Life — December 15, 1887 — page 10: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

- LIFE: —<s RIDER HAGGARD'S weird tale of “She” has been put upon the stage at Niblo’s. It possesses much of the frailty that poets ascribe to the female sex, and, except as a spectacle, in which respect it is gorgeously like other shes we meet with, it must be set down as uninterest- ing. The play should be encouraged on purely philanthropic grounds, as a drama which opens up a field for the aged and infirm ballet-girl is little short of a charitable enterprise; when the heroine is two thousand years of age, a four- thousand-year-old chorus girl stands a very good chance of being able to make a living. 7 WANS ~ ALY S Theatre is gradually developing into a museum and gallery of art, and a leisurely stroll about the Soyers is a thing not to be omitted. Not least among later attractions is the =F youthful Celestial. who / dispenses bills of the play in the vestibule. This gentleman is high- ly decorative, in addition to being an object of great util- ity. We might, perhaps, say, ith Mrs. Partington, an “ ob- ject of bigotry and. virtue.” The “Railroad of Love” is still crowded with passengers, and if other railroads in the coun- try had all their seats taken for as many weeks ahead as in Mr. Daly's case, there would be a R. R. boom of abnormal dimensions. It is seldom New Yorkers have so delicious a morsel offered their d/asé palates as this exquisite comedy. M*: PALMER is doing his best to encourage such latent dramatic genius as may exist in this country. His series of authors’ performances has been most success- ful from the standpoint of the American Dramatists, cer- tainly, and from Mr. Palmer's point of view, probably, since he has decided to continue them through the winter. It has. long been the complaint of the needy American playwright that the great American Drama has been hiding its light under a bushel for many years, because of a marked preference of our managers for the successes of the London season. In demonstrating the truth or falsity of this claim, Mr. Palmer is doing the public a service. We shall now have an opportunity to learn whether we have any Sheridans among us, to say nothing of the possibility of Shakespeares or Bacons without number. The season this year was opened on Tuesday evening last at the Madison Square Theatre, with the dramatization of rennyson’s “ Elaine,” by Messrs. G. P. Lathrop and Harry Edwards, The audience was an appreciative one, and the work done by the company was conscientious, as everything at Mr. Palmer's house is. The general verdict seems to be that Mr. Lathrop has not found Tennyson's poem suggestive of any intensely dramatic situations, but has discovered possibilities for painting the lily of the Poet-peer's M Ie must be said in Mr. Lathrop’s behalf, that in his endeavor to make this particular poem blood-curdling, or whatever else it ought to be to satisfy the thirst of the American audience, he has suffered from the same drawbacks which stood in the way of the novelist who tried to write a bustling narrative of Life in Philadelphia. Galvanization is the hardest attribute for a literary man to acquire, and if Mr. Lathrop has not in this instance succeeded in achieving anything more than a literary success, it must be set down to his having chosen luerature, and not electrical science, for a profession. The production of “Elaine” is an event which in itself entitles Mr. Palmer to the best wishes of the community. He is giving the American dramatist a chance. “Elaine” is a success, and its authors are fair objects for congratula tion. It is, of course, a romantic work, in which beauty and poetic feeling play an important part, and the authors have most skillfully achieved their aim, FOR MORALITY. Jorkins : THat’s A GOOD MOVE OF CoMSTOCK'S TO PUT AN EXD TO NUDITY IN THE PARK. Barker: How so? Jorkins: He's ARRESTED THE REAR. comicbooks.com