In the time needed by his confreres to prepare a plot, he
would finish four, and he never secured this prodigious fecundity
at the expense of originality. It is in no commonplace mould that
his creations are cast. There is not one of his works that has not
at least its grain of novelty."
On his part, M. Octave Feuillet, a master in things theatrical,
said in his reception discourse:--
"One of the most difficult arts in the domain of literary
invention, is that of charming the imagination without unsettling
it, of touching the heart without troubling it, of amusing men
without corrupting them; this was the supreme art of Scribe."
They are very pretty, very alert, very French, these plays of the
Theatre de Madame. They have aged less than many pretentious works
that have aimed at immortality. There is hardly one of them
without its ingenious idea, something truly scenic. We often see
amateurs seeking pieces to play in the salons; let them draw from
this repertory; they will have but an embarrassment of choice
among plays always amusing and always in good form.
Scribe said, in his reception discourse at the French Academy
(January 28, 1836):--
"It happens, by a curious fatality, that the stage and society are
almost always in direct contradiction. Take the period of the
Regency. If comedy were the constant expression of society, the
comedy of that time must have offered us strong license or joyous
Saturnalia.
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