"Theatrical" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... they had a less lively fear of mice, and they were not so apt to be out of health and to want their meals sent up; they ate more, but they did not waste so much, and they never did any sort of washing in their rooms. Cornelia did not know who or what some of them were; but she made sure of a theatrical manager; two or three gentlemen in different branches of commerce; a newspaper writer of some sort, and an oldish gentleman who had been with Mrs. Montgomery a great while, and did not seem to be anything but a gentleman boarder, pure and simple. They were all very civil and quiet, ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... Dream,' which the audience had besought of him. The hall remained thrilled and breathless under this impaired and yet sovereign voice. All yielded in rapt astonishment to the spell. There was no prestige, no theatrical illusion. Iphigenia was a professor in a black frock coat; the orchestra was a piano, giving forth here and there an unexpected modulation. This was his whole force; yet the hall was mute, hearts beat, tears flowed from many eyes, and when the recital ended, enthusiastic shouts arose, as if Iphigenia ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... while Fritz von Uhde or Lhermitte put the Christ in a country school, in a workingman's house, the weakling writers, imitating poets, dress Him in old, faded, traditional clothes and surround Him with a theatrical light which they dare to call "mysticism." They are crowding the porticos of the temple, but they are merely merchants. Anatole France alone cannot be placed ...
— So Runs the World • Henryk Sienkiewicz,
... pain; my left ankle was badly sprained, in addition to various minor scratches and bruises. There was a revulsion of feeling, of course— instant, complete, and hideous. I fairly hated the Unknown. "Fool that I was!" I exclaimed, in the theatrical manner, dashing the palm of my hand softly against my brow: "lured to this by the fair traitress! But, no!—not fair: she shows the artfulness of faded, desperate spinsterhood; she is all compact of enamel, 'liquid bloom ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... fellow-men, and his art, would scarcely seem well qualified to take up sacred subjects. But criticism is entirely and hopelessly divided on the question, for while some authorities hold that he made of the awful scene of the Crucifixion a merely historical and decidedly theatrical procession, other authorities maintain that he preserved in that 'great composition' 'repose and dignity, ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler
... Charles Lamb set came to lodge at No. 9, half-way down on the right-hand side as you come from Holborn. There for four years lived, taught, wrote, and suffered that admirable essayist, fine-art and theatrical critic, thoughtful metaphysician, and miserable man, William Hazlitt. He lodged at the house of Mr. Walker, a tailor, who was blessed with two fair daughters, with one of whom (Sarah) Hazlitt, then ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... the stage; and it is amusing to fancy the little tobacconist, snuff-box in hand, calmly watching the pit fill, or from his elevated position admiring the histrionic talents of his gifted patron. His shop in Fleet street is also memorable. It was the general resort of theatrical men and tyros, who sought to reach the manager through his subordinates, and his little back parlor witnessed the debut of many who afterwards gained applause from larger, though ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... era of the British Stage, Mr. Hazlit was engaged as theatrical reporter to the Morning Chronicle, newspaper, then conducted by Mr. Perry, and printed on the exact site of the MIRROR office: in his Table Talk he gives the following portraiture of ...
— Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 276 - Volume 10, No. 276, October 6, 1827 • Various
... about as close to bed rock as a girl could be, my husband said to her: 'Madge, if the managers won't give you a hearing, why don't you try some of those agencies in the Pittman Building in Longacre Square? I see all sorts of musical and theatrical agencies' signs on the windows.' Bless us, if the very first one to which she applied didn't give her the position that indirectly led her straight to the Metropolitan! Some one connected with one of the biggest ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... that it means," continued Kathleen, raising her voice to a slightly theatrical pitch, and extending her arm so that the lamplight fell all over it—"the chief thing that it means is to be free—yes, free as the air, free as the mountain streams, free as the dear, darling, glorious, everlasting mountains themselves. Oh, to know freedom and then to be torn away from it! Girls, ...
— The Rebel of the School • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... matter, such as the enormous number of Ministers in the new Government, which was formed, if I remember rightly, as a protest against too large a Cabinet; such as the colossal genius of each and every performer in Mr. COCHRANE'S theatrical companies; such as the best place in Oxford Street to contract the shopping habit; such as the breaks made day by day all through the War by billiard champions; such as the departure of Mr. G.B. SHAW on his bewildering and, one would think, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 28, 1917 • Various
... went on; "I do not feel at all inclined, from what little I know of Rivarez, to intrust him with all the party's secrets. He seems to me feather-brained and theatrical. To give the whole management of a party's contraband work into a man's hands is a serious matter. Fabrizi, what do ...
