584
PARTISAN REVIEW
At this point in the story of his adventures Mr. Eliot seems to tremble on
the verge of a real understanding of poetic drama, as distinguished
from the versified play. But he does not attempt to explore his in–
sights any further. Instead he turns to the more immediate, superficial,
and pressing problem of putting himself across on the contemporary
stage at all; from the deeper strategy of his development as a dramatist,
to tactics; in short, to the making of
The Cocktail Party.
In devising
The Cocktail Party
he resolved, to begin with, to have
"no chorus and no ghosts." He again used a Greek story-that of
Euripides'
Alcestis-but
transformed it so completely that no one but
himself has recognized Reilly, the convivial psychiatrist and good–
natured Christian, as Herakles' spiritual heir. It was necessary to his
conception of poetic drama that the play be in verse, but as he
explains, "I laid down for myself the ascetic rule to avoid poetry which
could not stand the test of strict dramatic utility: with such success,
indeed, that it is perhaps an open question whether there is any
poetry in the play at all." In this passage he seems to imply a distinc–
tion between verse and poetry, but not to suspect that there might be
any poetry in the drama itself.
Mr. Eliot says that he is still exploring the weaknesses of this play,
and perhaps his critics should emulate him in this respect, and not try to
estimate
The Cocktail Party
until it has had time to sink in. But on the
evidence of the Broadway performance and this account of its genesis,
The Cocktail Party
looks to me like the momentary triumph of Mr.
Eliot's ingenuity over his poetry. Just because of this ingenuity the
play is fascinating to watch, as a good mystery-thriller is. But the
mystery, or puzzle, is the author's: how will Mr. Eliot bootleg
his Christian message into our unsuspecting show-shops?
As
for
the play onstage-the play between the characters--it is thin, patchy in
style, and unconvincing. The first act moves amusingly enough, on the
serviceable principles of parlor comedy; but compared with virtuoso–
pieces of this kind-with
Private Lives,
for example- it is pedestrian
and creaky.
If
the second act were to succeed as a play, we should have
to be able to take the characters and their problems seriously; for this
act purports to show the conversions, or changes of heart, of three
suffering human creatures. This we do not see; but we do begin to dis–
cern the philosophy, or moral of the tale, and its emergence is interesting
to watch. The third act is the weakest: we are in another clattering
(though somewhat discouraged) cocktail party with the same char–
acters; and the sensational results of sanctity, with which the story
ends, are reported over the martinis. The conception of this art seems to
