. The life and art of Edwin Booth and his contemporaries . Charles I. was produced, and in thisagain Mr. Irving scored a triumph, not so great asthe first, perhaps, but no less remarkable in view ofthe versatility displayed. Whereas in the part ofMathias he had wrought the profoundest impressionby his portrayal of the frenzies of despairing guilt, henow compelled admiration by the dignity and mourn-ful tenderness with which he played the luckless old faults were manifest, but in a less painfuldegree, and the artistic repose and pathos of theimpersonation awakened profound admiration.
. The life and art of Edwin Booth and his contemporaries . Charles I. was produced, and in thisagain Mr. Irving scored a triumph, not so great asthe first, perhaps, but no less remarkable in view ofthe versatility displayed. Whereas in the part ofMathias he had wrought the profoundest impressionby his portrayal of the frenzies of despairing guilt, henow compelled admiration by the dignity and mourn-ful tenderness with which he played the luckless old faults were manifest, but in a less painfuldegree, and the artistic repose and pathos of theimpersonation awakened profound admiration. InApril, 1873, Mr. Irving added Eugene Aram to histheatrical portrait gallery, and again the actor wassuccessful, but his success in this was less astonishing,as the character, although widely different from thatof Mathias, was manifestly easily within the resourcesof the actor who had created the latter part. In 1873, Mr. Irving made the bold experiment ofplaying Richelieu, and the storm of criticism ragedonce more. That the performance was exceedingly. HENRY IRVINGAs Mathias in The Bells. MR. HENRY IRVING. 137 clever, elaborated with rare skill and keen intellectualinsight, was generally conceded, but the lack of trueemotional power in the most trying scenes was clearlyshown, especially when the inevitable comparison wasmade with the performances of men like Macreadyand Phelps. The play ran for more than one hun-dred nights, but the representation cannot be classedamong Mr. Irvings triumphs. The next Lyceumplay was Philip, and then in the autumn of 1874 took the boldest step of his career and playedHamlet. By this time the critics had resolved them-selves into two bodies. To the one party everythingdone by Mr. Irving was the work of supreme genius—to the other his claims to eminence in tragedy seemedpreposterous. A furious battle was waged in thepublic prints over his Dane, and the bitterness of thedisputants, as in the case of Fechter, only tended toincrease publ
Size: 1342px × 1862px
Photo credit: © Reading Room 2020 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookidlifeartofedw, bookyear1906