— The Gadfly • E. L. Voynich
... girl's observant eyes some of the papers appeared to be of a legal or official character, and others like bills of lading, with which she was familiar. Their half-theatrical exhibition reminded her of some play she had seen; they might be the clue to some story, or the mere worthless hoardings of a diseased fancy. Whatever they were, de Ferrieres did not apparently care to explain further; indeed, the next moment his manner changed to ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte
... moment in total darkness. Then with a sudden burst of illumination, a marvellous glow of a deep violet color shot over the whole room, and the two men turned and faced each other both with inquiry in their looks, so unexpected was this theatrical effect to the one, and so inexplicable its cause and purpose ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... amuse themselves with theatrical converse, arising out of their last half-price visit to the Victoria gallery, admire the terrific combat, which is nightly encored, and expatiate on the inimitable manner in which Bill Thompson can 'come the double monkey,' or go through the mysterious ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... this man, and for him there never existed that greatest danger to authors (a danger which for a long time menaced his great rival Henrik Ibsen), namely, that of having his name shrouded in silence. Even as a very young author, as a theatrical critic and political writer, he had entered the field of literature with such an eagerness for combat that a rumbling noise arose about him wherever he appeared. Like his own Thorbjoern in 'Synnoeve Solbakken,' he displayed in early youth the combative tendency of the athlete; but like his Sigurd ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... fairies to deck her bowers with all the splendor of earth and ocean. Like poor Amy Robsart, in the solitary halls of Cumnor. Bengal Lights, kindled in these beautiful retreats, produce an effect more gorgeous than any theatrical representation of fairyland; but they smoke the pure white incrustations, and the guide is therefore very properly reluctant to have them used. The reflection from the shining walls is so strong, that lamplight ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... France, the unruly, feared; Little for all her witcheries endeared; Theatrical of arrogance, a sprite With gaseous vapours overblown, In her conceit of power ensphered, Foredoomed to violate and atone; Her the grim conqueror's iron might Avengeing clutched, distrusting rent; Not that sharp intellect with fire ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... be grasped by even the gluttonous eye of the managers, The Adelphi might overflow—the Surrey might quake with reiterated "pitsfull"—still there remained over and above the feast-crumbs sufficient for the battenings of other than theatrical appetites. Immediately the press-gang—we beg pardon, the press—arose, and with a mighty throe spawned many monsters. Great drama! Greater ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 30, 1841 • Various
... extension. The Staff are lodged in a house considerably the worse for German occupancy, where offices have been improvised by means of wooden hoardings, and where, sitting in a bare passage on a frayed damask sofa surmounted by theatrical posters and faced by a bed with a plum-coloured counterpane, we listened for a while to the jingle of telephones, the rat-tat of typewriters, the steady hum of dictation and the coming and going of hurried despatch-bearers and orderlies. The ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton
... half-white, "Bill Ragsdale," whom I mentioned in one of my earlier letters, and who is certainly the most "notorious" man in Hilo. He has a remarkable gift of eloquence, both in English and Hawaiian: a combination of pathos, invective, and sarcasm; and his manner, though theatrical, is considered perfect by his native admirers. His moral character, however, has been very low, which makes the outburst of feeling at ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... the poor simple knight (in his dream), and offered his services to polish the corslet up a bit against that great occasion. He pointed toward his forge, and the knight marched to it, in three wide steps that savored strongly of theatrical burlesque. But the moment he saw the specimens of Henry's work lying about, he drew back, and wheeled upon the man of the day with huge disdain. "What," said he, "do you forge toys! Learn that a gentleman can only forge those weapons ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... Burbage in Finsbury Fields, just north of London. It was in this theater that Shakespeare probably found employment when he first came to the city. The success of this venture was immediate, and the next thirty years saw a score of theatrical companies, at least seven regular theaters, and a dozen or more inn yards permanently fitted for the giving of plays,—all established in the city and its immediate suburbs. The growth seems all the more remarkable when we remember that the London of those days would now be considered ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... continue my studies, and M. Baffo chose the Abbe Schiavo to teach me a pure Italian style, especially poetry, for which I had a decided talent. I was very comfortably lodged with my brother Francois, who was studying theatrical architecture. My sister and my youngest brother were living with our grandam in a house of her own, in which it was her wish to die, because her husband had there breathed his last. The house in which I dwelt was the same in which my father had died, and the rent of which my mother continued ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... your Attic salt? which of you can tell who was Jupiter's great- grandfather? or what metres will successively remain, if you take off the three first syllables, one by one, from a pure antispastic acatalectic tetrameter? Now, sir, there are three questions for you: theatrical, mythological, and metrical; to every one of which an Athenian would give an answer that would lay me prostrate in ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock
... ornamentation: Over a sacred fountain the walls of a theatre, with emblems of a theatrical nature and garlands of flowers and fruits, wine skins, tyrsus, torches, masks and musical ...
— Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome • Apicius
... penniless when the manager of a travelling theatrical company engaged him for a consideration ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau
... "A theatrical troupe is just leaving town—so there should be several empty rooms. A good many of them hang out there when in New York. There is one thing in your favor. Your—pardon me—beauty won't be so conspicuous in Bleecker Street as it would be in hotels. ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton
... and naked save for the slightest suggestion of covering about her waist and bust, was the centre of attraction. For five minutes she held the crowd spell-bound with a dance so beautifully sensual no theatrical manager would have dared present it. Yet it was received by the only burst of applause which broke the monotony ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... tyranny of Squeers and his wife, especially to a poor boy named Smike. Smike runs away from the school to follow Nicholas, and remains his humble follower till death. At Portsmouth, Nicholas joins the theatrical company of Mr. Crummles, but leaves the profession for other adventures. He falls in with the brothers Cheeryble, who make him their clerk; and in this post he rises to become a merchant, and ultimately marries ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... John.—Retrospections of America, 1797-1811. Harper and Brothers, New York, 1887. One volume. Bernard was famous in his time as a comedian and one of the earliest American managers of theatrical companies. He visited Virginia in 1799 and made many excursions to the homes of the wealthy planters. He thus had an opportunity to see the inner life of the most refined class of the state. His descriptions ...
