16 JULY 1892, Page 26

Playhouse Impressions. By A. B. Walkley. (T. Fisher Unwin.) —Mr.

Walkley's " impressions " are reprinted from two weekly and one evening paper. They show a great deal of honest and appreciative criticism of the more modern type, and are often good reading. Mr. Walkley occasionally makes a good point in analysing a character, so as to indicate wherein it succeeds and wherein it fails. His sketches, however, are naturally impres- sionist, and no doubt read better in an ephemeral form than

they do collected in a volume. Their great value seems to us to be the vigorous descriptions of plot and motif, for the aim of

the modern dramatist is not always immediately grasped by the audience, who go to be amused more than to follow the author through a psychological study.