Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Introduction and Bibliography — Context and Discussion

Editorial Principles and Textual Authority

Moses explicitly states his “original basis of selection”: to include only plays not readily available elsewhere. Yet he admits that “exactions of copyright have sometimes compelled him to depart from this rule.” This tension between ideal and practice is a recurring note. For instance, he includes George Henry Boker’s “Francesca da Rimini” and Bronson Howard’s “Shenandoah” because “no anthology of the present historical scope… can disregard” them. In the case of Langdon Mitchell’s “The New York Idea,” Moses offers a text “completely revised by the author,” which Mitchell wished to be “regarded as the correct version.” Such details underscore Moses’s concern for textual fidelity and his role as an editor who negotiates between competing editions.

The Structure of the Anthology: From Rip to Belasco

The table of contents moves chronologically from Charles Burke’s 1850 “Rip Van Winkle” to David Belasco’s 1911 “The Return of Peter Grimm.” This span of sixty-one years is bridged by plays that shift from legend and historical drama to social realism. Moses includes a “Comparative Arrangement with the Kerr Version” for “Rip Van Winkle,” signaling a scholarly apparatus that invites readers to compare dramatizations. The list of authors and their plays, appended as a bibliography, provides production dates and venues—from the Arch Street Theatre in 1881 to the Lyceum Theatre in 1885—creating a geographical and temporal map of American theatre. This structure allows readers to trace the movement of plays across cities and decades.

Recurring Images: The Theatre as a Living Archive

Throughout the introduction, Moses treats the theatre as a repository of ephemeral artifacts: “original playbills,” “portraits,” and manuscripts that are “for the first time made available.” He mentions that some plays were “known to be scheduled for this collection” but were preempted by other editors, a detail that casts the anthology as part of a larger, sometimes contentious, effort to preserve American drama. The bibliography for each playwright lists not only published works but also “plays that have never been acted,” such as Bronson Howard’s “Knave & Queen.” This inclusion of unperformed texts suggests that Moses values the written record over stage success, reinforcing the image of the anthology as a library of dramatic literature rather than a performance guide.

Movement Between Plays: From Boucicault to Belasco

Moses’s decision to omit Dion Boucicault’s “The Octoroon” because of its “easy accessibility” illustrates his principle of avoiding duplication. Yet he acknowledges Boucicault’s “jovial prolixity” and notes that his “London Assurance” appears in a companion volume. This cross-referencing creates a network of anthologies. The introduction also moves between plays by noting their sources: Steele Mackaye’s “Paul Kauvar” is listed alongside “Anarchy,” its earlier title, and “Dakolar” is “based on Georges Ohnet’s ‘Le Maitre de Forges.’” Such details reveal how American dramatists adapted European works, a pattern that Moses traces without commentary, letting the bibliography speak for itself.

Readers approaching this volume should treat the introduction and bibliography as a guide to the editor’s choices rather than a comprehensive history. Moses’s candid remarks about omitted plays and revised texts offer a behind-the-scenes view of anthologizing in the 1920s. The bibliography, with its lists of productions and unpublished works, rewards those who wish to trace the movement of a single playwright across theatres or to compare the textual history of a play like “The New York Idea.”

Reading Moses's careful sorting of old plays made me think of my grandfather’s shelves, where brittle volumes waited like sleeping friends. His Representative Plays feels like that—a quiet, patient hand restoring fragments. The same tenderness surfaced when I later found The Romance of a Princess: A Comedy; and Other Poems — Context and Discussion, another forgotten voice asking only to be listened to once more. Strange how anthologies hold echo chambers for our own pasts.