IN HELL WITH THE DRAMATISTS

       (Enters, followed by man in overalls, grumbling and lugging a bucket of paste, roll of paper, and billposter's brush.)
       Stir yourself. Get up that three-sheet and let's be off before the dramatists arrive.

       Say, boss, don't I ever get a vacation? When you sent me back to earth to work as advance agent for a musical comedy, it was about the limit in dirty jobs, and you've got to hand it to me for putting over some hot stuff for you. But I just get back and you send me out sticking bills. I don't want any more of these responsible jobs. Let me be just an imp for a change.

       I'll think it over when I get time; but finish up this job first. I've got a stunt on for tonight that will do you good. This is to be Dramatists' Initiation.

       Say — what's the matter with all them guys? They think they're in heaven.

       That's just their conceit. I've been letting them go on thinking so until I got a good collection of them, and now I'm going to put them all through the first degree in a body.

       Great stuff! (Starts posting three-sheet.)

Hurry up! And if anyone comes, don't answer any questions. (Exit.)

       (Enters slowly and moodily, and stares at Billposter. Muses.) Man in overalls — symbol of toil. Brush, similar to broom — symbol of domestic slavery. Paste — symbol of affinities. Three-sheet — symbol of mendacity. Ha! A whole drama unfolds itself. (He passes heavily across stage and exits.)

       (As he finishes the work, turns and looks at Maeterlinck.)
       Nut!
       (Takes up implements and exits. The billboard reads: "Tonight — A Play by the Greatest Living Dramatist.")
       Enter George Bernard Shaw and Eugene Brieux, arm in arm.

       My dear Shaw, it is so charming to meet you here. Heaven would not be heaven without the man who declared me the greatest dramatist west of Russia. But there is one thing I have always wanted to ask you — why did you say "west of Russia," for we both know those Russians cannot hold a candle to either of us?

       I had to place you definitely somewhere, in order to make an exception of myself.

       But England is west of Russia.

       England — yes. But England does not contain me. I permeate the universe. I am English, Chinese, Persian, American, cosmic. Anything west of Russia is west of me, for I am more Russian than Gorky, just as I am more French than you yourself, my dear Brieux.

       I begin not to think so much of heaven after all. (Unlinks his arm from that of his prefaceur.)

       That's your provincialism. The fact of the matter is that, without my personal recommendation, it is doubtful if you, Ibsen, or any other dramatist would be allowed here at all.

       (Sarcastically.) If you have such a low opinion of us, why did you exert this influence in our behalf?

       What would heaven be for me, without the means of permanently displaying my admitted superiority?

       (Turning away.) Insufferable! (Sees the three-sheet.) But what is this? "The Greatest of Living Dramatists!" (He and Shaw turn to the theater.)

       (Rushes in, waves his arms frantically, rolls his eyes and tears his towsled hair. Howls.)
       I hate everybody.
       (Strindberg rushes away and dramatists pour upon the stage from every direction.)

       What was that fearful racket?

       Just Strindberg indulging himself in his substitute for the ice-cream soda of the matinee girl.

       I shall certainly lodge a protest against him. I might say that the management of this institution leaves much to be desired. I might say that I should like to see St. Peter panned, but I refrain. However, heaven should be free from all manifestations of the physical and violent.

       Oh, you Englishmen, with your rules of order and conventional desire to make everyone act as you wish to act yourselves! Don't you realize that heaven is heaven, only because it frees the individual from all responsibility to the mob?

       But you Swedes are too noisy.

       Ignoramus! I am a Norwegian — an entirely different nationality.

       Then, if I am to have perfect freedom of action I shall continue to call you a Swede.

       Freedom! That's the thing. Now I am able to write my great anarchistic drama at last. No more theoretical sociology. I shall kill the czarovitch and one grand duke in the first act, the czarina and two grand dukes in the second act, the czar and three grand dukes in the third act — but where — oh where, am I to find a climax for my fourth act?

       (Passing across the front of the group and addressing space.) Pellucid! Crystalline! At last I nearly understand me.

