Glogowski calmed himself, gazed around a moment and began drinking his tea.
Majkowska was listening silently, while Mimi, stretched out on
Wawrzecki's overcoat, was fast asleep.
Janina was serving tea to all and did not lose a word of that conversation. She had already forgotten about Grzesikiewicz, about her father, and about her talk with Kotlicki, and was entirely engrossed by the questions that were now being discussed, while Topolski's dreams fascinated her by their fantasies. Such general discussions on art and artistic subjects absorbed her entirely.
"What about your dramatic society?" she asked Topolski who was just raising his head.
"It will be . . . it must be formed!" answered Topolski.
"I warrant you it will be," interposed Kotlicki, "not the kind that Topolski desires but that which will be the best within the bounds of possibility. It will even be possible to introduce certain improvements by way of variety and attraction, but we shall leave the reformation of the theater to someone else; for that you would need hundreds of thousands of rubles and you would have to start it in Paris."
"The reformation of the theater will not originate with the managers, and as for dramatic creativity, what is it really? . . . The seeking of something in the dark, a dog-like scenting about, an aimless straying, or the antics of a flea. A genius must arrive to revolutionize the modern theater; I already have a feeling that one is coming . . ." asserted Glogowski.
"How is that? . . . Aren't the existing masterpieces of the drama sufficient for creating an ideal theater?" queried Janina.
"No . . . those masterpieces belong to the past; we need other works. For us those masterpieces are a very important archeology," answered Glogowski.
"So in your estimation Shakespeare is antiquated?"