Emphasis, as in these three instances, may come on some detail—handkerchief, fan, libretto—which is to be made important later in the development of the plot. It may come within a scene or act, or at the end of either to emphasize a part or the whole of the scene or act. The soliloquies of Iago referred to on page 183 are of this sort. Emphasis may stress little by little or with one blow what the play means. The significance of the whole play Strife—the utter uselessness of the conflict chronicled—is thus emphasized in the last lines of the play:
Harness. A woman dead; and the two best men both broken!
Tench. (Staring at him—suddenly excited.) D’you know, sir—these terms, they’re the very same we drew up together, you and I, and put to both sides before the fight began? All this—all this—and—and what for?
Harness. (In a slow, grim voice.) That’s where the fun comes in!
(Underwood without turning from the door makes a gesture of assent.)
The curtain falls[26]
The Second Mrs. Tanqueray[27] illustrates the play in which emphasis little by little brings out the meaning of the whole piece. Examine even the first act. It is full of the feeling: “It cannot nor it will not come to good.” Tanqueray himself says frankly, “My marriage is not even the conventional sort of marriage likely to satisfy society.” Drummle coming in declares that George Orreyed is “a thing of the past,” because he has married Mabel Hervey. The group of old friends show anxiety, and it is clear that to the mind of Cayley Drummle Tanqueray is but repeating the rash step of Orreyed. The whole act prepares for the finale of the play.
Hervieu’s The Trail of the Torch shows the emphasis which strikes one hard blow and leaves to the rest of the play illustration of what has been clearly stressed. About one third of the way through Act I, Maravon explains to Sabine the thesis which the entire play illustrates:
Sabine. (Pointing to the two who have just gone.) Ah, my dear Maravon, what an absurd friend I have there!
Maravon. Mme. Gribert, you mean?