Because of the easy accessibility
of Dion Boucicault's "The Octoroon; or, Life in Louisiana," it was
thought best to omit this Irish-American playwright, whose jovial
prolixity enriched the American stage of the '60's and '70's. His
"London Assurance" is included in the present Editor's collection of
"Representative British Dramas: Victorian and Modern."
Of more historical significance than Joseph Jefferson's final version of
"Rip Van Winkle," are the two texts upon which Boucicault and Jefferson
based their play. It has been possible to offer the reader a comparative
arrangement of the John Kerr and Charles Burke dramatizations.
In the choice of Steele Mackaye's "Paul Kauvar; or, Anarchy" a period is
illustrated which might be described as transitional. Executors of the
Augustin Daly estate are not ready to allow any of Daly's original plays
or adaptations to be published. The consequence is "Paul Kauvar" must
stand representative of the eighteen-eighty fervour of Lester Wallack,
A.M. Palmer, and Daly, who were in the Mackaye tradition.
Oliver Bunce's "Love in '76" has been selected for the same reason that
one might select Clyde Fitch's Revolutionary or Civil War
pieces--because of its bloodless character; because it is one of the
rare parlour comedies of the period.
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