THE STAGE'S FUNCTION.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 336, 24 October 1908, Page 12

THE STAGE'S FUNCTION.

Oil the occasion 6f the visit of the British Association to the Abbey Theatre, Mr. W. B. Yeats delivered fioffi tho stage an address on the aims of the Irish National Theatre. Some years ago (he said) a group of Irish writers, among ( whom were Lady Gregory alid Myself, nfifocing that the Irish people eared more for oratory than for reading- (for a nation only domes slowly to the reading habit),' resolved to express ourselves through a theatre. At first we brought over English actors, because there was no Irish company in existence, but there was always something iiifcbugruous between Irish words and an English voice and accent. Presently, with the help of a tfery able actor, who has lately left us, an electric light fitter, by occupation* We got together a grdup of young mon and young Wonlen hero in Dublin, who were pre> prepared to givo their entire leisure to tho creation of an Irish theatre. They Worked for their'living during the day and for their art during tho evening. At first W<i played in little inconvenient halls, but after a few years a generous friend gave Ms tho nSo of this thoatrq, and, finding that our people wore becoming overworked, gave us enough money to free them from thoir shops and offices. In this way ( quite apart from the traditions ef tho ordinary theatre. We have built up an art of acting which is perhaps peculiar to oUrselvea. Our players, instead of specialising,'.as most actors do, to represent tho life 6t the drawing-room, which is the Sniiie all over the world, have cbncelitrated themselves upon the representation of what is hiost characteristic in ono nation. I think I can say with perfect sincerity that until our- people learnt their business what is most characteristic in .Irish life had never been set upon the stage at all. i doubt if tho Irish accent bad over been accurately Spoken there, In' rehearsing our plays We have tried to give the Words great importance, to make spcecli, whether it be the beautiful and rhythmical delivery of verse or the accurate speaking of a rhythmical dialect, our supreme end. Almost all our, playwrights in the -same ,w»v. £iye .to .tho yividacaa an 4

picturosquenoss of theif style a principal consideration. We believe that words are moro : important than 'gesture, that voico is the principal po\veV iIU actor possosseß, alld that nothing 'may diStrhbt from thti hctor and what lib says wo have greatly simplified scenery. Wheli fre wish to give n remote poetical blfect Wis tlirdw atfay realism altogether and. ate Content with sUggestibll. This is the idea of the Japanese in tlioif drsil- - Srt. They helibVo that artificial objects—the interior) let us say, of sohie Modern hoUse—should be perfectly copied, because ft peifcct copy is possible, but tliht when yoit get to sea and sl;y you should blily suggeat) alld when they wish to suggest a sea they iil-0 bblitbnt tb put before .you merely a pattern of \vaveS. Gbod realistic : scenery is merely bad landscape painting—an attempt tb do something \vliicn_ can ohly be done properly in an easel painting* But if yoti aro content to decorate the stage, to BUggest, you create something which is peculiar to the stage, • for you put before your audience a sbfthe that only wakes into lifo when the actors more in front of it. Any of you Who have heard of us at all ■will have heard how a year jind a half ago some hundreds'of police were called out to quell a riot over one of oilf plays. We brought that play to London/ and a little while before we produced it there we received a letter frotii your Ceilsor (We have no official censor in Ireland) Saying that as the play, though harmless in itself, was likely to raise a riot, ho was colisftltiiig tho Homo Office as to whether it should bo forbidden. Now your English Censor is "a very much worse person than our Irish censors are, for .Vour man has got thfe police on his side. However, actors and authors consulted together, and .after calculating ways ' and means ajid raising suffifcieht Capital We. decided, if hecOsgiiry, to give an illegal performance in London afid all go to prison However, the Homfe Office had tilore sanity ithan the Censon ahd Wo Wefe allowed to give 6Uf play, Which Was taken very peaceably. When I wafi coming up in the train the other day ftohi Galway I began thinking how unlike yolir work was to my work, and then suddenly it strubk me that it Was all the same. A picture arose before my mind's oye. I saw Adftm numbering the creatures of Eden; soft aud terrible, foul and fair, they all went before him. That, I thought, is the man of science, naming ahd numbering for. our understanding everything in tho world. But/theh, I thought, We writers, do we not also nuniher and desoribe, though with a difference? You are chiefly busy With the, exterior world and wo With the interior. Science understands that everything must bo known in the wbfld our eyes look at. There is nothing t6o obscurfe, too COlhraoll, tob Vile tb bb thb. slihjbct of knowledge. When a mail of 6'cioneo disoovors a new speeibs w a hew lav, yoft do not ask the value bf thb la# br thb value bf th 6 species hbfbfe yon do him honour. You leave all that ta tho judgment bf the generations. It is fbr pride that ill you thb human race contemplates all thifigs With so pure, sb disinterested an eyethat it forgets its own lifeccssitibs ahd •inhrihities, all its hopes and fears, in thb cbfitemplatibii bf truth fof tile sake of truth, reality fbr thb sake of reality. Oil : the other hand, our Adams are bf a different Eden, a more terrible Eden, perhaps, for we must name and number thb passions and motives of men. There, too, everything must be known, everything urtdbr- - stood, everything exposed. There, alsb, there is nothing common, nothing unclean. Every .motive must be followed through. All tho obscure mystery of illogical mankind ihuSt be Se&n and understood, ill every possible '.circumstances, in every conceivable Situation. ; There is no laughter tbo bitter, no irony tob r harsh for utterance, no passion tob tewihlb ,to he Set before the minds of' men, ihe I Greeks knew that billy in this way can mankind be Understood. Only when we have put ourselves in all the positions bf life, frem the most miserable to those that aro So lefty that wo can. only Speak of them in symbbls and in mysteries) -will entire wisidbhl be possible. All wise government depends upon this knowledge not less than ; upon that other knowledge which is your business, rather than ours, and we and you alike rejoice ill battle, finding the sweetest bf all musib to he stroko of the sword. . ■«-