Liebelei
5. L
box 11/4
ence br the presentation of“ Light o' Lore,“ Nr. G. Valentine Williams’s
English version of Herr Arthur Schnitzler's“ Liebelei,“ given for the ürst
time gesterday alternoon at IIis Majestr’s Theatre, and to be repeated next
Tuesdar and Thursday afternoons. The play ocals with a subject which
is supposed, more than any other, to monopolise all dramatists —Love,
Unfortunately, however, our British dramatists scarcely ever deal with it
sincerelz. Mr. Barrie generally toys daintily with it; Mr. Shaw tackles it
scientiticall, and coolly as a sort of intellectual phenomenon; most of our
plapwrights treat it as no more than something rather pretty and decorative !
in a sentimental war. We have to go back two years for an English play
in which vne passiem ofa man and a woman was represented in anything
like its #atural power. That, ## was“ John Glayde’s Honour,’ and even
in that ihe lovers serined suddenly to cool and become ashaned in the last
few minutes of the last act.“ Light o' Love,?' on the other hand, deals
with the subject with a stark sincerity. We can casily credit the stor#
of the succees it has had in Austria; and we wish we could believe that a
plag so poignant and so sincere was sure of a similar success here. In this
countre the majority of playgoers are still content wath a superficial
handling of human nature. There is, however a rapidlv-growing bodv ol
London theatre-goers who are asking for Reality, and these should crowd
His Majesty's Theatre to the doors for the two remaining performances of
sthis perfectly simple play.
The storv of“ Light o’ Love“’ can be told in a sentence or two.A
voung girl, Christine Weiring, the daughter of a fiddier in a Viennese theatre
orchestra, falls in love with Fritz Lobheimer, a voung officer of agreeable
presence and manners. Unknown to her he has been carrying on a
liaison with the wife of a man of his own class, and the husband has dis¬
covered it, has challenged him to a duel, and he is killed. Christine hears
ofhis death and of the circumstances which have led ap to it; gradua'ly
realises the little part which, after all, she has played in nis life; and inshes
forth, torn with grief and shame, to destroy herself on his grave. That is
all.
Anvbody couk. have invented such a story, and no craftsmanship
was required in putting it together. But for all that“ Light o'Love? is
adramatic masterpiece, for there is not ; scene, and scarrely a line in st
rhät does not illuminate human character, and that hnas not the ring of
truth.
A Pakr FoR A GRkar ACTRESS.
The part of Christine is one that the greatest of actresses might be proud
to play. Her tenderness, her simplicitr, her beautv,-which is the admira¬
ti#m ofarrfy öile #acepi herselt, her absorption in the love that has come
to her, her readiness to give all, her gratitude for a smile or a soft tone,
her love of her father, from whom for the first time in her life-she finds
herself keepinga secrei, her belief in her lover, her gentle resentment at'
being outside so many of his interests and so much of his life--these and a¬
score of other characteristics help to compese one of those intensely real¬
üigures we onlv mect with now and then ir, the Theatre. As impersonated
gesterdar by Miss Margaret Halstan, it was simply exquisite—a little more
appealing perhaps in the less exacting scenes than in the denouement, wiien
theactress’s tragic powers were putto the severest test, and now and thenan
inflection ofthe voice secmnedto fall a little short of the note that was wanted,
but always beautiful, wistful, and inevitably stricken by Fate. Such love¬,
stories as that of Christine and her Fritz are nearly always trägic. Perhaps
that is why most of cur dramatists —who feel that thev have to consider the
box-ollice and public taste—only trifle with taem when they touch them¬
at all.
