Life and Letters of Robert Browning [48]
an Aristophanic one
of fifty syllables: but I have spoken it, relieved myself,
and commend all that concerns me to the approved and valued friend
of whom I am proud to account myself in corresponding friendship,
His truly ever
Robert Browning.
==
Mr. Browning also alludes to Mr. Phelps's acting as not only
not having been detrimental to the play, but having helped to save it,
in the conspiracy of circumstances which seemed to invoke its failure.
This was a mistake, since Macready had been anxious to resume the part,
and would have saved it, to say the least, more thoroughly. It must,
however, be remembered that the irritation which these letters express
was due much less to the nature of the facts recorded in them
than to the manner in which they had been brought before Mr. Browning's mind.
Writing on the subject to Lady Martin in February 1881,
he had spoken very temperately of Macready's treatment of his play,
while deprecating the injustice towards his own friendship
which its want of frankness involved: and many years before this,
the touch of a common sorrow had caused the old feeling, at least momentarily,
to well up again. The two met for the first time after these occurrences
when Mr. Browning had returned, a widower, from Italy. Mr. Macready, too,
had recently lost his wife; and Mr. Browning could only start forward,
grasp the hand of his old friend, and in a voice choked with emotion say,
`O Macready!'
Lady Martin has spoken to me of the poet's attitude on the occasion
of this performance as being full of generous sympathy for those
who were working with him, as well as of the natural anxiety of a young author
for his own success. She also remains convinced that this sympathy
led him rather to over- than to under-rate the support he received.
She wrote concerning it in `Blackwood's Magazine', March 1881:
==
`It seems but yesterday that I sat by his [Mr. Elton's] side
in the green-room at the reading of Robert Browning's beautiful drama,
`A Blot in the 'Scutcheon'. As a rule Mr. Macready always read the new plays.
But owing, I suppose, to some press of business, the task was entrusted
on this occasion to the head prompter, -- a clever man in his way,
but wholly unfitted to bring out, or even to understand,
Mr. Browning's meaning. Consequently, the delicate, subtle lines
were twisted, perverted, and sometimes even made ridiculous in his hands.
My "cruel father" [Mr. Elton] was a warm admirer of the poet.
He sat writhing and indignant, and tried by gentle asides to make me see
the real meaning of the verse. But somehow the mischief proved irreparable,
for a few of the actors during the rehearsals chose to continue
to misunderstand the text, and never took the interest in the play
which they would have done had Mr. Macready read it.'
==
Looking back on the first appearance of his tragedy through the widening
perspectives of nearly forty years, Mr. Browning might well declare
as he did in the letter to Lady Martin to which I have just referred,
that her `PERFECT behaviour as a woman' and her `admirable playing
as an actress' had been (or at all events were) to him
`the one gratifying circumstance connected with it.'
He also felt it a just cause of bitterness that the letter
from Charles Dickens,* which conveyed his almost passionate admiration of
`A Blot in the 'Scutcheon', and was clearly written to Mr. Forster in order
that it might be seen, was withheld for thirty years from his knowledge,
and that of the public whose judgment it might so largely have influenced.
Nor was this the only time in the poet's life that fairly earned honours
escaped him.
--
* See Forster's `Life of Dickens'.
--
`Colombe's Birthday' was produced in 1853 at the Haymarket;*
and afterwards in the provinces, under the direction of Miss Helen Faucit,
who created the principal part. It was again performed
for the Browning Society in 1885,** and although Miss Alma Murray,
as Colombe, was almost
of fifty syllables: but I have spoken it, relieved myself,
and commend all that concerns me to the approved and valued friend
of whom I am proud to account myself in corresponding friendship,
His truly ever
Robert Browning.
==
Mr. Browning also alludes to Mr. Phelps's acting as not only
not having been detrimental to the play, but having helped to save it,
in the conspiracy of circumstances which seemed to invoke its failure.
This was a mistake, since Macready had been anxious to resume the part,
and would have saved it, to say the least, more thoroughly. It must,
however, be remembered that the irritation which these letters express
was due much less to the nature of the facts recorded in them
than to the manner in which they had been brought before Mr. Browning's mind.
Writing on the subject to Lady Martin in February 1881,
he had spoken very temperately of Macready's treatment of his play,
while deprecating the injustice towards his own friendship
which its want of frankness involved: and many years before this,
the touch of a common sorrow had caused the old feeling, at least momentarily,
to well up again. The two met for the first time after these occurrences
when Mr. Browning had returned, a widower, from Italy. Mr. Macready, too,
had recently lost his wife; and Mr. Browning could only start forward,
grasp the hand of his old friend, and in a voice choked with emotion say,
`O Macready!'
Lady Martin has spoken to me of the poet's attitude on the occasion
of this performance as being full of generous sympathy for those
who were working with him, as well as of the natural anxiety of a young author
for his own success. She also remains convinced that this sympathy
led him rather to over- than to under-rate the support he received.
She wrote concerning it in `Blackwood's Magazine', March 1881:
==
`It seems but yesterday that I sat by his [Mr. Elton's] side
in the green-room at the reading of Robert Browning's beautiful drama,
`A Blot in the 'Scutcheon'. As a rule Mr. Macready always read the new plays.
But owing, I suppose, to some press of business, the task was entrusted
on this occasion to the head prompter, -- a clever man in his way,
but wholly unfitted to bring out, or even to understand,
Mr. Browning's meaning. Consequently, the delicate, subtle lines
were twisted, perverted, and sometimes even made ridiculous in his hands.
My "cruel father" [Mr. Elton] was a warm admirer of the poet.
He sat writhing and indignant, and tried by gentle asides to make me see
the real meaning of the verse. But somehow the mischief proved irreparable,
for a few of the actors during the rehearsals chose to continue
to misunderstand the text, and never took the interest in the play
which they would have done had Mr. Macready read it.'
==
Looking back on the first appearance of his tragedy through the widening
perspectives of nearly forty years, Mr. Browning might well declare
as he did in the letter to Lady Martin to which I have just referred,
that her `PERFECT behaviour as a woman' and her `admirable playing
as an actress' had been (or at all events were) to him
`the one gratifying circumstance connected with it.'
He also felt it a just cause of bitterness that the letter
from Charles Dickens,* which conveyed his almost passionate admiration of
`A Blot in the 'Scutcheon', and was clearly written to Mr. Forster in order
that it might be seen, was withheld for thirty years from his knowledge,
and that of the public whose judgment it might so largely have influenced.
Nor was this the only time in the poet's life that fairly earned honours
escaped him.
--
* See Forster's `Life of Dickens'.
--
`Colombe's Birthday' was produced in 1853 at the Haymarket;*
and afterwards in the provinces, under the direction of Miss Helen Faucit,
who created the principal part. It was again performed
for the Browning Society in 1885,** and although Miss Alma Murray,
as Colombe, was almost