Liebeler
box 11/2
5. Ann
It is scarceiy to be hoped that Arthur
Schnitzler’s Liebelei,“ which was pro¬
duced by private effort at the Berkeley
Lyceum Theatre, will find its way tothe
regular stage, but the piece is none the less
to be welcomed on general grounds as the
best work of the leader of the modern
Austrian dramatists, and in particular
as bringing to us a perfume from the sen¬
suous gayety of Vienna—a perfume that
inthe end becomes a pang.
A realist Schnitzler is, but with none of
the broad love of life of the modern school
that centres in Berlin, none of the stark
will that has given form tothe Northern
drama. True successor to Grillparzer and
Bauernfeld, what interests him is the poetry
and the humor of moods, the outward
texture of life, shot through like a change¬
able silk with fine lights and soft shadows.
Life is a waltz by the blue Danube—what¬
ever the end of that waltz.
Always in Vienna there is a gay breath
of Paris—a breath that has taken on only
a partial odor of the soil in the many genera¬
tions of Austrian culture. This old violinist
of the theatre, whose sentimental tolerance
of the amorous pastimes of youth proved
bis daughter’s undoing, adds only a touch
of German dreaminess to the Gallie lust
of life. His misguided child might have
spent a lifetime singing
Plaisir d’amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d’amour dure toute la vie———.
except for a strain of the German passion
that leads to self-destruction.
Hans Wehring is poor. In yauth he was
too poortto give his sister a dowry, and in
age he is in the same situation as regards
his daughter. Inyouth he believed in vir¬
tue, and guarded his sister down the joyless
pathof her life to a dreary age and death.
The experience saddened him and made
him tender. He doubts the sterner morali¬
ties. Youth comes but once. Why should
not Cotherine taste of the natural joysofthe
senses, indulge the natural promptings of
her heart? When temptation comes he
knows it, but pretends not to know. She
falls in love with ayoung student and gives
herself up to him.
Butto him love is a pastime, and hetakes
up with Catherine only as a means of escape
from an amour that threatened to prove
dangerous. It does, in fact, become most
dangerous. The husband of his former mis¬
tress finds a package of letters, and kills
him in the inevitable duel. After he is dead
Christing learns the truth. She cannot go
to his funeral, thoughithe privilege is given
to mere friends. She cannot even goto his
grave without risk of there confronting the
dishonored wife. Chance seems to play a
part here. but sooner or later theaffair must
have come to just about this—the love of a.
woman’s lifetime sacrificed to a man's ca¬
price. With fine irony the author called this
play Caresses.“ To our more rigid moral¬
ity it is The Reckoning.“
For twoacts it seems rather familiar and
slight. The time is long past when sym¬
pathy can be aroused in the theatre over
Continental amours and duels. It is. I
think, a mistake in dramaturgy that the
story is told from the point of view of the
man, who is a very ordinary fellow at best.
It is only with the disclosure of the soul of
the old musician that the tragedy becomes
authentio and poignant. There are cases,
he makes us feel, in which virtue is
its only reward—a Barmecide feast that
brings starvation of the body and the sonl.
But the alternative? Would you choose to
grow lean and gray in purity, orto perish in
the flames of passion? It is a sentimental,
if yon will, an ummoral question, but Vienna
is the town of sentimental unmorals.
Hotikd Wemri
ven Miss anEr
Surprised Her Audience by Her
Strength of Feeling in The
Reckoning.“
-GENESEE OF THE HILLS' A
WESTERN DRAMA.
By FREDERIC EDWARD MCKAY.
There was a triumph at the Berkeley!
Lyceum theatre last night. It was
schieved by Katherine Grey. She actedl
the lending, role in The Reckoning,“ a
play from the German, with a variety'of
meaning, a restrained power, and, finally,
a series of bursts of feeling that surprised
even those most familiar with her abili¬
ties. Excellent player though she has
proven herseif, Miss Grer, never before
gave any demonstration.of.the full' scope
of her powers.
The gift of a girl’s first love, its pre¬
cions and undeviating quality, its fine
and subtle devotion—then the rude, vio¬
lent shattering of her faith throughithe
news that her Jover has been shot in a.
duel bg the husband of the woman with¬
whom the young man has had an Laf¬
fair''=that is what this three-act drama
mainly exploits.
It is a sad and somber theme, accentu¬
ating human weakness and. concluding
with the acconnt of a. funeral and its
attendant circumstances; and there is
scarcely any of that element of comedy:
reliet wüth which even the Juvenlle lov¬“
ers provide:! Camille.
Natual throughout, with moments of
unnsual strength,Teckoning.?
withont ang doubt, profoundly. impressed
the !’special' audience gathered tegether
last night. This was dueras much tosthe,
acting as to the plot andits development
by Arthur Schnitzler, its author. For,
though Mies Grey easily captured first:
honors, there was not a member of the
east of seven that uni nol play wich most
ccmmendable rationality—so that the
personages involved in the cast all took
on the semblance of actunl beings, each
actuated by separate motives.
The stage management and appoint¬
ments also helped toward the accomplish.
ment of ilusion. The first act, represent¬
ing a supper party of four, including
Fritz, the “hero“ (ohn Dean), Theodore.
Lis friend (Robert Conness), Christine
Wehring (Miss Grey), and Mitzf (Phylles
Rankin), a sophisticated little milliner,
is full of appropriate frivolous detail, re¬
lieved by the tokens ofthe whole-souled
love of Christine for the erring Eritz,
and later, in strenger contrast, by the¬
sidetracking of the party while the of¬
fended husband (Albert Brunning) calls
and issues the duel challengé.
