Three Plays and a Pantomime. By George Calderon. (Grant Richards.
12s. 6d.)—The reputation of the late George Calderon is based most securely on his Tahiti, and it will scarcely be enhanced by this latest collection of his dramatic work. Three Plays and a Pantomime includes "Revolt," "The Fountain," an historical drama in verse, and the draft of a burlesque, which parodies the more obvious mannerisms of Ibsen. The burlesque is, however, amusing, and some of the dialogue in the two comedies shows the author as a shrewd observer and a humorist. With the lapse of a dozen years since the composition of the comedies their separate ingredients have become more noticeable, and the author's manner seems to be a composite of Shaw, Ibsen and Tchehov rather than a personal style. It is a virtue to have been aware of Tchehov so early, but it did not free Calderon from the sociological obsession of his period. The events in the first two plays come too pat on the heels of theory to be dramatically convincing. They are interesting relics of a long- dead past when bright young men used to attend meetings of the Fabian Society.
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