— Patrician and Plebeian - Or The Origin and Development of the Social Classes of the Old Dominion • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... revival of old religion or theosophy. From all this, fascinating as it might actually be to one side of his character, he was kept by a genuine virility there, effective in him, among other results, as a hatred of what was theatrical, and the instinctive recognition that in vigorous intelligence, after all, divinity was most likely to be found a resident. With this was connected the feeling, increasing with his advance to manhood, ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... more remote, however, for, starting from New York, he had a continent to traverse before embarking for the shores that held for him an uncertain welcome. To test his ability to interest an audience, to "try it on the dog," as they say in theatrical parlance, he subjected himself to the severest test possible, crossed to Randall's Island and read before a company of boys. Unsophisticated by the lecturer's reputation as a humorist, the boys proved to be the organs of sincerest testimony to the permanence of the old ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... To teach him patience, teach him tact, How promptly in a fix to act, He should adopt, in point of fact, A manager's profession. To that condition he should stoop (Despite a too fond mother), With eight or ten "stars" in his troupe, All jealous of each other! Oh, the man who can rule a theatrical crew, Each member a genius (and some of them two), And manage to humour them, little and great, Can govern ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... other first if he could. I knew that Fairfax was the greater coward—not that there was much to choose between them—and I also knew that he was the injured person. That is really all there is about it. My somewhat theatrical statement to you was based upon probability, and not upon any certain foreknowledge. As ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... reading of Dickens in the "Oliver Twist" murder scene unite in testifying to the wonderful effect he produced in it. Old theatrical habitues have told me that, since the days of Edmund Kean and Cooper, no mimetic representation had been superior to it. I became so much interested in all I heard about it, that I resolved early in the ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... theatrical representations to you; which are excellent at Paris. The tragedies of Corneille and Racine, and the comedies of Moliere, well attended to, are admirable lessons, both for the heart and the head. There ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... filled with a miscellaneous collection of theatrical properties all lying loose—showy necklaces, chains, pendants, all of them obviously false; but lying beneath them, and partially hidden by the meretricious ornaments, were one or two boxes covered with velvet such as jewellers use. My keen eyes noted ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... of the efforts he had made for the advantage of his country, he grew very excited, walking hastily up and down the room with theatrical attitudes and declamation, which he evidently fancied had the effect of imposing on his listener; but, alas! for the vanity of man, it only made him appear ridiculous; the mocassins sadly marred the ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... self-confession, self-discipline and of making fun of itself, it naturally follows that with Labor in the same undeveloped state, the President's Conference was mainly valuable as a national dramatization,—a rather loud and theatrical acting out before an amazed people of the fact that Capital and Labor in this country as institutions were as petulant, as incapable, as full of fear, superstitions and childishness about one another as the monotonous strikes and lockouts they have dumped on us, ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... "The theatrical gentlemen have a confident hope of its success. I know not that any alterations for the stage will be necessary; if any, they will be trifling, and you shall be duly apprised. I would suggest that you should not attend ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... these literary and dramatic associations of Brompton Square, Liston resided for some time at No. 40, Mr. Yates and Mr. John Reeve at 57 and 58; and that pair of comic theatrical gems, Mr. and Mrs. Keeley, have been inhabitants of ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... against another, and which were carried through with the pomp and circumstance of war, colours flying, bugles sounding, and long lines charging elaborately planned intrenchments, were a constant source of amusement, except to unpopular officers. Theatrical and musical performances enlivened the tedium of the long evenings; and when, by the glare of the camp-fires, the band of the 5th Virginia broke into the rattling quick-step of "Dixie's Land," not the least stirring of national anthems, and the great concourse of grey-jackets took ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... to the French Protestant Church, the place in which the famous Saurin delivered his eloquent discourses. The congregation was thin; my emotions and recollections of Saurin contrasted with the present preacher and congregation. The pulpit was at the side; the form of the church was amphi-theatrical. I noticed old Bibles, and Psalms; the text was Luke xxiii 27-28. A moderate preacher, calm, solemn and graceful; baptisms after the service. Went from the French to the English Church; only fifteen persons were present, including ourselves. I spoke to the clergyman ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... could not bear to be parted from a friend who was going to Paris. He was anxious, he told his brothers quaintly, to study various arts and sciences there. In Paris he kept a journal for about three weeks; it records attendance upon a single lecture in botany and seventeen theatrical performances. Naturally his brothers could only see that he was an amiable, idle young fellow, who had drifted into a dilettante attitude toward life, and showed little promise of usefulness. But idling as well as industry has to be judged ...
— Washington Irving • Henry W. Boynton
... honor." Marie Louise was not to leave Munich till the 19th of March. On the 18th she received a letter from her husband, brought by one of his equerries, the Baron of Saint Aignan. That evening there was a state dinner at the palace, a levee, and a theatrical representation. The next day, the 19th, the Empress was destined to suffer a heavy blow. She had brought with her from Vienna to Braunau, and from Braunau to Munich, her grand mistress, a confidential friend, a woman who had had faithful charge of her ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... turnkey led the way along a great stone corridor to a little central patio with flowers and a central fountain babbling merrily. From this radiated fifteen other long-vaulted passages, seeming each fully a half mile in length; for with Latin love of the theatrical the farther ends had been painted to resemble an endless array of cells, even the numbers being continued above the false doors to minute infinity. Besides these imaginary ones there were some forty real places ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... "The theatrical entertainments consisted of great variety, both tragical and comical; several distinct pieces were acted in succession, though without any apparent connexion with one another. Some of them were historical, ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... to a branch of the Y.M.C.A. located just off Broadway, and had played handball and boxed with chunky, slow-footed city detectives who were struggling to retain some physical activity, and with fat playwrights, and with Jewish theatrical managers, and with the few authentic Christians who occasionally strayed into the place and seemed ill at ease therein. He had liked this club for another reason; his sense of humor had often been highly excited by the thought of his being ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... upon the relative pretensions of two actresses,—two politicians disputing at his back on the Sinking Fund and the Funds in general, as little disturbed his meditations as two disputants before his face, viz. the landlord and the manager of the theatrical company, who were sharply discussing some private point of finance in their daily reckoning. The poor manager,—with his keen, meagre, and anxious countenance, at this moment rendered doubly anxious by the throes of an arithmetical computation,—seemed the antagonist pole of the Dutchman: ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... so theatrical!" said his uncle, and then, seeing that George was leaving the room: "Come back here. You mustn't speak to your ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... is undeniably Mrs. Radcliffe's masterpiece. No one would claim that his character is subtle study, but in his interviews with the Marchesa, Mrs. Radcliffe reveals unexpected gifts tor probing into human motives. He is an imposing figure, theatrical sometimes, but wrought of flesh and blood. In fiction, as in life, the villain has always existed, but it was Mrs. Radcliffe who first created the romantic villain, stained with the darkest crimes, yet dignified and impressive ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... detective to reinforce her position, she took her stand against the unhappy George and his mother, and so successful were her efforts to make divorce difficult that she came out of chambers with thirty thousand dollars in cash, an aristocratic name, and a valuable claim to theatrical distinction. ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... "But I think their dissimilarity owes its emphasis to some lurking likeness. Otherwise how could he have reminded me of her?" Lydia, as she spoke, sat down with a troubled expression, as if trying to unravel her thoughts. "And yet," she added, presently, "my theatrical associations are so complex that—" A long silence ensued, during which Alice, conscious of some unusual stir in her patroness, watched her furtively and wondered what ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... service to the colony. It was pronounced by Laval in 1661 almost equal in educational advantages and standing to the Jesuits' establishments in France; and according to a trustworthy author it 'was a reproduction on a small scale of the French colleges: classes in letters and arts, literary and theatrical entertainments, were found there.' Some of the public performances given at the Jesuits' College were memorable, such as the reception to the Vicomte d'Argenson when he entered upon the government of New France, and the philosophical debate of July 2, 1666, which was graced with the ...
