of No Importance_, he allowed this gift to run away
with him to such an extent that the opening acts of both pieces contain
many speeches lifted from his notebooks, seemingly, and placed
arbitrarily in the mouths of sundry persons of the play: some of the
speeches could quite as well have been spoken by others. This
constituted a defect which might have seriously militated against the
success of those dramas had they not possessed in full measure brilliant
qualities of genuine constructive play-making. The theme, after all,
was there, once it was started; and so was the deft handling. But
dialogue not motivated by character or necessitated by story is always
an injury, and much drama to-day suffers from this fault. The producer
of the play declares that its tone is too steadily serious and demands
the insertion of some humor to lighten it, and the playwright, poor,
helpless wight, yields, though he knows he is sinning against the Holy
Ghost of his art. Or perhaps the play is too short to fill the required
time and so padding is deemed necessary;[B] or it may be that the
ignorance or short-sightedness of those producing the play will lead
them to confuse the interests of the chief player with that of the piece
itself; and so a departure from theme follows, and unity be sacrificed.
That is what unity means: sticking to theme.

And unity of story, be sure, waits on unity of theme. This insistence
upon singleness of purpose in a play, clinging to it against all
allurements, does not imply that what is known as a subplot may not be
allowed in a drama. It was common in the past and can still be seen
to-day, though the tendency of modern technic is to abandon it for the
sake of greater emphasis upon the main plot and the resulting tightening
of the texture, avoiding any risk of a splitting of interest. However, a
secondary or subplot in the right hands--as we see it in Shakespeare's
_Merchant of Venice_, or, for a modern instance, in Pinero's _Sweet
Lavender_--is legitimate enough. Those who manipulate it with success
will be careful to see that the minor plot shall never appear for a
moment to be major; and that both strands shall be interwoven into an
essential unity of design, which is admirably illustrated in
Shakespeare's comedy just mentioned.

Have a theme then, let it be quite your own, and stick to it, is a
succinct injunction which every dramatist will do well to heed and the
critic in the seat will do well to dema