_An Historical Drama. By Frances Ann Kemble_.

This extraordinary production has awakened an interest in the dramatic and
literary world, scarcely equalled in our times. We know of its fortune
upon the stage by report only; but, from our acquaintance with the
requisites of the acting drama, we should conceive its permanence will be
more problematical in the theatre than in the closet; and considering the
conditions upon which dramatic fame is now attainable, we think the clever
authoress will not have reason to regret these inequalities of success.
That Miss Kemble's tragedy possesses points to be made, and passages that
will _tell_ on the stage, cannot be denied; but its interest for
representation requires to be concentrated; it "wants a hero, an uncommon
thing." It is well observed in the _Quarterly Review_, (by the way, the
only notice yet taken of the tragedy, that merits attention,) that "the
piece is crowded with characters of the greatest variety, all of
considerable importance in the piece, engaged in the most striking
situations, and contributing essentially to the main design. Instead of
that simple unity of interest, from which modern tragic writers have
rarely ventured to depart, it takes the wider range of that historic unity,
which is the characteristic of our elder drama; moulds together, and
connects by some common agent employed in both, incidents which have no
necessary connexion; and--what in the present tragedy strikes us as on
many accounts especially noticeable--unites by a fine though less
perceptible moral link, remote but highly tragic events with the immediate,
if we may so speak, the domestic interests of the play." This language is
finely characteristic of the drama. Again, the interest has "so much
Shakspearianism in the conception as to afford a remarkable indication of
the noble school in which the young authoress has studied, and the high
models which, with courage, in the present day, fairly to be called
originality, she has dared to set before her. In fact, Francis the First