The Press Saturday, November 1, 1924. The Drama and Life.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18219, 1 November 1924, Page 14

The Press Saturday, November 1, 1924. The Drama and Life.

It is a refreshing sign of sanity when a critic can publicly admit that there are many other things in life than the art in which he specialises. For there is a strong temptation for the critic to be narrow, to interpret life in terms of his art, forgetting that art is only part of life, and that the greatest of arts is the art of living. Some critics tend to be absorbed in books, others in pictures, others in music, and are disposed to cast into the outer darkness those who do not appreciate their j favourite workers in theso arts. When, therefore, we find Mr James Agate, a i young, capable, and very enthusiastic' dramatic critic in London, remarking that "the tlieatro is a good thing in its "way," and that the fact that in Britain only a very small percentage of the people care for serious drama gives no reason to despair of the country—when wo find Mr Agate saying this and adding that if ho observes the average Englishman losing his interest in motor cycles and pining for blank-verse tragedies about Beowulf ho will begin to be anxious, some notice should be taken of this detachment. Mr Agate is criticising a book on the. theatre by another man of common sense and vigorous utterance, Mr St. John Ervine, but if we may judge from the paraphrase this critic of a critic has made, Mr Ervine's zeal this time has to some extent run away with his judgment. Mr Ervine is pleading for more encouragement for the serious drama, and advocates the establishment of a chain of repertory theatres. He censures England for preferring so greatly comedy to tragedy, and seems to regard this as a sign of decadence. As Mr Agate' paraphrases his argument breezily, "a race which does not take "its theatre seriously is going to the "devil." Mr Agate, replying sympathetically to a fine mind that is serving the drama so well, says some unconventional things about the old drama and its publics. This, bear in mind, is not a weary and rather "blase" critic like Mr Walkley, but a young man full of zest for the theatre. "The truth is "that Mr Ervino's generalisations arc "made up of pitfalls, and that he attaches far too much importance to "the theatre. To my mind it seems "probable that the old Greeks and "Elizabethans purged themselves with "terror and pity largely for want of "other diversions. What else was there "to do in the summer evenings of "Shakespeare's time? Archery had "gone out, there were not enough bears "to make baiting a continuous spec"tacle, cricket and football had not "been invented, books were non-exist- '' ent or few. So the youth of the country flocked to the theatre for the want "of anything else." To-day, all is changed. There are scores of thingsgames, politics, sociology, mechanical inventions —to engage the attention. There is surely at least a strong whiff of common-sense in all this. We may waive the question of the Greeks, merely remarking that they were an exceptional community, small and based on slave labour. But what was the proportion of Elizabethans who cared for Shakespeare and his great contemporaries? Was it as great as the proportion of English people who care for tragedy to-day? It would be interesting if we could get a few thousand Elizabethans gathered in London to-day and see what they chose for amusement. I Is it certain that the majority would prefer Shakespeare to revues? The argument that thero is a connexion between great drama and national greatness does not lead very far. Rome was not strong in drama, but only an extreme pacifist would deny her greatness. Britain's greatest dramatic period coincided with her struggle with Spain, but what drama had she when she defeated Napoleon? The splendid expansion of the Empire in the nineteenth century, including the development of self-government oversea, was set in a period glorious for every kind of literature except drama. Indeed, for the greater part of Victoria's reigu, English drama was almost negligible. On the other hand, in the years before the supreme test of the Great War, there was a renaissance in drama unequalled by anything since the Elizabethan period. We are uot arguing that fine drama, and especially tragedy, has little value. On the contrary we have in this column emphasised its intellectual, emotional, ami moral importance. We quote Mr Agate as ;i corrective. He doubts whether one per cent, of the people in England take a< si-riotis interest in literature and art, and he refuses to believe thnt "the moral of a country "depends upon the mental attitude "of one per cent, of its population." The truth is that compared with some other peoples, the EngliHh have not :i highly developed sense of the theatre. But for the Puritans they would pro bably have more, but then they would not have other tliinys, derived from the

Puritans- By all means let Mr Ervinc and other enthusiasts fight the good fight for Letter drama. England -would l.c .ill the better for a rational theatre, and a chain of repertory theatres managed by sensible idealists. All that Mr Agate asks English people to do is to preserve n sense of proportion, and uot to think that because the population does not 'flock to Shakespeare, it is on the downward slope of decadence.

The British General Election. That the Conservatives would make substantial gains at the general election in Britain on Wednesday was admitted in the forecasts made by the rival parties, but nobody, nob even the most sanguine Conservative, can have expected such a sweeping victory as we record to-day. At the general election in January 1900 the Liberal Party obtained a clear majority (387 out of 670 seats) which the Irish and Labour parties (with 123 seats between them) made an overwhelming majority (">l2) over the 158 Conservatives and I'nionists in opposition. The Irish vote is no longer a factor, and i, L fl House of 61-1 members the Conservatives have won between 410 and 420 seats. They have thus a solid majority of more than 200 over the combined forces opposed to them. A majority of the people of this Dominion will be exceedingly glad of this result. In the first place the problems which confront Great Britain in domestic, Imperial, aud foreign affairs are so difficult that it is a comfort to know that the handling of them will be undertaken by a party with a far wider and deeper experience of the practical work of government than the Labour Party's. The present is almost as bad a time as could be imagined for the continued operation of a Government composed of viewy doctrinaires and subjected to the constant pressure of reckless and impatient extremists. It is doubtful wlictlior the Zinovieff letter or the Campbell ease were decisive factors in the Conservative victory, although they must have assisted to emphasise the fact, already recognised by the electorate, that Labour in office was a dangerous and undependafble servant. It may turn out that the number of votes given to Labour candidate's has not greatly decreased since the last poll -the decrease in the number of Labour members, from 191 to about 150, though substantial, is not enormous—but the voting as a whole shows that the electorate had very firmly resolved that Labour had been found wanting after a very fair trial. The most striking line in the. figures is that which measures the fearful disaster that has overtaken the Libeial Party. At the last, poll the Party was forced into the bottom place, but even then it won 158 seats. To-day its members in the House number less than two score. For all practical purposes it is wiped out; it no longer exists in the House,."at any rate, as an effective force. That something like this was certain to happen to the Liberals most people who have followed the development of political thought fully expected. The electors saw that the Bupreme need was to avert the menace of a Socialist Government and the grave evils it would inflict upon the country, and they saw nothing in the Liberal Party which offered any guarantee that it could gi v ° the country the necessary protection. They could not see that the Liberals stood for any principles which .mattered in the real conflict of political opinions. The country recognised, in short, that it had to face a challenge'from Socialism, and in the presence of this issue it could -not recognise the utility of any so-called "middle" party. The challengo of the Revolutionary Socialists to moderate men of progressive outlook is the issue which must be faced in New Zealand at the next poll, and nothing is more certain than that if the Liberal Party persists in going before the electors it will meet with the disaster that has overtaken the middle party in Britain.