INVERCARGILL D.L.F. LITERARY AND DEBATING CLUB.

Otago Witness, Issue 2928, 27 April 1910, Page 85

INVERCARGILL D.L.F. LITERARY AND DEBATING CLUB.

Motto " Excelsior."

The weekly meeting of the club was held in the Y.M.C.A. rooms, Tay street, on Wednesday evening, the 29th inst., at the usual hour, Shasta occupying the cha-ir. There was a fair attendance of members, and also a few visitors, who were cordially welcomed by Shasta on behalf of the club. The visitors included Audlem’s Pride, Cornstalk (a writer of four years’ standing), Sylvia, Esther, Bernecia, Pi-ri-pi, Bret Harte, and also a grown-up young lady, unfortunately not a D.L.E., whose smile endeared her at once to the boys in the back seat. The election of a Social Committee was then proceeded with, resulting in Lola, Midgie, and Casino being selected to assist Shasta and Lavengro in the organising 'of this impoirttant D.L.F. event. Pafceha was also 'appointed country members’ representative, vice Mother’s Help, resigned. This business being over the debate was opened by Shasta reading her paper on. the affirmative side. The question at issue .was; “ Does the Modern Theatre Exercise a Wholesome Influence on the Community?” S'hasta’s paper was, as usual, brilliantly written, and apparently left the other side without a solitary argument. Lola led for the negative, and although fighting against public opinion, she put up a first-olass paper. Midgie followed with an admirable impromptu speech in favour of the theatre, while Iris came next with a splendid paper containing some very telling arguments on Lola’s side. The only other paper was The Helmsman’s (affirmative), which was read very nervously from the secretary’s chair. All the other members had something to say cin the subject, the result being r majority of 9 to 3 in favour of the drama. THE HELMSMAN, Acting Secretary. EXTRACTS. “ To see a clever play cleverly acted is to enjoy one of the meet delightful spectacles our dull old planet has to offer. Perhaps it might be said that we could derive as much pleasure from reading the clever play at home. Not -a hit of it. I read and reread ‘ As You Like It,’ hut the play did ncit begin to live until I saw it acted. To see coy Rosalind, the romantic and slow Orlandd, the faithful Adam, the melancholy Jacques, and all the rest playing their parts in the forest of Arden is a very different thing from reading the play. We can all gain enormously by an intelligent appreciation of the drama, and for my own part I only wish I had more opportunities of coming under the wholesome influence cl the theatre!”—Shasta. “Why do people go to see the play? Is it not for much the same reason as we look in, the glass to see what manner ctf people we are ? The great majority do not go to the theatre to be influenced; they go to enjoy a hearty laugh, to have their emotions stirred. Again, a certain class go toi see the popular actors and actresses, no matter what the play may be; and what is more curious, every company has its own followers. Some go to see the fashion, but only one in a hundred go' to bs instructed or inspired.”— Lola. “ Take the tiny children who take part in the pantomimes. Night after night they are on the stage till all hours, when they would derive much more benefit from, being in their beds. The plays that people patronise mostly nowadays are not the ones that we would derive the most benefit from It is seldom now that you hear the remark passed, ‘ The herq was such a grand character; he leads the kind of life we should all strive to do.’ But it is the very opposite: the comic actor is the one we discuss most. ‘He was really so very good!’ ” —lris. “ It may not be generally known that an official censor is employed by the British Government to carefully read and judge every play before it can be offered to any manager for production, so that there is little or no ohanoe of plays of an objectionable nature ever reaching the stage. Regarding Shakespeare I must admit that I have net seen enough of the plays to criticise them, hut considering that half my life has been spent in camps ‘at the west of sunset side,’ I could be scarcely expected to take a great interest in the higher forms of drama. I have worked with many brokendown actors froc the Old Country—’Varsity men, —‘ men who would have moulded nations if it were not for the drink, but among them all, even the most confirmed pessimists, I have never met one who considered that the theatre had anything but an elevating effect on the public.”—Helmsman.