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Prologues precede the piece in mournful verse,
As undertakers walk before the hearse.
Prologues precede the piece in mournful verse,
As undertakers walk before the hearse.
Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's read more
Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks;
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's you: the table is the place:
The carvers we: the prologue is the grace.
Each act, a course, each scene, a different dish,
Though we're in Lent, I doubt you're still for flesh.
Satire's the sauce, high-season'd, sharp and rough.
Kind masks and beaux, I hope you're pepperproof?
Wit is the wine; but 'tis so scarce the true
Poets, like vintners, balderdash and brew.
Your surly scenes, where rant and bloodshed join.
Are butcher's meat, a battle's sirloin:
Your scenes of love, so flowing, soft and chaste,
Are water-gruel without salt or taste.
Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.
Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.
As good as a play.
As good as a play.
There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.
There still remains to mortify a wit
The many-headed monster of the pit.
See, how these rascals use me! They will not let my play run;
and yet they steal my thunder.
See, how these rascals use me! They will not let my play run;
and yet they steal my thunder.
But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
read more
But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
The Artist is a rare, rare breed. There were but two, forsooth,
In all me time (the stage's prime!) and The Other One was Booth.
And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As read more
And Tragedy should blush as much to stoop
To the low mimic follies of a farce,
As a grave matron would to dance with girls.
