* * * * *
Brieux is a man with moral ideas. I will admit even that he is dominated
by moral ideas, which, if they are sometimes crude, are certainly
righteous. He is a reformer and a passionate reformer. But a man can be a
passionate reformer, with a marked turn for eloquence, and yet not be a
serious dramatist. Dr. Clifford is a reformer; Mr. Henniker Heaton is a
passionate reformer; and both are capable of literature when they are
excited. But they are not dramatists. We still await Mr. Henniker Heaton's
tragic fourth act about the failure of the negotiations for a penny post
with France. Brieux is too violent a reformer ever to be a serious
dramatist. Violent reformers are unprincipled, and the reformer in Brieux
forces the dramatist in him to prostitution. The dramatist in him is not
strong enough to resist the odious demands of the reformer: which fact
alone shows how far he is from being a first-rate dramatist. As a
dramatist Brieux is no stronger, no more sincere, no less unscrupulous, no
less viciously sentimental, than the fashionable authors of the boulevard,
such as Capus, Donnay, and the ineffable Bernstein, so adored in London.
And it is as a dramatist that he must be judged. Of course, if you wish to
judge him as a reformer, you must get some expert opinion about his
subjects of reform.
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