Picture Plays (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: HIS MOTHER'S FACE Characters: Jean Antoine Watteau in his last hour, a Sister, and a Boy. The stage is divided from right to left by a screen which, when only the forefront is illuminated, represents the wall of a room. When light is thrown on the back scene it serves as a misty veil that lends an effect of illusion to the pictures there presented. These pictures, groupings from the well-known canvases of Watteau, are supposed to be conjured up in the fancy of the dying artist, the spectator sharing his supernormal vision. The Sister and the Boy, however, who are ministering to him, betray no consciousness whatever that the room has ceased to be bounded by a wall. The curtains, parting, disclose a simply furnished room. At one side, toward the front, on a couch lies Watteau, the Sister and the Boy in attendance on him. Watteau. Rousing himself.] Sister, brush and palette bring me. Play, Jeannot, on your guitar. While I paint, some ballad sing me. Faring on a journey far, Sieur Watteau, Academician, For one sitter's portrait calls On remembrance, art-magician, Ere the final darkness falls. [The Sisteb having complied with his request, he makes an effort to work.] The Boy. [Sings to his guitar.] Days of Hesse! Days of Liesse! Season of wreathed lovers, song, and spring! Come, warm me with your old-time tenderness, Before my soul takes wing! [The wall at the back of the room seems to dissolve, and, as if in a dream, appear phantasmagorial groups of Watteau Cavaliers and Ladies, in a garden presided over by a statue of Venus. Exclaiming, the artist moves, as if to advance toward the vision, then sinking back, waves it away.] Watteau. Gallants, dames, of courtly fashion, Butterflies of ballet corps, Airy forms of painted passion, Pass! Binds me y...