Page:The life and writings of Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870) (IA lifewritingsofal00spurrich).pdf/50

 the dark as to the nature and direction of his own abilities, two events of great importance happened. Louis XVIII. had died, and had been succeeded by Charles X., whose career in some respects resembled that of our James II. Charles had pledged himself on his accession to abolish the censorship; but he soon attempted to re-impose it. A political-literary agitation followed, and after a struggle the obnoxious threat was withdrawn. The other event was the arrival in Paris of Kean and an English company of Shakespearean actors. Not so long before, English players had been pelted from the pit of the Porte St Martin, but at this moment (1827) the French had been seized with Anglo-mania. Scott was being read and dramatised on all hands; Guizot was studying the British constitution, for future application to French politics, and Byron was a literary fashion. Dumas was even more prepared to welcome Shakespeare than were the majority of his fellow-Romantics. He saw "Hamlet," and it electrified him. He knew every word of the play beforehand, and strange as he found the English style of acting, he "saw light" for the first time on the path of his future. But let him speak for himself:

"Ah, this was what my soul had been seeking after: this was what I had lacked, and which had come at last! Here were actors forgetting that they were