Pictorial Shakespeare, 1880-1890 - eTheses Repository - University ...

63
in 1882, but v;ith the exception of a few passages - notably
the hero's description of a dream in 11,2 - it is unpretentious
and life-like. The villainous "Spider" has some lines which
anticipate the manner of Shavian dialogue: at the beginning of
the third act the villain and his wife are in the parlour of
their villa at Bromley. The vdfe, looking out of the window at
the thickly-falling snow, suggests that "The Spider" is being
needlessly cruel in evicting a poor widow and her family from
a cottage he owns. This does not seem to be intended as a
comic situation - Bromley would suggest the affluence of a man
able to live in the countryside of Kent, and not the suburban
j2,
dullness which the name now invokes. The villain's reasons for
proceeding v.ith his cruelty have the cynical humour we associate
with Andrew (Jndershaft or Alfred Doolittle: he is determined
not to have poor people cluttering his grounds -
.. .It's no fault in England to b© r»oor. It's
a crime. That's the reason I'm rich. 12
The part was played by the much-admired melodramatic actor,
E.S.' 'illard, and, according to .The. Illustrated Sporting and
Drama t i c : lews , would have been hissed in the customary manner,
"but that the audience feared to lose one line of his, much
as they disapproved of his morals and sentiments." (25 T'?ov 1882)
The success of The Silver King was due to its enlivening
of a dying genre - it was felt that rj.olodrnma, whilst relying
upon certain simplifications and extravagances of writing and
presentation, v;rs subject to certain restrictions. At Drury LanQ
the siimlicitioe; of plot and chare c tor were being used to link
together scenes of spectacular rather than pathetic interest.
Harris was cultivating an inferior kind of exoticism. Barrett's
efforts at the -rincess'o wore, he claimed on the play's
hundredth night, "to raise what for want of a better word was
calico ".Iclodrana into the region of literature and poetry, and
natural tragedy" and to "orocTuce on the melodramatic otn^e v:ork
which would have a more than ephemeral existence" (The Times.
19 Marcli 1882).
liile some ..ritors of po,-al:,r ploys wore a celling the
e-.-'-irov'J. of literary men, some literati v;erc attempting to
occomodrto their tnlentc to t»ie cta^c. In "literary" nlrv/s