— The Great Intendant - A Chronicle of Jean Talon in Canada 1665-1672 • Thomas Chapais
... commandment to "wash one another's feet" is perhaps the most ridiculous ever given by the Son of God. In the semi-theatrical church entertainments men may pay a large sum for the privilege of kissing the most handsome lady, and for similar or more shameful indulgences, but to humbly wash a brother's feet would be shocking ...
— The Gospel Day • Charles Ebert Orr
... Randal did not dare to retaliate (though boiling over with indignant rage), for fear of offending Leonard's uncle. Leonard was unquestionably the popular speaker of the three. Though his temperament was a writer's, not an orator's; though he abhorred what he considered the theatrical exhibition of self, which makes what is called "delivery" more effective than ideas; though he had little interest at any time in party politics; though at this time his heart was far away from the Blues and ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... much high-sounding emphasis, and when he had finished she would reply with a carefully worded retort, setting forth the claims and rewards of virtue. Thus it would continue, argument succeeding argument, a declamatory give and take, dignified, passionless, theatrical. ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... of England?—a sentimental adherent of the cause. But this business of the bagpipes touched the comic. To harry an old valet out of bed and set him droning on pipes in the small hours smacked of a theatrical taste, or at least of an undignified fancy. Kings in exile, if they wish to keep the tragic air, should not ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... a comical sight. He trembled at being noticed, for he might lose his position; and he made timid and ridiculous gestures, quite a theatrical display of love signals, to which the women responded with a ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... It was composed entirely of men who had been "over," and had lost their sight. But this loss of sight had not lessened their love of music or their power of musical expression, as many of the boys who were in hospital in London can testify. High-class singers, theatrical parties, in fact, all the leading theatrical performers and many minor ones, paid their tribute to the boys by entertaining them with song and sketch; but no performance had quite the same popularity as the rag-time discoursed by the "blind boys." And the remarkable thing about the band is ...
— Through St. Dunstan's to Light • James H. Rawlinson
... in a stranger to express his unbounded gratitude for that delightful and most humorous dialogue, in which the history of the Elzevir Press (starting from Le Pastissier francois) and the tragedy of the rotifer are so adroitly interwoven with the theatrical scene of Fingal's Cave and its unusual visitors, the whole adventure ending in the happiest laughter over the expulsion of the dramatist. I may not have any right to say so, but I throw myself on the mercy ...
— Sir Walter Scott - A Lecture at the Sorbonne • William Paton Ker
... to this trifling, and even had a sort of mystery added to its imposing grandeur. It is true that the flaming bonfires and the colored lights and the tiny figures of men and women standing in the gorge within the depth of the arch made the scene theatrical, but it was strange and weird and awful, like the fantasy of a Walpurgis' Night or ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Epilogue for a Private Theatrical, I have written nothing new for near six months. It is in vain to spur me on. I must wait. I cannot write without a genial impulse, and I have none. 'T is barren all and dearth. No matter; life is something without ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... through their course of training they embarked at Alexandria, but they were no sooner out at sea than their vessel was torpedoed and sunk! Many lives were lost, including Lieut. Morris, who will be remembered by all for his activities in the theatrical line, as, under his able direction, the "S.N.H. AND THE 20TH COMBINED CONCERT PARTY" provided us with a ...
— Through Palestine with the 20th Machine Gun Squadron • Unknown
... I forget which. He was doing his theatrical nonsense in the East with some barn-storming show or other, having been obliged to get out of England to escape arrest for some shady transaction a year before. He was always a bad egg; always a disgrace to his name and connections. That's ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... century-old English oak. The camel-saddle (iii. 247) is neither Eastern nor possible for the rider, but it presently improves (iii. 424 and elsewhere). The emerging of the Merfolk (iii. 262) is a "tableau," a transformation-scene of the transpontine pantomime, and equally theatrical is the attitude of wicked Queen Lab (iii. 298), while the Jinni, snatching away Daulat Khatun (iii.341), seems to be waltzing with her in horizontal position. A sun-parasol, not a huge Oriental umbrella, is held ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... wearing wreaths, carolling and deep drinking in the midst of churchyards. Councils, popes, and bishops never tired of protesting, nor the faithful of dancing. Be it forbidden, says Innocent III. at the beginning of the thirteenth century, to perform "theatrical games" in churches. Be this prohibition enforced, says Gregory IX. a little later.[757] Be it forbidden, says Walter de Chanteloup, bishop of Worcester, to perform "dishonest games" in cemeteries and churches, especially on feast days and on the vigils of saints.[758] ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... in a panic over the prospect of that evening;—her father arriving triumphant in Paula's supposed surrender to find Maxfield Ware with his five years' contract in his pocket. And the responsibility for the disaster would be attributed to herself; was indeed so attributable with a kind of theatrical completeness seldom, to be found in life. It didn't often happen that any one was as entirely to blame for a calamity to some one else as Mary was for this volte-face ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... fashions, or reading Cumberland's "British Theatre." The Sunday Times was her paper, for she voted the Dispatch, that journal which is taken in by most ladies of her profession, to be vulgar and Radical, and loved the theatrical gossip in which the other mentioned ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray
... masks! Mrs. Orme died on the theatrical boards to-night, and henceforth the world knows me as Minnie Laurance! Ah! by the ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... which they were piled one upon another. A third apartment was filled with flasks of wine, with casks probably containing spirits, and boxes, the contents of which they did not pause to examine. A fourth contained male and female habiliments, spread out like the dresses in a theatrical wardrobe. Most of these garments were of the gayest and costliest description, and of the latest fashion, and Leonard sighed as he looked upon them, and thought of the fate of those they ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... Fall is near Interlaken, on the other side of the lake of Brienz, and is illuminated every night with those gorgeous theatrical fires whose name I cannot call just at this moment. This was said to be a spectacle which the tourist ought by no means to miss. I was strongly tempted, but I could not go there with propriety, because one ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... merely for exhibition, in which she makes herself talk of morals and principle, as if her qualms of conscience would not permit her to go all lengths with her Holy Allies, are all to gull her own people. It is a theatrical farce, in which the five powers are the actors, England the Tartuffe, and her people the dupes. Playing thus so dextrously into each other's hands, and their own persons seeming secured, they are now looking to their privileged orders. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... real life as they are in Bookland. What is it consoles the tradesman when the actor, earning eighty pounds a week, cannot pay his debts? Why, reading in the theatrical newspapers gushing accounts of the dear fellow's invariable generosity to the poor. What is it stills the small but irritating voice of conscience when we have successfully accomplished some extra big feat of swindling? Why, the noble resolve to give ten per cent of the net profits ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... spark of enthusiasm. Of course they could not have the true ring of royalty, for royalty was not in them. But they could not play the part well. One simple sentence from the Queen or the Prince of Wales, or even from Prince Arthur, would be worth all the theatrical pomp they could display in a generation. Those noblemen had no natural connection with the kingdom, fitting them to take the first place in it. They were not hereditary chiefs. They were not elected by the people. They were mere 'casual' chief-governors; and they formed no ties ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... assemblies, having neither halls, nor any kind of building for that purpose. These things he thought of no advantage to their councils, but rather a disservice; as they distracted the attention, and turned it upon trifles, on observing the statues and pictures, the splendid roofs, and every other theatrical ornament. The people thus assembled had no right to propose any subject of debate, and were only authorized to ratify or reject what might be proposed to them by the senate and the kings. But because, in process ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... one of your rivals who had discovered a method of placing you in a position of extreme absurdity before the eyes of those who were dearest to you—for instance, while you had your mouth crooked like that of a theatrical mask, or while your eloquent lips, like the copper faucet of a scanty fountain, dripped pure water—you would probably stab him. This rival is sleep. Is there a man in the world who knows how he appears to others, and what he does ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... flirtations with Scandinavian materials. In these later poems he broadened the field of poetic material notably; but in them he hardly deepened the imaginative or emotional tone: his manner, rather, became elaborate and theatrical. The "Elegy" is the language of ...