The next two acts take place in the
humble home of Christine and her ven¬
e father (George Hlenry Trader), an¬
box 11/2
5. Ann
It is scarceiy to be hoped that Arthur
Schnitzler’s Liebelei,“ which was pro¬
duced by private effort at the Berkeley
Lyceum Theatre, will find its way tothe
regular stage, but the piece is none the less
to be welcomed on general grounds as the
best work of the leader of the modern
Austrian dramatists, and in particular
as bringing to us a perfume from the sen¬
suous gayety of Vienna—a perfume that
inthe end becomes a pang.
A realist Schnitzler is, but with none of
the broad love of life of the modern school
that centres in Berlin, none of the stark
will that has given form tothe Northern
drama. True successor to Grillparzer and
Bauernfeld, what interests him is the poetry
and the humor of moods, the outward
texture of life, shot through like a change¬
able silk with fine lights and soft shadows.
Life is a waltz by the blue Danube—what¬
ever the end of that waltz.
Always in Vienna there is a gay breath
of Paris—a breath that has taken on only
a partial odor of the soil in the many genera¬
tions of Austrian culture. This old violinist
of the theatre, whose sentimental tolerance
of the amorous pastimes of youth proved
bis daughter’s undoing, adds only a touch
of German dreaminess to the Gallie lust
of life. His misguided child might have
spent a lifetime singing
Plaisir d’amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d’amour dure toute la vie———.
except for a strain of the German passion
that leads to self-destruction.
Hans Wehring is poor. In yauth he was
too poortto give his sister a dowry, and in
age he is in the same situation as regards
his daughter. Inyouth he believed in vir¬
tue, and guarded his sister down the joyless
pathof her life to a dreary age and death.
The experience saddened him and made
him tender. He doubts the sterner morali¬
ties. Youth comes but once. Why should
not Cotherine taste of the natural joysofthe
senses, indulge the natural promptings of
her heart? When temptation comes he
knows it, but pretends not to know. She
falls in love with ayoung student and gives
herself up to him.
Butto him love is a pastime, and hetakes
up with Catherine only as a means of escape
from an amour that threatened to prove
dangerous. It does, in fact, become most
dangerous. The husband of his former mis¬
tress finds a package of letters, and kills
him in the inevitable duel. After he is dead
Christing learns the truth. She cannot go
to his funeral, thoughithe privilege is given
to mere friends. She cannot even goto his
grave without risk of there confronting the
dishonored wife. Chance seems to play a
part here. but sooner or later theaffair must
have come to just about this—the love of a.
woman’s lifetime sacrificed to a man's ca¬
price. With fine irony the author called this
play Caresses.“ To our more rigid moral¬
ity it is The Reckoning.“
For twoacts it seems rather familiar and
slight. The time is long past when sym¬
pathy can be aroused in the theatre over
Continental amours and duels. It is. I
think, a mistake in dramaturgy that the
story is told from the point of view of the
man, who is a very ordinary fellow at best.
It is only with the disclosure of the soul of
the old musician that the tragedy becomes
authentio and poignant. There are cases,
he makes us feel, in which virtue is
its only reward—a Barmecide feast that
brings starvation of the body and the sonl.
But the alternative? Would you choose to
grow lean and gray in purity, orto perish in
the flames of passion? It is a sentimental,
if yon will, an ummoral question, but Vienna
is the town of sentimental unmorals.
Hotikd Wemri
ven Miss anEr
Surprised Her Audience by Her
Strength of Feeling in The
Reckoning.“
-GENESEE OF THE HILLS' A
WESTERN DRAMA.
By FREDERIC EDWARD MCKAY.
There was a triumph at the Berkeley!
Lyceum theatre last night. It was
schieved by Katherine Grey. She actedl
the lending, role in The Reckoning,“ a
play from the German, with a variety'of
meaning, a restrained power, and, finally,
a series of bursts of feeling that surprised
even those most familiar with her abili¬
ties. Excellent player though she has
proven herseif, Miss Grer, never before
gave any demonstration.of.the full' scope
of her powers.
The gift of a girl’s first love, its pre¬
cions and undeviating quality, its fine
and subtle devotion—then the rude, vio¬
lent shattering of her faith throughithe
news that her Jover has been shot in a.
duel bg the husband of the woman with¬
whom the young man has had an Laf¬
fair''=that is what this three-act drama
mainly exploits.
It is a sad and somber theme, accentu¬
ating human weakness and. concluding
with the acconnt of a. funeral and its
attendant circumstances; and there is
scarcely any of that element of comedy:
reliet wüth which even the Juvenlle lov¬“
ers provide:! Camille.
Natual throughout, with moments of
unnsual strength,Teckoning.?
withont ang doubt, profoundly. impressed
the !’special' audience gathered tegether
last night. This was dueras much tosthe,
acting as to the plot andits development
by Arthur Schnitzler, its author. For,
though Mies Grey easily captured first:
honors, there was not a member of the
east of seven that uni nol play wich most
ccmmendable rationality—so that the
personages involved in the cast all took
on the semblance of actunl beings, each
actuated by separate motives.
The stage management and appoint¬
ments also helped toward the accomplish.
ment of ilusion. The first act, represent¬
ing a supper party of four, including
Fritz, the “hero“ (ohn Dean), Theodore.
Lis friend (Robert Conness), Christine
Wehring (Miss Grey), and Mitzf (Phylles
Rankin), a sophisticated little milliner,
is full of appropriate frivolous detail, re¬
lieved by the tokens ofthe whole-souled
love of Christine for the erring Eritz,
and later, in strenger contrast, by the¬
sidetracking of the party while the of¬
fended husband (Albert Brunning) calls
and issues the duel challengé.
The next two acts take place in the
humble home of Christine and her ven¬
e father (George Hlenry Trader), an¬