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only to be plunged back into despairing madness. But this is not the end. Hope arrives with Cordelia and the French power, but, unlike Macbeth where the tyrant is removed and Scotland restored to peace, in Lear this last throw fails too, and Lear and Cordelia are seized by the triumphant evil-doers. There is no easy release for them or for our natural instinct for justice and virtue's final victory. Dr Johnson confessed that he could not accept the tragic ending of the play and preferred Tate's 'happy' version. But this is to miss the point of the play. If virtue and goodness inevitably do win, they then lose their intrinsic value and only serve human ends. People will be good only for what advantage it will bring, not because they should be. The acme of charity is not that a man should offer his life, but actually lose it for his friend. So Lear and Cordelia die. And poor Lear dies asking, in effect, the ultimate question implicit in the whole play-what is the good of goodness ?
'Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, And thou no breath at all ?'
Perhaps Hazlitt was right in saying that in Lear Shakespeare was 'the most in earnest'. Certainly, it is a most difficult play to put on, with its deep theme, its poetry and the feverish pace of its action. In a very true sense one cannot enjoy King Lear, but rather recognize its unpalatable truths. It is a harsh, cruel play and there is no easy refuge in it for the producer. It must stand or fall oil its sheer quality, not on any incidental attractiveness. If it does not cut cleanly to the bone, it does not merely blunt, but shatters into fragments.
Fr Armishaw must have calculated his purpose, despite this, in the knowledge that lie had at his disposal as good a company of actors as any schoolmaster call hope to find at once. As a group, they really were outstanding. It showed in many ways in the faultless knowledge of lines--an
elementary but rare achievement ; in the precise taking of cues ; in the easy use of the stage ; in the ability to make a dramatic pause without appearing to have forgotten a line ; in the natural stance and placing of hands and feet ; in the timing of words and gestures. All these were apparent. But these things, important as they are, are yet incidental. The real test lies in the portrayal of characters and their reactions upon one another.
Clearly, the play depends above all on Lear himself and in this role V. Round was splendid. It is an extraordinarily difficult part, quite apart from its sheer physical strain. But the real difficulty is in the portrayal of the progressive transition from a self-willed, vigorous old king, through madness to a pitiable, helpless and chastened man, 'more sinned against that sinning'.
Round carried off the task with enormous conviction and quite captivated his audience. His scene at the beginning, disclaiming Cordelia, was full of fine anger and indignation. His encounter with Regan and Goneril when they refuse him his retinue, was skilfully done, showing authority lapsing into petulance, dignity into senility and vigour into the beginnings of madness. It is this constant ebb and flow of Lear's moods and faculties which make the part so demanding and which Round was able to convey so well. One recalls well the mock-trial scene, too-an excellent passage. And in the critical encounter between Lear and Gloucester, Round proved that he can hold an audience spell-bound. Again, it was 'matter and impertinency mixed' and filled with pathos accordingly. The final scene with Cordelia he played with the quiet dignity it asks and the contrast with the irascible figure at the beginning of the play was complete. A producer can guide and inspire, but it is still the quality of the actor which counts most and which will make a good performance or one that is