Poems and Dramas (Volume 7) (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1910. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... FOREWORD In these short dramas I have attempted to give voice to two elemental emotions, the emotion of the inevitableness of destiny and the emotion of tragical loveliness. One does not need to know the story of Midir and Etain, of Concobar and Deirdre, of Deirdre and the Sons of Usna, in order to know the mystery and the silent arrivals of destiny, or to know the emotion of sorrow at the passage of beauty: as one does not need to know the story of Iphigenia in Aulis in order to know the emotion of indignation at kingly guile or the emotion of pity for the betrayed: as one does not need to know the story of the Crowned Hippolytos in order to know the emotion of tragical suspense, as when Phaedra's love for the son of her husband is like a leaf on the wind; or in order to know the emotion of bewildered futility, as when Theseus curses and banishes his innocent son and persuades to him the doom of Poseidon. For these emotions are not the properties of drama, which is but a fowler snaring them in a net. These deep elementals are the obscure Chorus which plays upon the silent flutes, upon the nerves wherein the soul sits enmeshed. They have their own savage or divine energy, and the man of the woods and the dark girl of the canebrakes know them with the same bowed suspense or uplifted lamentation or joy as do the men and women who have great names and to whom the lords of the imagination have given immortality. Many kings have desired, and the gods forbidden. Concobar has but lain down where Caesars have fallen and Pharaohs closed imperial eyes, and many satraps and many tyrants have bent before the wind. All old men who in strength and passion rise up against the bitterness of destiny are the kindred of Lear: those who have kept love as the crown of years, and see...