R370502C. Strafford.
The Morning Post, 2 May 1837, p. 3.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 3, 389–390.
Covent Garden. Last night a new tragedy in five acts, called Strafford, was produced at this theatre. In addition to this attraction of novelty it was the night of Mr. Macready, and the house was completely filled. No man deserves better than Macready the compliment that is implied by a crowded house. He is an actor of great talents, and his capabilities are never injured by want of industry. He seems to love his profession, and to him, therefore, industry, however laborious, is a work of pleasure. There is no circumstance in his theatrical life which proves more decidedly that he possesses great talent than the fact that his success has, perhaps, been greatest in original characters, which have been played for the first time by himself, as in the instance of Ion and of his Strafford of last night. This is an historical tragedy, and even an attempt of this kind deserves encouragement. Nothing tends to fix in the mind more vividly and more permanently the great events of our history than to see them treated by men of genius, with dramatic accompaniment. If the poetry be of a lofty character it gives a value to the facts, which, in many minds, they would not otherwise possess. Every page of Shakspeare’s historical plays is a proof of this. One never forgets the character which has received even but one or two touches from his immortal pencil. The attempt at an historical play, however, is attended with much risk, for an audience who are acquainted with history will not be pleased to see the important facts greatly deviated from, and the poet must, therefore, feel his imagination in some measure under restraint. The tragedy is by Mr. Browning, who is already favourably known to the public by his poem of “Paracelsus.” The characters in the piece are numerous, but those who are sufficiently prominent to attract much notice are Charles I. (Mr. Dale), Wentworth Earl of Strafford (Mr. Macready), John Pym (Mr. Vandenhoff), Denvil Hollis (Mr. G. Bennett), Queen Henrietta (Miss Vincent), and Lucy Percy Countess of Carlisle, (Miss Helen Faucit). John Hampden (Mr. Harris), is also of the number, but we regret to say that he cuts a sorry figure here. Whenever he appears he seems but a poor, unnoticed, and, to all appearance, unknown, hanger-on upon the scene. It would be better to have left him out altogether than thus to strip him of all with which history connects him in our minds. Much of this may be owing to the wretched manner in which the character is played. There is nothing very deeply interesting in the first and second acts. It is only after Wentworth’s secession from the popular cause becomes known that the play begins to become interesting. In the third act, when Strafford first discovers that he is to be impeached, there is a very able piece of acting by Mr. Macready. The indignation of his great soul is powerfully expressed, and he drew down thunders of applause from all parts of the house. In the third scene of the same act, when he is ordered to be taken into custody and to be deprived of his sword, the exertions of the actor gave to the passage a force and vividness of delineation which could not be effected by less than genius of the very first order. There is not much source of inspiration in the passage itself, and never was it more clearly proved how much an actor can do for a dramatic writer than by the effect which Mr. Macready produced. Indeed we might as well take this opportunity of saying that the language is not often, if ever at all, raised above mediocrity, and is not unfrequently trivial, not to say vulgar. Perhaps the following passage is as good as any in the tragedy, and it is as well to insert it here:—
You’ll be good to those children, Sire. I know
You’ll not believe her even should the Queen
Think they take after one they never saw!
I had intended that my son should live
A stranger to these matters, but you are
So utterly deprived of friends! He too
Must serve you. Will you not be good to him?
Stay—Sire—stay—do not promise—do not swear!
And Hollis—do the best you can for me!
I’ve not a soul to trust to: Wandesford’s dead—
And you’ve got Radcliffe safe—and Laud is here.
I’ve had small time of late for my affairs—
But I’ll trust any of you—Pym himself:
No one could hurt them. There’s an infant, too—
These tedious cares! Your Majesty could spare them—
But ’tis so awkward—dying in a hurry!
Nay, pardon me, my King! I had forgotten
Your education, trials, and temptations
And weakness. I have said a peevish word—
But, mind, I bless you at the last! You know
’Tis between you and me—what has the world
To do with it? Farewell!
And yet in this passage Mr. Macready, by a touch of art, produced no inconsiderable sensation. In pronouncing the words—
Stay—Sire—stay, do not promise, do not swear,
it was so marked as to convey forcibly the sense which Strafford as well as others his contemporaries, entertained, of that want of firmness and of adherence to promises for which, unfortunately, the Monarch was too much known. The author evidently expended his resources upon the concluding act, and yet it passed very tediously. It seems to have been his object to draw together an overwhelming crowd of sufferings. The Sovereign, the Countess of Carlisle, Hollis, Pym, are all present—all in sorrow—even Pym himself, though his stern sense of what he conceives to be right will not permit him to relent. There is something unseemly in this closing scene which produced a laugh from a few of the audience, and, had it become pretty general, the effect might have been fatal. The King is reclined upon a sofa in an agony of grief, and while Strafford and Pym are taking a last leave he starts up and throws himself at the feet of Pym, entreating mercy for his favourite. There was in his manner, and in the very action, even if not accompanied with awkwardness, such a total forgetfulness of royalty as nearly made the thing ludicrous. The two children of Strafford are introduced, as accompanying him in his prison, and innocently chaunting a simple ditty, as if unconscious of the fate that awaited their father. We cannot greatly commend this expedient. It would perhaps, for the purpose of producing tragic effect, have been much better to adhere to history, and taken an opportunity of introducing the words of Strafford, towards the close of his defence, when, directing his words to his two children who accompanied him, he calls them “The dear pledges which a saint in Heaven has left me.” There were no words uttered throughout the whole which made a stronger impression than the exclamation of Strafford, when he finds that the King had consented to his death, “Put not your trust in Princes, nor in the sons of men, for in them there is no salvation.” The character of the stern, unrelenting, though mistaken patriot, Pym, was ably supported by Vandenhoff. The leading features of Strafford are his unalterable attachment to his Sovereign. The relation which the Countess of Carlisle stands in to Strafford seems to be rather ambiguous. She is more upon the scene than any other of the dramatis personæ, and her tender attachment, her ever ready will to serve or to sympathise with Strafford, are made interesting enough by Miss Faucit. She is purely a creature of the author’s fancy, having no existence in history. The character of Hollis, as depicted by Mr. Bennett, is much too loud in language, too violent in gesticulation, and in every respect too melodramatic to convey any impression of the man which one would conceive Hollis to have been. The tragedy was most favourably received, and announced for repetition on Wednesday and Friday next. The usual ceremony was insisted upon by the galleries, and Macready and Vandenhoff forced upon the stage by unmerciful vociferation. The author deserves encouragement, but if he be a candidate for immortality he must do much more before he can attain it as a dramatic poet.
Reviewed:
Strafford (RB), London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, 1837.
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