Cultured, handsome, self-indulgent, the figurerof Fritz is less sym¬
pathetie but not less astype: commoner in the German and Austrian
armies than in ours-a soldier with the temperament-of an artist. In the
first act we find him beginning to weary a little of therfears of his fashion¬
able mistress (she is sure they are being watched). He also is becoming
nervous; beginning to desire a love that would be “a caressing restful¬
ness, and not acontinual fear and anxiety. Andithen, when it is too late,
and the duel is arränged, heealises that perhäßs,such a love is readv for
him in the heart of Christüig. And get she, doo, had worried him a litile,
with her continual questlonings, partjcularly ebout his “péople,“ his frientsg“
and how and ihere he spent his #venmgs. There wasa social, gulf Between.
themn. He was an oflicer in the Kaiser’s dragoons, she wassthe daughter.
ofa theatre violinist. After all, she could never he more than & part'ofhig
life, an incident in it. Weyleelsthat—feel it even in the moment of the
impassioned parting from her before beigbes 40 flaht the ducl. As played
br Mr. Henry Ainley, this character, so weak, pet’so lovable, and that could.
be gentle and yet so cruel, alse lived before yesterday’s audience.
A DARING CREarloN.
Christine's old father is more strictly speaking. a creation—he is
even a daring creation. We are almost afraid to describe him,
feeling that our sentences will do injustice to the delicacy with which he is
set forth by the author. He would see his daughterchappy, and, knowing
of her passion for the voung oflicer, he is not afraid of or aghast at the
particular sort of happiness that scems in store for her, even at the risk
of after-sorrow. He is a dreamer, an artist, something of a transcen¬
dentalist; and quite the worst sort of person to bes, in charge of such a
daughter. Que can almost imagine him seeking to console her
broken heurt by offering, quite sweetlv and affectionately, to play
her something from Schubert on his violin! Most tenderly
plaved bv Mr.
Ilignert, the old man seemned quite com¬
prehensible. And there was the lighter side of the story, enacted by Mr.
Charles Maude as a gayer brother-officer of Fritz, and Miss Margaret
Bussé as a thoughtlessly vivacious friend of Christine; and a briefly-seen
but intensely dramatie figure is that of the wronged husband, played
with rare intensity br Mr. James Hearn, And as, under the direction of
Herr Max Behrend, the whole thing was well stage-managed, and full of
little touches of Austrian life, the illusion crcated by the#actors was sus¬
tained in all other respects, and the play made its full #mpression. We
are much indebted to the Afternoon Theatre for producing a play which
so conspicuously fulfils the first requisition in serious drama—that of being
true to lise.
5. L
box 11/4
ence br the presentation of“ Light o' Lore,“ Nr. G. Valentine Williams’s
English version of Herr Arthur Schnitzler's“ Liebelei,“ given for the ürst
time gesterday alternoon at IIis Majestr’s Theatre, and to be repeated next
Tuesdar and Thursday afternoons. The play ocals with a subject which
is supposed, more than any other, to monopolise all dramatists —Love,
Unfortunately, however, our British dramatists scarcely ever deal with it
sincerelz. Mr. Barrie generally toys daintily with it; Mr. Shaw tackles it
scientiticall, and coolly as a sort of intellectual phenomenon; most of our
plapwrights treat it as no more than something rather pretty and decorative !
in a sentimental war. We have to go back two years for an English play
in which vne passiem ofa man and a woman was represented in anything
like its #atural power. That, ## was“ John Glayde’s Honour,’ and even
in that ihe lovers serined suddenly to cool and become ashaned in the last
few minutes of the last act.“ Light o' Love,?' on the other hand, deals
with the subject with a stark sincerity. We can casily credit the stor#
of the succees it has had in Austria; and we wish we could believe that a
plag so poignant and so sincere was sure of a similar success here. In this
countre the majority of playgoers are still content wath a superficial
handling of human nature. There is, however a rapidlv-growing bodv ol
London theatre-goers who are asking for Reality, and these should crowd
His Majesty's Theatre to the doors for the two remaining performances of
sthis perfectly simple play.
The storv of“ Light o’ Love“’ can be told in a sentence or two.A
voung girl, Christine Weiring, the daughter of a fiddier in a Viennese theatre
orchestra, falls in love with Fritz Lobheimer, a voung officer of agreeable
presence and manners. Unknown to her he has been carrying on a
liaison with the wife of a man of his own class, and the husband has dis¬
covered it, has challenged him to a duel, and he is killed. Christine hears
ofhis death and of the circumstances which have led ap to it; gradua'ly
realises the little part which, after all, she has played in nis life; and inshes
forth, torn with grief and shame, to destroy herself on his grave. That is
all.
