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boldly, may be a greater menace to our social
fabric and a more powerful inspiration than the
wildest harangue of the soapbox orator.
Unfortunately, we in America have so far
looked upon the theater as a place of amusement
only, exclusive of ideas and inspiration. Because
the modern drama of Europe has till recently been
inaccessible in printed form to the average
theatergoer in this country, he had to content himself with
the interpretation, or rather misinterpretation, of
our dramatic critics. As a result the social
significance of the Modern Drama has well nigh been
lost to the general public.
As to the native drama, America has so far
produced very little worthy to be considered in a social
light. Lacking the cultural and evolutionary
tradition of the Old World, America has necessarily
first to prepare the soil out of which sprouts
creative genius.
The hundred and one springs of local and
sectional life must have time to furrow their common
channel into the seething sea of life at large, and
social questions and problems make themselves
felt, if not crystallized, before the throbbing pulse
of the big national heart can find its reflex in a
great literature—and specifically in the drama—
of a social character. This evolution has been
going on in this country for a considerable time,
shaping the wide-spread unrest that is now
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