Page:Plays by Jacinto Benavente - Second series (IA playsbyjacintobe00bena).pdf/22

 All of us are shocked once a year by what goes on about us for the rest of the year without shocking us, or, indeed, attracting our attention at all.

Art is the one subject upon which aristocracy and democracy agree. Both invariably vote for foolishness and vulgarity.

It is not easy to surprise the heart while the intelligence holds out.

With very notable exceptions, the prepossession of good actors for bad plays is as general as it is deplorable.

Many, upon going to the theatre and seeing a detestable play, think mistakenly: "I could do this thing better myself." The fact is that they could do it better, only their better would be worse for the dramatic effect. In the theatre, even to be bad requires a badness all its own.

No, the theatre, like all other forms of art, is many-sided, and neither can nor should live by exclusion. All styles are good, even the dull, if there is any adequate reason for its being so. Only dulness for its own sake is inadmissible; it is not like art for art's sake. Let us be sincere with ourselves. When we read "Don Quixote" or "The Divine Comedy," or Shakespeare's plays for the first time, were we not upon the point of finding them a little tiresome? If we had permitted ourselves to be overcome by the first impression, and had ceased to read, should we not have sacrificed the most profound artistic emotions of our lives?

It is not more difficult to write a good play than it is a good sonnet, only one must know how to write it, just as one must a sonnet. This is the principal resemblance between the theatre and other forms of literature.

The theatre must be loved for itself, perhaps with greater devotion than any other form of art. The true playwright must have passed his life in the theatre, he must have seen all the plays and all the actors within his reach, and he must have acted himself. Remember that no small part of Shakespeare and Lope de Rueda and Molière was the actor. To the playwright the world must be a vast stage, men and