minutes of a well-constructed drama, it may be noticed,
are generally devoted to some incident, interesting or amusing in
itself, preferably external so as to catch the eye, but not too vital,
and involving, as a rule, minor characters, without revealing anything
really crucial in the action. The matter presented thus is not so much
important as action that leads up to what is important; and its lack of
importance must not be implied in too barefaced a way, lest attention be
drawn to it. This part of the play marks time, and yet is by way of
preparation for the entrance of the main character or characters.

Much skill is needed, and has been developed, in regard to the
marshaling of the precedent conditions: to which the word _exposition_
has been by common consent given. Exposition to-day is by no means what
it was in Shakespeare's; indeed, it has been greatly refined and
improved upon. In the earlier technic this prefatory material was
introduced more frankly and openly in the shape of a prologue; or if the
prologue was not used, at least the information was conveyed directly
and at once to the audience by means of minor characters, stock figures
like the servant or confidante, often employed mainly, or even solely,
for that purpose. This made the device too obvious for modern taste, and
such as to injure the illusion; the play lost its effect of presenting
truthfully a piece of life, just when it was particularly important to
seem such; that is, at the beginning. For with the coming of the subtler
methods culminating in the deft technic of an Ibsen, which aims to draw
ever closer to a real presentation of life on the stage, and so strove
to find methods of depiction which should not obtrude artifice except
when unavoidable, the stage artist has learned to interweave these
antecedent circumstances with the story shown on the stage before the
audience. And the result is that to-day the exposition of an Ibsen, a
Shaw, a Wilde, a Pinero or a Jones is so managed as hardly to be
detected save by the expert in stage mechanics. The intelligent
play-goer will derive pleasure and profit from a study of Ibsen's growth
in this respect; observing, for example, how much more deftly exposition
is hidden in a late work like _Hedda Gabler_ than in a comparatively
early one like _Pillars of Society_; and, again, how bald and obvious
was this master's technic in this respect when he began in the middle
of the nineteenth century to write