aspects of social life. A
drama, as this book seeks to show, is in its finest estate a work of art
comparable with such other works of art as pictures, statuary, musical
compositions and the achievements of the book world. I shall endeavor
later to show a little more in detail wherein lie the artistic
requirements and successes of the play; and a suggestion of this has
been already made in chapter one.

But this thought of the play as a work of art has hardly been in the
minds of folk of our race and speech until the recent awakening of an
enlightened interest in things dramatic; a movement so brief as to be
embraced by the present generation. The theater has been regarded
carelessly, thoughtlessly, merely as a place of idle amusement, or
worse; ignorant prejudice against it has been rife, with a natural
reaction for the worse upon the institution itself. The play has neither
been associated with a serious treatment of life nor with the refined
pleasure derivable from contact with art. Nor, although the personality
of actors has always been acclaimed, and an infinite amount of silly
chatter about their private lives been constant, have theater-goers as a
class realized the distinguished skill of the dramatist in the handling
of a very difficult and delicate art, nor done justice to the art which
the actor represents, nor to his own artistry in it. But now a change
has come, happily. The English-speaking lands have begun at least to get
into line with other enlightened countries, to comprehend the
educational value of the playhouse, and the consequent importance of the
play. The rapid growth to-day in what may be called social consciousness
has quickened our sense of the social significance of an institution
that, whatever its esthetic and intellectual status, is an enormous
influence in the daily life of the multitude. Gradually those who think
have come to see that the theater, this people's pleasure, should offer
drama that is rational, wholesome amusement; that society in general has
a vital stake in the nature of an entertainment so widely diffused, so
imperatively demanded and so surely effective in shaping the ideals of
the people at large. The final chapter will enlarge upon this
suggestion.

And this idea has grown along with the now very evident re-birth of a
drama which, while practical stage material, has taken on the literary
graces and makes so strong an appeal as literature that much of our best
in lette