer, and most recently the dictaphone have seemed to puzzled dramatists the swift road to successful initial exposition. To all these human or unhuman aids some overburdened soul has felt free to say anything the audience might need to hear. Probably this use of the telephone has come to stay, for daily there is proof that nothing is too intimate for it. There are, however, more ambitious workers who, weary of servants, confidants, telephones, stenographers, and dictaphones, want to set forth necessary information so naturally that no one may question whether it might have come out in this way. Also, they want the information to be so interestingly conveyed that an auditor thinks of what is happening rather than merely of the facts.
In the first act of The Second Mrs. Tanqueray,[13] the audience must hear a narrative setting forth Aubrey Tanqueray’s position in society, his first marriage, his relations with his daughter, and the nature of his proposed second marriage. What complicates the task is that the narrative must be told to old friends, so that much of it is to them well known. What device will make the narrative, under the circumstances, plausible? Here is where a modern dramatist sighs for the serviceable heralds, messengers, and chorus of plays of decades long past or for the freer methods in narrative of the novelist. How easy to tell much of this in your own person, as have Thackeray or Meredith, in comparison with stating it through another so placed that he will be glad to hear again much which he already knows! The necessity creates with Sir Arthur the device of the little supper party in Aubrey Tanqueray’s chambers in the Albany, to which he has invited four of his oldest friends. The moment chosen for the opening of the play is when the old friends, over the coffee, fall quite naturally into reminiscent vein. What helps to freer exposition is their chance to talk of Cayley Drummle, who, even yet, though bidden, has not appeared. Before the chat is over and Cayley enters, much needed information is in the minds of the audience. Cayley brings news of a terrible mésalliance in a family known to all the supper party. In his efforts to advise and comfort the distracted mother he has been kept from the meeting of old friends. The news leads Aubrey Tanqueray to avow his quixotic scheme for a second marriage. Through the contrasting comments of the friends, even through their reservations, the audience becomes perfectly informed as to the view the world will take of this second marriage. Indeed, as the supper party breaks up, all the audience requires in order to listen intelligently to the succeeding acts, is a chance to see Paula herself. Her impulsive visit to Tanqueray, just after the supper party ends, provides the information needed, for in it her character is sketched in broadly as it will be filled out in detail in the succeeding acts. Evidently device, the ingenious discovery of a plausible reason for exposition necessary in a play, is basal in the best stage narrative. Without it, character is sacrificed to mere necessary exposition; with it, the spectator, absorbed by incident or characterization, learns unconsciously that without which he cannot intelligently and sympathetically follow the story of the play. In other words, successful discovery of devices for such exposition clearly means that disguising which is essential to the best narrative in drama.
The first quality of good expository device is clearness. Secondly, it should be an adequate reason for the exposition it contains: i.e., it must seem natural that the facts should come out in this way. Thirdly, and of the utmost importance, the device must be something so interesting in itself as to hold the attention of an auditor while necessary facts are insinuated into his mind. Lastly, the device should permit this preliminary exposition to be given swiftly. It is hard to conceal exposition as such if the movement is as slow as in the first two scenes of Act I of The Journey of Papa Perrichon.
ACT I
The Lyons railway station at Paris. At the back, a turn-stile opening on the waiting-rooms. At the back, right, a ticket window. At the back, left, benches, a cake vender; at the left, a book stall.
SCENE 1. Majorin, A Railway Official, Travelers, Porters
Majorin. (Walking about impatiently.) Still this Perrichon doesn’t come! Already I’ve waited an hour.... Certainly it is today that he is to set out for Switzerland with his wife and daughter. (Bitterly.) Carriage builders who go to Switzerland! Carriage builders who have forty thousand pounds a year income! Carriage builders who keep their carriages! What times these are! While I,—I am earning two thousand four hundred francs ... a clerk, hard-working, intelligent, always bent over his desk.... Today I asked for leave ... I said it was my day for guard duty.... It is absolutely necessary that I see Perrichon before his departure.... I want to ask him to advance me my quarter’s salary.... Six hundred francs! He is going to put on his patronizing air ... make himself important ... a carriage builder! It’s a shame! Still he doesn’t come! One would say that he did it on purpose! (Addressing a porter who passes, followed by travelers.) Monsieur, at what time does the train start for Lyons?
Porter. (Brusquely.) Ask the official. (He goes out at the left.)
Majorin. Thanks ... clodhopper! (Addressing the official who is near the ticket window.) Monsieur, at what time does the through train start for Lyons?
The Official. (Brusquely.) That doesn’t concern me! Look at the poster. (He points to a poster in the left wings.)