— An Elegy Wrote in a Country Church Yard (1751) and The Eton College Manuscript • Thomas Gray
... thinking, it may be, no small beer of themselves, we may term the first lot Treble Excellent and the second Double Excellent—the latter division think that concerts possibly, sacred concerts certainly, and certain other forms of mild and non-theatrical entertainments, are of a sufficiently severe character to constitute, as it were, a form of discipline. Then there are the larger proportion of those "who," as Mrs. Malaprop would say, "'care for none ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100. February 21, 1891 • Various
... not know whether to laugh or to cry. So, of all things, a gramophone needs must come on the scene at such a time, repeating at every winding the nasal twang of its theatrical songs! What a fearsome thing results when a machine apes ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... Apprenticeship, a novel which captivated the literary class, if not the general public, and was destined to exert great influence on German fiction for a generation to come. It had been some twenty years in the making. In its earlier form it was called Wilhelm Meister's Theatrical Mission.[3] This tells the story of a Werther-like youth who is to be saved from Werther's fate by finding a work to do. His "mission," apparently, is to become a good actor and to promote high ideals of the histrionic art. Incidentally he ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... is a much greater malady, and may have most dangerous consequences, in a wholly marvellous religion which we must love. These marvels are displeasing in pious narratives, where they are fully proved, and they are sought for in theatrical compositions, where they are mere fictions: the distinction is dishonorable to Christians. Finally, as to the falsehood: What risk does the pious multitude run, in believing the miracles of the Lives of the Saints? ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... secretary at the signing of the Concordat: "Bourrienne, you will see what use I shall make of the priests!" The golden chasubles had made a brilliant spectacle by the side of the uniforms; the crosses and the tiara by the side of the swords and the sceptre. Napoleon, always a master of theatrical effect, had known how to lend antiquity to his newborn glory by borrowing from the past all its majesty and pomp, and by skilfully decking himself with what was most brilliant in the chronicles of ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... disposed, with reservations, to reckon negligible: Baron von Harden, head of a Netherlands banking house, a silent body whose acute mental processes went on behind a pallid screen of flabby features; Julius Becker, a theatrical manager of New York, whose right name ended in ski; Bartlett Putnam, late charge d'affaires of the American embassy in Madrid; Edmund O'Reilly, naturalized citizen of the United States, interested in the manufacture of motor ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... "hang out" the Association was the most popular. At any hour after school, until closing time in the evening, small groups of fellows of every age might be found in the various departments, talking athletics, planning an all-day hike into the mountains, discussing an amateur theatrical, a debating club, a Bible study supper, or some other of the many activities carried on by these fellows with the Association as a basis of operations and a partner. It appealed to the best fellows in the school, ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley
... repeat some magniloquent gnome from Greek, or Hebrew, or German philosophers, give us a scrap of Hegel, or of the Talmud, and we will willingly take it to be the real thing for imaginative purposes, as we allow ourselves to believe that some theatrical goblet really contains a fluid of magical efficacy. Unluckily, however, and the misfortune illustrates the inconvenience of combining politics with fiction, Disraeli had something to say, and still more unluckily that something was a mere nothing. It was the creed of Young ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen
... express a feeling for the miseries of war; and to open some sort of conversation, which (after our public overtures had glutted their pride), at a cautious and jealous distance, might lead to something like an accommodation. What was the event? A strange uncouth thing, a theatrical figure of the opera, his head shaded with three-coloured plumes, his body fantastically habited, strutted from the back scenes, and, after a short speech, in the mock heroic falsetto of stupid tragedy, delivered the gentleman who came to make the representation ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... SCOTT, in his most useful column of theatrical information in the Daily Telegraph, told us last Friday, that the Princess's Theatre is now "heated by a new process," which must mean the exceptionally warm reception given every evening to Mrs. LANGTRY as Cleopatra. In this favourable sense of the phrase, "She gets it hot all ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Dec. 20, 1890 • Various
... it doesn't matter much. We mustn't exaggerate the fellow's importance; he's a very poor sample of the theatrical villain. Besides, I imagine you seldom meet the latter in real life; ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... restoration and recovery through the gentlest means. Though sometimes it was to be feared that all persuasion would be useless, and that the scandalous spectacle of an English Bishop seceding to the Church of Rome would be exhibited with an almost theatrical effect in his friend's case. For the ornate ritual which the Bishop maintained in his Cathedral services was almost worthy of a Mass at St. Peter's. The old, simple chaste English style of 'Morning Prayer' was exchanged for 'Matins,'—choristers perpetually ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... mother had found an asylum for her at the elegant home of the farmer-general M. de La Popeliniere. This occurred at the time that Paris was theatre mad, and when great actors and actresses were the heroes and heroines of society. At this house the young girl became the central figure in the theatrical and musical entertainments. After passing through this schooling, she stood the test of the court without any difficulty, and completely won the favor of her husband's family, as well as that of the court ladies and the members of the other distinguished ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... "I'm a theatrical manager, my girl, and I'm not on the inside: which is another way of saying that a man who can't ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... Reading in his Garret His First Books Florian's Romances Begins to Rhyme The Poetic Nature Barbers and Poetry Importance of the Barber Jasmin first Theatrical Entertainment Under the Tiles Talent for ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... were able, by enriching its portal and decorating the natural divisions of the building, to attain a stately form that honestly fulfilled its purpose; here the magnificence is secured by masking the low aisles of the nave with a wall that is a mere theatrical adjunct, its simulated windows and its stringcourses marking stories that do not exist. Apart from theoretical criticism, it is not quite admirable in itself; the three doorways are hardly of sufficient importance, the central window is somewhat larger than it should ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Salisbury - A Description of its Fabric and a Brief History of the See of Sarum • Gleeson White
... moving, while two red lines slowly defined themselves across his face. The theatrical quality of the scene and the turgid rhetorical bathos of the boy's speeches attested his youth and the unformed violence of his emotions. Did they also indicate a rehearsal, or had the boy merely been goaded to vague ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... drifted into what we now call grandly "the theatrical profession" we do not know. In 1593, Marlowe made his tragic exit from life, and Greene, Shakespeare's other rival on the popular stage, had preceded Marlowe in an equally miserable death the year before. Shakespeare already ...
