From: Arden Town (1913; Unpublished MS)
Author: Scott Nearing
Published:
The day’s work was over, but the day’s play was still to come. A plunge in the cool water lent a feeling of complete satisfaction after the strenuous physical exertion, and turned each one to the fun of the evening with a livelier sense of enjoyment.
“To-night you will see Shakespeare by lantern light,” Will Evans told Fred Allen at dinner. “It is children’s night, too. You are so fond of children that the coincidence should be doubly enjoyable for you.
“I would ask you how you manage to stage such difficult things as Shakespeare, but I know that you will answer that you do it yourselves,” said Fred Allen, with a rueful face. “What a wonderful deal of enjoyment you get out of doing it! What enjoyment I might get out of it too!” he added reflectively. “It has surpassed my fondest belief.”
“It’s only human nature,” laughed Will Evans. “Even admitting, for the sake of argument, the conservative contention that human nature doesn’t change, one can still be optimistic to the full, because it is already so full of splendid qualities that it is unnecessary to add more in order to establish a magnificently harmonious society.”
While they were talking Ruth Wade hurried into the dining-room and crossed to the table where they were sitting, with the question,—
“Uncle Will, where is that Shylock wig? We need it to-night.”
“Are you in this play too?” Fred Allen asked. “I need scarcely ask, though,” he went on, “since you are in everything.”
“Yes,” she said, laughing, “I am. I have a rather unimportant part, but I like it.”
“She is playing her usual role,” interrupted the captain, looking at her with earnest eyes. “She is Titania, Queen of the Fairies.”
“Ah!” cried Fred Allen, in an effort to mitigate the captain’s compliment, “‘Mid-summer Night’s Dream.’ It is my favorite Shakespeare, I think.”
“You came very near not seeing it to-night.” Ruth Wade said severely. “Until ten minutes ago we needed a prompter, but he turned up in the form of another unfortunate who knows the play very well; so you may serve to-night among those who only stand and wait—or watch, in this particular case.”
“Are you in the play?” Fred Allen asked of Will Evans.
“No,” was the reply, “only on the side lines. I am stage manager to-night.”
“He has more than his share now,” Ruth Wade interposed. “With Shylock, Mercutio, Mark Antony, and a few other minor roles, he has his dramatic leisure well occupied.”
Dinner was over. The sun had fallen among the banked clouds like a great red ball behind a range of snow-covered hills. Already the twilight was setting in. Crickets were chirping. Here and there the grating cry of a locust broke harshly on the still air. The current of Arden life turned toward the field theatre, where preparations for the play were being completed. Daintily attired children, with wings at their backs, flitted here and there; grown-ups, clad in their costumes, stood out in marked contrast to the purple green of the banked foliage. Fred Allen took his seat on the terraced bank in front of the stage, only to be called into action by the boy who was stringing up the Japanese lanterns.
“You wouldn’t mind lending a hand, would you?” queried the boy. “This is a hard job for one, and my pal’s gone for candles.”
Fred did not mind. Indeed he was glad to do what was wanted, despite the strenuous day, which had left a bruise or two, as well as an aching muscle here and there. So he helped to fix and light the lanterns, wondering, meanwhile, how his favorite comedy would fare at such crude hands out there under the stars. He did not remain long in doubt. A herald, clad in bright scarlet, stepped through one of the side entrances and read a brief announcement to the effect that a play called “Mid-summer Night’s Dream,” written by one Will Shakespeare, would be played for the benefit of the town. As he mentioned the name of each character, the player who was to take the part walked across the green turf that covered the stage.
As the last player left the stage, Fred Allen turned to look at the audience. The little amphitheatre was already crowded. Some people were sitting on the terrace, others on the row of benches which surrounded the open area, while many stood behind. Altogether there might be two or three hundred, Fred told himself. Then the play began, and he gave his attention to it unreservedly.
Clothed in bright colors, with costumes designed in the style of the Elizabethan age in England, the players grouped themselves artistically on the background of rocks and shrubs which set the limits of the stage. The lanterns spread a soft, yellow light over the whole, bringing out in shadowy detail the forms and costumes of the players. The voices floated sweetly on the night air. Once, in a pause of the dialogue, an owl hooted dismally in the trees behind the theatre, and a dog answered. Then the music of the players’ voices began again.
Fred Allen enjoyed it all—Bottom’s gruff tones; the sweet inconsequence with which a little child of five replied, “I am Pease-blossom; Puck’s antics; the splendor of Oberon; yet everywhere there floated across his vision the lovely Titania, gentle, full of grace, playing her part with an abandon and a force that would have drawn the applause of many an experienced critic. He knew that he had never seen anything so beautiful as her soft, white form. Her voice was music; her ways were magic. Wrapped in the ecstasy of it, he was scarcely aware that the play was over until the applause had died away, and a hum of voices had broken out around him.
He could not have told why, but the sweet play, given in the starlight by boys and girls, and men and women, who, knowing each other so well, turned to this as a form of pleasure in which all might happily join, moved him more than any theatre-staged play he had ever seen. The setting was so perfect, the acting so real, and the appeal of the thing so strong, that he could not shake it off, even while he danced with Ruth Wade over at the Club House, complimenting her, furtively, almost bashfully, on the beauty of her part. All evening the spell held him, and when the dance broke up, he went home to dream of a gentle Titania watching over him and lulling him to sounder slumbers.
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