The (almost really) Complete Works of Lewis Carroll

To the Editor of the St. James’s Gazette

Sir,—There is a large class of the British Public who attend theatres and take an intelligent interest in plays, keenly enjoying all the good they find in them, and resenting with equal keenness all that is bad or even worthless. There is another class, who abstain from them on account of the evils they find associated with them, but who regard those evils as being accidental rather than essential, and as robbing the Stage of that influence for good which it might otherwise exercise on Society. And there is yet a third class, who neither attend theatres nor believe in the possibility of raising the Stage to the position of an educator of Society; but who would gladly recognize in it, if only it could be freed from its attendant evils, a source of innocent amusement for the many who find recreation of one kind or another necessary for their mental and bodily health.

To these three classes of your readers I desire, with your kind permission, to say a word. I do not propose, within the narrow limits of this letter, to address even a word to those who regard the Stage as essentially evil; nor to those who view its evils with indifference, or even with relish, and for whom impurity and profanity have more attraction than good acting.

An effort is being made to set on foot in England an institution somewhat similar to the Conservatoire in Paris, where actors and actresses may receive a thorough and systematic education. The proposed “Dramatic School of Art” has the sympathy and support of the leading members of the dramatic profession—I content myself with instancing the honoured names of Mrs. Kendal and Mr. Irving—but, unless well supported by the general public, it has, I fear, but little chance of gaining a sure foot-hold and becoming a permanent institution.

I need not dwell on the many adventages that would result to all—players and playgoers alike—if the Stage were supplied with competent and trained performers instead of the tyros whom managers must often accept for want of better material; but it may be worth while to recall one or two of the “thousand natural shocks” that the playgoer is “heir to,” owing to the players’ want of training. I will take three instances only—faults in elocution, in rendering the text of the play, and in “business” (the action of a play, as distinct from the words).

How often we find a pointed and witty dialogue entirely thrown away by the words being so ill-pronounced that only half the audience can hear them, while the unlucky holder of a back stall or of a seat in the second row of the dress-circle feels like a deaf man at a dinner-party, at once tantalized by the unmeaning fragments that reach his ear and exasperated by the laughter of those who have caught the joke! How often, again, do speakers of all sorts—players, preachers, and others—forget that, as the strength of a chain is that of its weakest link, so the audibility of a sentence is that of its least audible portion. Each fresh paragraph they begin in a clear resonant voice; but with the approach of the full-stop the sound dies away, and the last few words are pronounced sotto voce, giving the sentence all the vagueness, but, alas! none of the beauty, of a vignette. I have heard a clergyman so give out the Banns of Marriage that the most eager listener could learn no more than that two human beings proposed to commit matrimony; their names remained an unfathomable mystery. Let any visitor at the Lyceum listen to Miss Ellen Terry, and then try to realize what a rich treat a play would be if the other players had but half of her marvellous powers of elocution!

What a differance it makes if the speaker, as was once amusingly depicted by Punch, calmly announces himself with

And when a repartee is to be delivered, how agonizing it is, instead of being allowed to watch the mental process of the speaker—first grasping the meaning of the words that lead up to it, and then, after a moment’s pause, suddenly lighting on the happy thought—to see that the reply is as ready as an answer in a catechism, and is begun before the other speaker has well got the words out of his mouth!

How much good and appropriate “business” would add to our enjoyment of a play we can hardly realize till we get it. For want of it we are for ever being disillusionized, and dragged back out of the realms of fancy into common life, and our “sweet dream” falls “into nothing.”

But I must not trespass on your space by dwelling further on a subject of ever-widening area. Let me simply say, in conclusion, that it is only as an outsider and an amateur that I plead the cause of the Dramatic School. I am unconnected with its promoters, and it is by no suggestion of theirs that I have written this letter; but I feel that the work is a good one, that it deserves support and encouragement, and that every one who wishes well to the Stage should do what he can. Suppose every one of the thousands who crowd our theatres were just for once to deny himself (oh! almost superhuman effort of self-sacrifice!) one single visit he had projected to the play, and to give the value of his ticket to the fund, the future of the new School would indeed be nobly provided for. This, of course, is not to be expected; yet surely in the three classes I named at the opening of this letter enough may be found who are capable of taking a not entirely selfish view of this matter, and willing to give something without expecting a quid pro quo.

The treasurer of the fund is Mr. Cecil Raleigh, of 35, York Street, Portman Square; the bankers are Messrs. Robarts, Lubbock, and Co., of 15, Lombard Street, E.C. Need I say more?—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

March 6, 1882

To the Editor of the St. James’s Gazette

Sir,—The letter of mine, which you published on the 27th of February under the above title, having elicted two replies, one friendly to the scheme and one hostile, in your paper on the 2nd of March, I shall be grateful if you will let me say a few words in reply.

Both writers seem to me to suggest for the projected “Dramatic School of Art” work which lies outside its proper sphere of action. “Sir Charles Young” holds that “one of the most effectual and practical steps they can take at the outset is to use their best endeavours to dissipate what still remains of the notion that to ‘go upon the stage’ is, for educated ladies and gentlemen, a proceeding highly derogatory to their social position.” The new School will, I trust, do much indirectly to dissipate such a notion; but, since those who hold it are little likely to offer themselves as students, it cannot reasonably hope to exert any direct influence in this matter. “Spectator” finds that the committee, “as far as he can make out” (an amount we have no data to determine) is “mainly composed of fashionable dilettanti.” He adds, “I never knew any case in which the interference of dilettanti was productive of much good to the British drama.” Even if he were right (which is open to question) as to the character of the committee it surely is not a necessary sequence that the teaching staff of the School should be also dilettanti? Yet this sequence is indispensible to his argument. He concludes with these words: “How Lewis Carroll’s friends intend to supply the requisites at which I have hinted I do not understand; and until I see that they are trying to do so, and have some fair chance of success, they will not draw a sixpence from my pocket.” Is it not a little premature thus to raise the question how the committee (whom I cannot presume to call my “friends,” not having the honor of their personal acquaintance) “intend to supply” these requisites, without first settling whether they do intend it? The requisites are as follows:—“As to those who seek to study the actor’s art, two things are essential to success in such a pursuit—first, the adventage of discriminating applause and censure; next the opportunity for frequent variety in the impersonations which they undertake.” Surely the only institutions which can supply these “requisites” are a school for audiences and a school for managers. Such schools are not as yet projected; when they are, their promoters may cheer themselves with the hope of sharing the donation so generously offered by “Spectator.”

Is it not a little hard on the new “School” to assign to it functions it has never assumed, and then take its friends to task because it fails to fulfil them? You might just as well find fault with Jumbo for not having secured himself against expatriation by taking his seat in the House of Commons.—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,