— Epicoene - Or, The Silent Woman • Ben Jonson
... Railway and Steamship Lines, connecting Toronto daily with all parts of America and Europe; of various classes of manufactures, which have grown up in a quarter of a century or so. No less than five notices of theatrical and other amusements appear; these entertainments take place in spacious, elegant halls and opera houses, instead of the little, confined rooms which satisfied the citizens of Toronto only a few years ago. Some forty barristers and attorneys, physicians and surgeons—no, not all gentlemen, ...
— The Intellectual Development of the Canadian People • John George Bourinot
... Lorette. The great church of the monastery was handsomely rebuilt and a multitude of altars erected; and beautiful frescoes and stained windows came from the leaders of the reaction. The whole effect was, perhaps, somewhat theatrical and thin, but it showed none the less earnestness in making the old "Isle of Saints" a protest ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... shattered lives and playing chorus to their own tragedy. For my part, I set the highest value on these choral odes, these mournful antiphones, in which the poet definitely triumphs over the mere playwright. They seem to me noble and beautiful in themselves, and as truly artistic, if not as theatrical, as any abrupter catastrophe could be. But I am not quite sure that they are exactly the conclusions the poet originally projected, and still less am I satisfied that they are reached by precisely the paths which he ...
— John Gabriel Borkman • Henrik Ibsen
... are small, and like those of the Chinese. The accounts written by ladies visiting the harems are to be taken with the allowance due to showy dress, jewels, cosmetics, and the general effect of a prepared exhibition, scarcely less than theatrical. It is scarcely possible that either the human face or form can long preserve symmetry of any kind in a life almost wholly destitute of exercise, in the confined air of their prison, and in the full indulgence of their meals. Activity, animation, and grace—the great constituents ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... and recreation, and, secondly, because the ministry of social recreation has fallen almost entirely under the dominance of the same trend; it has been thoroughly commercialized. We cannot cut the puzzling knot by simply prohibiting all forms of public theatrical entertainment. For one reason, these forms shade off imperceptibly from the church service to the extremes of the vaudeville. But the simple fact is that we no longer indiscriminately class all theaters as baneful and immoral; we are coming to see their ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... off. There was now every indication that the enemy would speedily venture out: officers and men were in the highest spirits at the prospects of giving them a decisive blow; such, indeed, as would put an end to all further contest upon the seas. Theatrical amusements were performed every evening in most of the ships; and God save the King was the hymn with which the sports concluded. "I verily believe," said Nelson (writing on the 6th of October), "that the country will soon be put to some expense on my account; ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... is, that a pitful of good-natured people applauded it. Ever since, I have been desirous of doing something in the same way that should better reward their attention." But, except in so far as its abrupt declension from the stage hurt its author in the eyes of the critics, and possibly in those of theatrical managers, "Strafford" was certainly no failure. It has the elements of a great acting play. Everything, even the language (and here was a stumbling-block with most of the critics and criticasters), ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... trembling like an old man, which he was, but which he never looked like save at moments of emotion like this, and told me to take the light; then stopped when he had got half-way across the room. "This is a piece of theatrical sentimentality," he said. "No, Phil, I will not go. I will not bring her into any such—Put down the lamp, and, if you will take my advice, go ...
— The Open Door, and the Portrait. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. • Margaret O. (Wilson) Oliphant
... 'A Blot on the "Scutcheon,"' is chiefly interesting, as it was the occasion of a quarrel between its author and that most eccentric of theatrical personalities, Macready. The quarrel was, our critic points out, a matter of money. But Browning failed to see this; he was a man of the world in his poems, but not in ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... supports seemed withdrawn together; he seemed to have dropped into this suddenly, suddenly to have discovered himself. In a moment he was changed. He found that he now feared to be inadequate, he feared to be theatrical, he feared the quality of his voice, the quality of his wit, astonished, he turned to the man in yellow with a propitiatory gesture. "For a moment," he said, "I must wait. I did not think it would be like this. I must think of the thing I have ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... working man's theatrical tastes, they lean, so far as they go, to the melodrama; but as a matter of fact there are great masses of working people who never go to the theatre at all. If you think of it, there are so few theatres accessible that they cannot go often. For instance, there are for the accommodation ...
