Playwrights On Playmaking

Brander Matthews opens this collection of stage studies with the voice of a lifelong playgoer and drama critic, setting out a clear creed: drama is a lasting art governed by enduring laws, yet always shaped by the practical conditions of actors, stages, and audiences. He argues that criticism is most valuable when it comes from artists who understand technique from within, and he insists that plays must be judged as living performances, not as literature in isolation. Across essays on dramatists and critics from Aristotle to Ibsen, Matthews contrasts theatrical common sense with abstract theorizing, praising writers who trusted the audience's judgment and adapted timeless principles to changing stage conditions. The later essays turn to Thackeray and Dickens as novelists with strong theatrical instincts. Matthews finds Thackeray's lone play slight and imperfect, but sees his fiction as rich with dramatic scenes, memorable figures, and a persistent awareness of performance. He traces the difficulties of adapting Thackeray's complex novels, noting that they work best when focused on a single striking character or episode, while Dickens's more vivid, episodic imagination more readily lends itself to the stage. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.