Excerpt from The Appreciation of the Drama With you in mind I have written this book, in token of the love we have in common for the theater. Whether we know it from behind the Curtain or solely from the Front, we love it for the spell that it wove about our wonder as children and around our hearts and understanding in later years, and that to the last shall haunt our imagination. We love it alike for the laughter and the tears that it has wrung from us; as well for drowning of care as for stimulus to thought; scarcely less for its parodies on men and things than for its enrichment of our knowledge of and zest in life, for the broadening of our sympathy with all sorts and conditions of humanity. Aye, we love it, when it transports us to the heights of spiritual imagination, or tips us on the see-saw of folly, or draws us down through dark places of sin and sorrow. That it is but a scene of painted illusion, trod by shadows of the real, we know, and for that reason believe in it the more. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.