— As We Are and As We May Be • Sir Walter Besant
... variety of suitable apparatus, Gregg. But we were not foolish enough to leave Great-New York on this voyage without our own arrangements. My brother, and Coniston and Prince—all of us shipped crates of freight consigned to Ferrok-Shahn—and Rankin had special baggage marked 'theatrical apparatus.'" ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... overshadowing Jack Landis—that was the thing! But to startle The Corner, where gold strikes were events of every twenty-four hours, just now—where robberies were common gossip, and where the killings now averaged nearly three a day—to startle The Corner was like trying to startle the theatrical world with a sensational play. Indeed, this parallel could have been pursued, for Donnegan was the nameless actor and the mountain desert was the stage on which he intended to become a headliner. No wonder, then, that his lean face was compressed in thought. Yet no one could have guessed it by ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... heart could desire in the way of fellowship, eminent politicians who might conceivably be of service to an ambitious young Assistant Commissioner of Police, beautiful ladies to interest and amuse him. Kara had even gone to the length of engaging a theatrical company to play "Sweet Lavender," and for this purpose the big ballroom at Hever Court had been transformed ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... execute a turn in extra elegant style. When the cake was finally awarded, the spectators were about evenly divided between those who cheered the winners and those who muttered about the unfairness of the judges. This was the cake-walk in its original form, and it is what the colored performers on the theatrical stage developed into the prancing movements now known all over the world, and which some Parisian critics pronounced the acme of ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... in Hieronnymo, of which the date is not certain, but which there is reason to believe at least as old as his earliest plays. This however is certain, that he is the first who taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to antiquaries and collectors of books, which are sought because they are scarce, and would not have been scarce, ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... which was one main cause of the sufferings of the ministers above noticed, we cannot pass over without mentioning that most abhorred and heaven-daring ignominy and contempt put upon our solemn and sacred covenants, and upon GOD the great Party in them, at Linlithgow on that day, by a theatrical exposing, and presumptuous committing them to the flames, together with The causes of GOD'S wrath, Lex Rex, acts of parliament, acts of committees of estates, and acts of assemblies made, during what they called the twenty-two years' rebellion, that is, from 1638 to ...
— Act, Declaration, & Testimony for the Whole of our Covenanted Reformation, as Attained to, and Established in Britain and Ireland; Particularly Betwixt the Years 1638 and 1649, Inclusive • The Reformed Presbytery
... present. My movements depend upon the results of the inquiries I shall make to-day in theatrical circles, and particularly at the Gare de Lyon, where I shall not meet with success in any event until the night ...
— The Albert Gate Mystery - Being Further Adventures of Reginald Brett, Barrister Detective • Louis Tracy
... minutely, had practised reading it aloud. It was of course written in French, and she found a clever woman, retired from a theatrical career in Paris, Madame Thenant, who gave her lessons in elocution, and who finally said that she read the libretto "assez bien." This from Madame Thenant, who had played Dowagers at the Comedie Francaise, was a high compliment. Charmian ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... asked me, at various times since, whether, in my opinion, Tolstoi is really sincere; and allusion has been made to a book published by a lady who claims to have been in close relations with his family, which would seem to reveal a theatrical element in his whole life. To this my answer has always been, and still is, that I believe him to be one of the most sincere and devoted men alive, a man of great genius and, at the same time, of very ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... from what he calls his "necessary acts," or his "great deeds," he is a vulgar, commonplace personage, puerile, theatrical, and vain. Those persons who are invited to St. Cloud, in the summer, receive with the invitation an order to bring a morning toilette and an evening toilette. He loves finery, display, feathers, embroidery, ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo
... temper. In actual achievement he did not quite fulfill the promise of his early books, and cannot be set high among his craft. He was an inferior artist; and though he achieved naturalism of matter, he clung to the theatrical artificiality of style which was in vogue. But if he had broken away from all traditions, he could have gained no hearing whatever; he died young—twenty years more might have left him a much greater figure; and ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... derive your tranquillity from our vigilance: since, therefore, we are mutually necessary to each other, let us live together like brothers in concord and love." [16] Such a festival must indeed have degenerated, in a wealthy and despotic empire, into a theatrical representation; but it was at least a comedy well worthy of a royal audience, and which might sometimes imprint a salutary lesson on the mind of ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... Prohibition which I was hoping for, if not actually expecting, failed to materialise. I had thought that the standard of what are called T.B.M. (Tired Business Men) theatrical shows might be higher if the tendency of alcohol to make audiences more tolerant (as it undoubtedly can do in London) were no longer operative. But these entertainments seemed, under ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... and I went my way leaving Comus with his rout, guileless, I hope, as Milton's innocent "Lady," but such scales never fell from her starry eyes as fell from mine. I knew well about Fantasca. During my last weeks in Berlin it had been much talked about, a splendid theatrical spectacle put on with consummate art, and lavish expenditure. I had not seen it. Heredity from eight Puritan generations reinforced by impecuniosity had kept me from that. But I had heard of the wonderful visions of beauty and grace. My handsome comrade of the Bavarian Alps had been at the ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... coup d'oeil, as the sun slid into the position described, impressed me very much as I have been impressed, when a boy, by the concluding scene of some well-arranged theatrical spectacle or melodrama. Not even the monstrosity of color was wanting; for the sunlight came out through the chasm, tinted all orange and purple; while the vivid green of the grass in the valley was reflected more or less upon all objects from the curtain of vapor that ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... Everything of any importance, except in the eyes of children and savages; everything in logic. He would not stand analysis at all. He was without definite character. He was posing, affected, pleased with himself, superficial, and theatrical, and interested in people only so long as they amused him ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... continues M. de St. Pierre, "instances of sensibility still more touching amongst the children of the common people, because the emotion was not here produced by any theatrical effect. As I was walking some years ago in the Pre St. Gervais, at the beginning of winter, I saw a poor woman lying on the ground, busied in weeding a bed of sorrel; near her was a little girl of six years old at the utmost, standing ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... colors are splashed on with a barbaric, almost a theatrical, touch. It's a regular backdrop of a country; its scenery looks as though it belonged on a stage—as though it should be painted on a curtain. You almost expect to see a chorus of comic-opera brigands or a bevy of stage ...
— Roughing it De Luxe • Irvin S. Cobb
... round the galleries, unamazed at the slowness to which the throng of loungers reduced his pace; he seemed accustomed to the stately step which is ironically nicknamed the ambassador's strut; still, his dignity had a touch of the theatrical. Though his features were handsome and imposing, his hat, from beneath which thick black curls stood out, was perhaps tilted a little too much over the right ear, and belied his gravity by a too rakish effect. His eyes, inattentive and half closed, looked ...