       (Calling to the assemblage.) See — gentlemen; we are going to learn tonight what our successors are doing with the wisdom we imparted.

       I shan't go. I never attend performances of my own plays, as no actors are capable of doing them justice.

       It says "living dramatist," Shaw.

       Certainly, the greatest living dramatist, of course, is the one who is most successful in writing my plays without leaving out any of the important parts.

       (Mockingly.) Haw, haw, haw! Why you were not even a success when you were alive. Everybody knows I set the fashion that made you possible, but even then you had to print your plays — you couldn't get them produced.

That's what proves my superiority. Anybody can write plays that are so stupid the public will like them. I educated the people so that they can now appreciate my imitators.

       (To Clyde Fitch.) Say, Clyde, doesn't it hand you an awful scream the way these boys hate themselves? I suppose you, or Gus Thomas, or Dave Belasco, or even poor old Theo. Kremer, made more on any one play net than was taken in, gross, on all the high-brow stuff this whole regiment wrote.

       (Sternly.) Oswald Alving, go!!

       (To Ibsen.) My boy, wake up and get wise to me. I'm the fellow that put New York on the map. I'll take you up to Forty-second Street and let you fire a cannon down Broadway, and I'll pay a million dollars for every guy you hit that knows whether you wrote plays or ran a barber shop. Am I right, 'Gene?

       Dead right, George.

       This is indeed some strange, new symbolic language. The world progresses swiftly, and the younger generation is knocking at the door.

       Knocking at the door is all right, Henry, if it were confined to that, but the trouble is that this particular younger generation does not limit its knocking to any particular locality. As an apostle of brotherly love I should wish that this greatest living dramatist could be a composite of all of us, but that is impossible, and it is the logical sequence of evolution that by now the Great American Drama must have been written (possibly by a naturalized citizen) and its author will be the one whose play we shall witness tonight.

       (Hurtles himself to the center of the stage, towsles himself and does a dervish act. Howls.) I hate everybody! (Rushes off.)

       (Rushing on breathlessly.) Say, where did he go? I want to book him on the Orpheum circuit. (He is hustled. off the stage.)

       I certainly shall lodge a complaint with the authorities against that man. There's such a thing as too much freedom.

       (Gathering a little crowd of Germans about him, including Hauptmann, Wedekind and Goethe.)
       This is all very amusing to us, who know that nothing can endure without the deep sincerity of the German philosophic —
       (He is interrupted by the sound of a small bell, off stage, and as it tinkles a voice calls out, authoritatively: "Don't move — hold it — clear space down stage, center. That's it. Now." The bell tinkles again and David Belasco strides in and takes the calcium.)

       Effective entrance, don't you think?

       Nice work, Dave, nice work. Let's see — you got that from my "Demons of the Dungeons," didn't you?

       (Bitterly.) Always the accusation of plagiarism! And this is heaven!

       Now look here, Dave, you must admit —

       Admit nothing! You scribblers turn out a lot of rot and then get somebody with brains to make a play out of it. Then you want all the credit and part of the royalties. I tell you this greatest dramatist is a man who knows how to handle the saw and hammer and run the switchboard. But what's the use trying to tell you fellows anything? You only write! (He retires to a corner by himself.)

       I have just thought a purple thought! How inscrutably comprehensible I am to me!

       This is all growing extremely tiresome. I have not spoken nor been spoken to, or of, in several minutes.

       If it's like that here, where you are, how much more so must it be back there, where you are not!

       Bosh! I left a censor working for me. So long as he keeps telling the people I am unfit for production, my place is assured.
       (Further recriminations are prevented by the return of the Billposter, now disguised as a theatrical manager, with a heavy encrustation of diamonds. He goes into the lobby, enters box-office, and raises window. The American dramatists unanimously take cards from their pockets and form a line at the window.)

       Give me the left lower stage box.

       Nuthin' doin'.

       Take 'em off, Abe — we know you.

