ns of becoming terribly monotonous." According
to him, in "Shaw there were the makings of a writer of talent."

Let us add that no evidence exists to show the decline of the author's
popularity; it may also be said that much of "G.B.S." is quite
incomprehensible to a foreigner. What Signor Borsa calls the
"restaurateurs-proprietors," and also the actor-managers--with a few
exceptions--may hold aloof, but Mr Shaw has brought to the theatres a
new public, and taken a good many of the old as well. Apparently Signor
Borsa's hostility to "G.B.S." is founded on the fact that the dramatist
is a revolutionary and refuses to accept the theatrical formulae which
satisfy the Italian. One must, however, point out that whilst Signor
Borsa's general conclusions concerning the most remarkable person of the
English theatre are unsound, his remarks in detail are acute and
luminous, and some of them well deserve the consideration of the victim.

The curiosity of the book is the treatment of the acting. According to
Signor Borsa, "the acting has little to boast of. A century, or even
half-a-century, ago the case was different. But the glories of Kean,
Macready, Kemble, and Siddons now belong to history and but yesterday
Sir Henry Irving stood alone--the unique representative in England of
the great tragic art.... In conveying irony, the English actor is in his
element; in comic parts, he is simply grotesque. The buffoon may
occasionally be found upon the English stage--the brilliant comedian
never. In tragic parts he easily assumes an exaggerated gravity and
solemnity; in sentimental _roles_ he is frankly ridiculous."

_Frankly_ is a mistranslation, or else the adjective is ridiculous, if
not "frankly" ridiculous. Signor Borsa falls into a very common error.
He thinks that because English actors do not gesticulate a great deal
they act badly. This might be true if they represented on the stage a
gesticulative race. The author points out carefully that we are not a
gesticulative race, and fails to see that it would be bad acting for the
player to represent an Englishman as being naturally gesticulative. The
English Jew is more gesticulative than the ordinary Englishman; the
Anglo-Jewish players--and there are many--curb themselves when they are
playing British characters, and of course they act artistically in so
doing.

The function of the actor is to impress the audience before him,
nine-tenths of which consist of people who would reg