A NOTABLE HISTRIONIC EVENT.

North Otago Times, 16 November 1912, Page 2

A NOTABLE HISTRIONIC EVENT.

| The opportunity ol witnessing the representation of cno of the works i of Shakespeare, ths greatest dramaI tist and post of our tongue, is of I so rare an occurrence as to become i an event worthy of mors than orI dinary attention, We need not, therefore, make any apology for referring in this columi) t B - the I coming presentation! OS "Othello", by the Oscar Asohe-Lily Brayton Company. It is now some thirty years! since that tragedy was last performed in Oamaru, and since then, only two ottos Bbak«spearefs great Imasterpiiecds have been placed upon the stage in Oamaru, There are reasons beyond the •change in popular taste to account for the rarity of the presentation of works by the great master. The very greatness of the works themselves, the- power and intensity of the passions delineated by the mastterKand, and the elegance of the ihlan'c verse in which the wor!:s of Shakespeare .are written make demands upon their exponents that can only v b'e met by artists of the highest rank; ard. therefore, It is only .whrn such artists as Mr Oscar Asche and Miss Lily Brayton do us the honor of paying "us a visit, bcccrr pf nifd by specially , chosen assoelates, that we can hope to see

adequately 1 staged works by the greatest of dramatists that our nation has produced, •'•'Othello" ' is j not, perhaps, for the student the , most attractive oil Shakespeate's , tragedies, But, with the exception of "King Lear," it is unequalled by any other in the delineation of the sublime energy of passion, and in no other of . his works has Shakespeare' presented a 'diversity pi character so pronounced, and yet so true, to nature, as in "Othello," The contrast between Othello and lago is as complete as the imagination could conceive, and| yet both are skilfully drawn. On the one hand there is the Moor amiable, brave, generous and trustful until the poison of insinuation insidiously dropped by lago' transforms the philosophic mind as .Othello becomes seized of the maddening conviction of his wife's treaohery ■apdshame, and all the' fierce passions latent in his soul break out. On the other side of the picture is lago, ambitious, scheming, cunning, relentless, without a single redeeming virtue, the very incarnation cl evil. In C Desdeniona weh ave probably the best type of woman presented 'by; Shakespeare—a 'generous, romantic girl, the embodiment of womanly gentleness and tenderness. And so through the whole range ot characters that figure in the tragedy. It Is, indeed, a tragdy, the true richness of which can only he realised' when presented by a company composed! of scholarly artists, such as 'that to foe seen here next week." In Othello Mr Asehe is said to reach his highest level, and it is moreover alleged ibhat today no greater exponent of the character adorns the stage, Thus, then, we have under promise a great intellectual feast, such as somes rarely to small communities remote from the centre of dramatic art.