       (Regaining his breath.) You mean to say you don't recognize the profession?

       You got me, first time.

       (Disgustedly.) And they call this heaven!

       You'll have to see the boss about that.

       You'd better bet I'll see the boss, and what's more, I'll get you if I have to spend one week's royalties of "Seven Keys to Baldpate," and buy the theater.

       Well, what's the name of this greatest living dramatist? Maybe we don't want to see the show after all. There's only thirty-six possible dramatic situations, and I used all of them — at least all anybody else ever had used — so I don't see much use going to a show. Come on — what's his name?

       William Shakespeare.

       (Startled.) What's that?        You heard me, Mr. Shaw.

       But he's been dead longer than any of us.

       You'll have to see the boss about that too. I don't book the shows — I just take the money.

       Well, where is "the boss?"

       I can't just say, but it's about half-past seven, and from the rising temperature I guess he's not far off.
(Satan suddenly appears in the midst of them, in conventional Satanic garb, red tights, horns, and tail.)

       Gee, fellows, look. Here's Louis Morrison. Say, I shouldn't think they'd let you wear that make-up here.

       We'll cut out the joking from now on, You've all been laboring under the delusion that this is heaven. It isn't. It's hell, and I'm the Devil.

       Well, I'm damned!

       Precisely so.

       Why, how do you do, Mephisto. Don't you remember me? I gave you a lot of free advertising, you know. In fact, I might be regarded as your greatest press agent.

       Exactly — and you came about as near the truth as the rest of the press agents. You advertised me too strongly, and ever since, I've had to go around in this uncomfortable costume, or my own imps don't know me. You might at least have selected a cooler color than red. You've a lot to answer for.

       I don't see how you can blame me for the way the actors dressed the part.

       It all goes back to you. If you hadn't written the play there wouldn't have been the opportunity.

       There's gratitude for you! I wrote the original problem play, and the Devil doesn't even thank me for it!

       Serves you right! And besides, you have no business here anyhow. The rest of us are all moderns.

       Moderns! Why I was modern before the rest of you were born.
       (He retires sulkily to the rear.)

       (Goes up to Satan and taps him on the shoulder.) Say, do you think you can get away with this stuff about Shakespeare being the greatest living dramatist?

       That's the way we bill him. Seems to be the general opinion that he's a pretty live one yet.

       Huh! Just a scheme to get out of paying royalties. But I'll tip you off to one thing — you won't get much of a house from this crowd. We had to forget all Shakespeare knew before we could land K. & E. time.

       Oh, I'm not worrying about the business. The fact is, you haven't entire say in the matter. One of your duties as subjects of my dominion is to attend a Shakespearean play every evening.
       (A long pause.)

       (Sepuchrally.) This is hell!

       Then, when you have learned the first principles of the drama, you will be required to witness your own plays in rotation.

       (Plaintively.) Excuse me, but am I to understand that I will have to sit through performances of American plays?

       (Inexorably and with a cruel grin.) You will, but just imagine the revenge you will have when the rest have to sit through "John Gabriel Borkman."
       (The dramatists gather in little groups and murmurs of rebellion are heard.) Come, come, gentlemen. There is no use holding back. The sooner you go in the sooner the show will start, and the sooner it will be over for the night. Remember, I'm all-powerful here. This is hell, you know.

       (The same thought occurring to each at the same time.) But if this is hell, where are the women?

       You gave them enough hell on earth.
       (The dramatists thoughtfully file into the theatre. Strindberg rushes around gnashing his teeth rapturously.) Hold on there — who let you in here? Any fool ought to know that it is heaven for you to see people in hell, and the only way to give you hell is to send you to heaven. (Sternly.) Back to your punishment.

       (Hysterically.) Don't, brother — how can you be so cruel to your blood relative?

       (Prods him with a trident and chases him out.) Away! Out of my sight! I couldn't stand hell myself with you around.
       (Strindberg's howls die away in the distance. Groans of agony are heard coming from the theater.)

       It does seem too bad, for they were all good friends of mine.