— Gambara • Honore de Balzac
... and though oft times I personally felt that the pattering of shrapnel on the tin roof opposite was uncomfortably close, I was convinced there was no theatrical display of bravery, no cheap heroism in our companions' unconsciousness. They were interested in ...
— With Those Who Wait • Frances Wilson Huard
... fine-looking men. The women are fairer, and with regular features; many of them ride on horseback with men's saddles, dressed in gay riding habits, and with a wreath of flowers encircling their raven tresses, which gives them somewhat of a theatrical appearance. The islands are governed by a sovereign, King Kamehameha the Third, who has a large family, and an income of about 1500 pounds a-year. He has likewise an army, clothed in gay uniforms, but there are almost as many officers as men; indeed, ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... took his walks in the deserted arcades of the empty Trocadero Palace, back of which he lived; went to the Theatre Francais, where he saw the great success of the day, and was startled that "an undramatic bagatelle with threadbare scenery, stale intrigues and superannuated theatrical tricks, could be playing on the foremost stage of the world;" saw at the Palais de l'Industrie the triennial exhibition of art works, "the creme de la creme of three salons, and found not one work of consequence." After some time he came to the conclusion that "the big city is not ...
— Plays: Comrades; Facing Death; Pariah; Easter • August Strindberg
... him, in the coach from London was John Forster; in Macready's drawing-room the poet and his critic first formed a personal acquaintance. Browning had for long been much interested in the stage, but only as a spectator. His imagination now turned towards dramatic authorship with a view to theatrical performance. A play on a subject from later Roman history, Narses, was thought of and was cast aside. The success of Talfourd's Ion, after the first performance of which (May 26, 1836) Browning supped in ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... corn of others passed through the hoppers of Shakspere's brain and came out fine flour, ready for use by the theatrical bakers. With the pen of pleasure and brush of fancy he painted human life in everlasting colors, that will not fade or tarnish with age or wither with the winds of adversity. The celestial sunlight of his genius permeated every ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... had always aspired to be an actor. One of the first things he did after settling in Sandusky was to organize an amateur theatrical company, composed entirely of people of German birth or descent. The performances were given in the Turner Hall, in the German tongue, on a makeshift stage with improvised scenery. Frohman became the directing force in the production of Schiller's and other classic ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... did not terminate, however, with the departure of the Indian. Another scene was enacted, but, unlike the popular mode of theatrical procedure, the farce ...
— Digging for Gold - Adventures in California • R.M. Ballantyne
... but I did not, and that failure led me into some unfortunate prophesying at the outbreak of the war. I judged Germany by the Kaiser, and by the Kaiser-worship which I saw in Berlin. I thought that he was a theatrical person who would dream of vast massed attacks and tremendous cavalry charges, and that he would lead Germany to be smashed against the Allied defensive in the West, and to be smashed so thoroughly that the war would be over. I did not properly appreciate the more studious ...
— What is Coming? • H. G. Wells
... agreeable to her. He met her during her first season in town. She is handsome, and there were plenty of other men, but I grant you your scowling brigand was the most picturesque of the lot. In his courtship, as in everything else, he was theatrical to the point of being ridiculous, but Ellen's sense of humor is not her strongest quality. He had the charm of celebrity, the air of a man who could storm his way through anything to get what he wanted. That sort of vehemence ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... joy. Hence the religious worship of the Greeks was cheerful, and adapted itself to the tastes and pleasures of the people; it was, however, essentially worldly, and sometimes degrading. It was similar in its effects to the rural sports of the yeomanry of the Middle Ages, and to the theatrical representations sometimes held in mediaeval churches,—certainly to the processions and pomps which the Catholic clergy instituted for the amusement of the people. Hence the sneering but acute remark ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... conglomeration of human beings from the far East to the far West. It would be a fruitless task to attempt a description of the motley assemblage. Pick out all the strangest, most ragged, most uncouth figures you ever saw in old pictures, from childhood up to the present day; select from every theatrical representation within the range of your experience the most monstrous and absurd caricatures upon humanity; bring to your aid all the masquerades and burlesque fancy-balls you ever visited, tumble them together in the great bag of your imagination, and pour them out over a vague wilderness of ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... confirmed. It remained for me to win the suffrages of Boston, and I secured them, first having made stops in Brooklyn, New Haven, and Hartford. When in the American Athens I became convinced that that city possesses the most refined artistic taste. Its theatrical audiences are serious, attentive to details, analytical—I might almost say scientific—and one might fancy that such careful critics had never in their lives done anything but occupy themselves with scenic art. With reference to a presentation of Shakespeare, they are profound, acute, ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles
... York was put to the test. He was offered a contract that guaranteed him $75,000 to appear in a moving picture play that would be staged in the Argonne in France and would tell the story of his mountain life. There was another proposition of $50,000. There were offers of vaudeville and theatrical engagements that ranged up to $1,000 a week, and totaled many thousands. On these his decision was reached on the instant they were offered. The theater was condemned by the tenets of his church, and all through ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... complicates the Puritan with the Cavalier. "From childhood," he is quoted as saying, "I have been under the influence of five men—Alexander, Julius Caesar, Theodoric II, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon." No great man moulds himself thus like others. It is but a theatrical greatness. But anyhow none of these names are Jewish, and not thus were "the Kings of Jerusalem" even "six thousand years ago." Our kings had the dull duty of copying out and studying the Torah, and the Rabbis reminded monarchy that the Torah demands forty-eight ...
— Chosen Peoples • Israel Zangwill
... at the time, interested themselves in the success of the movement. I allude to the brilliant demonstration that took place in December, 1816, when an amateur performance was got up in aid of the distress experienced in Liverpool, a distress felt in common with the whole nation. All the leading theatrical and musical amateurs in the town took part in that performance. I dare say that, at this distance of time even, it is well remembered by those who assisted at it, if there be any of them still amongst ...
— Recollections of Old Liverpool • A Nonagenarian
... in Edinburgh, for the benefit of the Theatrical Fund, on the 23d of February 1827, Sir Walter made his first avowal as to the authorship of the Waverley Novels,—an announcement which scarcely took the public by surprise. The physical energies of the illustrious author were ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... said with a theatrical flourish of the hand, "to introduce to you Mr. Blagrove, a fellow ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty |
