A People's---Chaste
word, it will bring forth no adjective. The plays of A People's
Theatre are People's plays. The plays of A People's Theatre are
plays about people.
It doesn't look much, at first sight. After all--people! Yes,
People! Not THE PEOPLE, _i.e._ Plebs, nor yet the Upper Ten.
People. Neither Piccoli nor Grandi in our republic. People.
People, ah God! Not mannequins. Not lords nor proletariats nor
bishops nor husbands nor co-respondents nor virgins nor adultresses
nor uncles nor noses. Not even white rabbits nor presidents. People.
Men who are somebody, not men who are something. Men who HAPPEN to
be bishops or co-respondents, women who happen to be chaste, just as
they happen to freckle, because it's one of their innumerable odd
qualities. Even men who happen, by the way, to have long noses.
But not noses on two legs, not burly pairs of gaiters, stuffed and
voluble, not white meringues of chastity, not incarnations of co-
respondence. Not proletariats, petitioners, president's, noses, bits
of fluff. Heavens, what an assortment of bits! And aren't we sick
of them!
People, I say. And after all, it's saying something. It's harder to
be a human being than to be a president or a bit of fluff. You can
be a president, or a bit of fluff, or even a nose, by clockwork.
Given a role, a PART, you can play it by clockwork. But you can't
have a clockwork human being.
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