Anvbody couk. have invented such a story, and no craftsmanship
was required in putting it together. But for all that“ Light o'Love? is
adramatic masterpiece, for there is not ; scene, and scarrely a line in st
rhät does not illuminate human character, and that hnas not the ring of
truth.
A Pakr FoR A GRkar ACTRESS.
The part of Christine is one that the greatest of actresses might be proud
to play. Her tenderness, her simplicitr, her beautv,-which is the admira¬
ti#m ofarrfy öile #acepi herselt, her absorption in the love that has come
to her, her readiness to give all, her gratitude for a smile or a soft tone,
her love of her father, from whom for the first time in her life-she finds
herself keepinga secrei, her belief in her lover, her gentle resentment at'
being outside so many of his interests and so much of his life--these and a¬
score of other characteristics help to compese one of those intensely real¬
üigures we onlv mect with now and then ir, the Theatre. As impersonated
gesterdar by Miss Margaret Halstan, it was simply exquisite—a little more
appealing perhaps in the less exacting scenes than in the denouement, wiien
theactress’s tragic powers were putto the severest test, and now and thenan
inflection ofthe voice secmnedto fall a little short of the note that was wanted,
but always beautiful, wistful, and inevitably stricken by Fate. Such love¬,
stories as that of Christine and her Fritz are nearly always trägic. Perhaps
that is why most of cur dramatists —who feel that thev have to consider the
box-ollice and public taste—only trifle with taem when they touch them¬
at all.
Cultured, handsome, self-indulgent, the figurerof Fritz is less sym¬
pathetie but not less astype: commoner in the German and Austrian
armies than in ours-a soldier with the temperament-of an artist. In the
first act we find him beginning to weary a little of therfears of his fashion¬
able mistress (she is sure they are being watched). He also is becoming
nervous; beginning to desire a love that would be “a caressing restful¬
ness, and not acontinual fear and anxiety. Andithen, when it is too late,
and the duel is arränged, heealises that perhäßs,such a love is readv for
him in the heart of Christüig. And get she, doo, had worried him a litile,
with her continual questlonings, partjcularly ebout his “péople,“ his frientsg“
and how and ihere he spent his #venmgs. There wasa social, gulf Between.
themn. He was an oflicer in the Kaiser’s dragoons, she wassthe daughter.
ofa theatre violinist. After all, she could never he more than & part'ofhig
life, an incident in it. Weyleelsthat—feel it even in the moment of the
impassioned parting from her before beigbes 40 flaht the ducl. As played
br Mr. Henry Ainley, this character, so weak, pet’so lovable, and that could.
be gentle and yet so cruel, alse lived before yesterday’s audience.
A DARING CREarloN.
Christine's old father is more strictly speaking. a creation—he is
even a daring creation. We are almost afraid to describe him,
feeling that our sentences will do injustice to the delicacy with which he is
set forth by the author. He would see his daughterchappy, and, knowing
of her passion for the voung oflicer, he is not afraid of or aghast at the
particular sort of happiness that scems in store for her, even at the risk
of after-sorrow. He is a dreamer, an artist, something of a transcen¬
dentalist; and quite the worst sort of person to bes, in charge of such a
daughter. Que can almost imagine him seeking to console her
broken heurt by offering, quite sweetlv and affectionately, to play
her something from Schubert on his violin! Most tenderly
plaved bv Mr.
Ilignert, the old man seemned quite com¬
prehensible. And there was the lighter side of the story, enacted by Mr.
Charles Maude as a gayer brother-officer of Fritz, and Miss Margaret
Bussé as a thoughtlessly vivacious friend of Christine; and a briefly-seen
but intensely dramatie figure is that of the wronged husband, played
with rare intensity br Mr. James Hearn, And as, under the direction of
Herr Max Behrend, the whole thing was well stage-managed, and full of
little touches of Austrian life, the illusion crcated by the#actors was sus¬
tained in all other respects, and the play made its full #mpression. We
are much indebted to the Afternoon Theatre for producing a play which
so conspicuously fulfils the first requisition in serious drama—that of being
true to lise.