ention that there are no allegories in any of my
plays.

An allegory I take to be a dig at something local and limited, such as
politics, while outwardly appearing to tell of things on some higher
plane. But, far from being the _chef d'oeuvre_ of some ponderously
profound thinker, I look on the allegory, if I have rightly defined it,
as being the one form of art that is narrowly limited in its application
to life. When the man whose cause it championed has been elected
alderman, when the esplanade has been widened, or the town better
lighted or drained, the allegory's work must necessarily be over; but
the truth of all other works of art is manifold and should be eternal.

Though there is no such land as the Golden Isles and was never any such
king as Hamaran, yet all that we write with sincerity is true, for we
can reflect nothing that we have not seen, and this we interpret with
our idiosyncracies when we attempt any form of art.

I set some store by the way in which the three lines about Zarabardes
are recited, though it is hard to explain in writing a matter of rhythm.
But the heartlessness of it can be indicated by a clear pronunciation of
the syllables, as though the people that utter these words had long been
drilled in a formula.

The third play, "Cheezo," tells of one of those rare occasions when it
is permissible for an artist, and may be a duty, to leave his wider art
in order to attack a definite evil. And the invention of "great new
foods" is often a huge evil.

"Cheezo" is a play of Right and Wrong, and Wrong triumphs. Were not this
particular Wrong triumphing at this particular date I should not have
thought it a duty to attack it, and were it easily defeated it would not
have been worth attacking.

I have seen it acted with a Stage Curate, rather weak and a little
comic; obviously such a man could be no match for Sladder. Hippanthigh
should be of stronger stuff than that: he is defeated because that
particular evil is, as I have said, defeating its enemies at present.
Nor could there be any drama in a contest between the brutal Sladder and
a Stage Curate; for the spark that we call humour, by whose light we see
much of life, comes as it were of two flints, and not of a flint and
cheese.

The three little plays that follow I will leave to speak for themselves,
as ultimately all plays have to do.

DUNSANY

CONTENTS