I think wrongly, or at least unfairly.
Besides being one of the two best shots in the United Kingdom, the King is
beyond any question a man of honourable intentions and of a strict
conscientiousness. But it is no part of his business to be sufficiently
expert to choose a play for a State performance. He has never pretended to
have artistic proclivities. Who among you, indeed, could be relied upon to
choose properly a play for a State performance? Take the best modern
plays. Who among you would dare to suggest for a State performance Oscar
Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest," Bernard Shaw's "Man and
Superman," John Galsworthy's "Justice," or Granville Barker's "The Voysey
Inheritance"? Nobody! These plays are unthinkable for a State performance,
because their distinction is utterly beyond the average comprehension of
the ruling classes--and State performances are for the ruling classes.
These plays are simply too good. Yet if you don't choose an old play you
must choose one of these four plays, or make the worst of both worlds.
Modern plays being ruled out, you must either have Shakespeare or--or
what? What is there? "The Cenci"?
* * * * *
Can you not now sympathize with the King as he ran through, in his mind,
the whole range of British drama? But the truth is that he did not run
through the whole range of British drama.
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