Irish Drama Arrives

Abstract

On 23 September (1901) I attended the one and only meeting of the committee of the Irish Literary Theatre;¹ and on 21 October its third and last season opened,² again in the Gaeity Theatre.³ Heretofore the actors had been chosen individually from the English stage; but on this occasion the main piece was put in the hands of the Benson Shakespearean Company. Diarmuid and Grania , the first title on the bill, was announced as under the joint authorship of W. B. Yeats and George Moore. The partnership was regarded by certain of Yeats’ admirers as a descent into Hades. But some consolation for the degradation of a spiritual poet to the companionship of a literary scavenger, as Moore was then considered, was attempted to be found in the hope that the fall of Yeats might bring about the redemption of Moore. Moments of poetry elicited the whispered exclamation, ‘Ah! that’s Willie.’ Other phrases were attributed to ‘dirty George’. But it came out, as a disturbing rumour, that the typical poetical Yeatsian patches were by Moore, and this typical Moorish splashes of realism were by Yeats. Be this as it may, some interchange of quality was apparent in the succeeding independent works of the collaborators. Moore passed from Esther Waters and bald ugliness to Evelyn Innes and beauty-spots; Yeats passed from The Countess Cathleen to heroic endeavours towards modernity in throwing chunks of ugliness into Deirdre.

We Two Together (Madras: Ganesh, 1950) pp. 62–5.