I think it would at once be found to be a very shallow plea. For in any
department of life, social, political, or artistic, nothing is more
difficult than to avoid incurring the suspicion that you mean to succeed
in the widest application of that term, if you can. If therefore there
be any truth in the assertion that "good work rarely sells," it would
appear that I must, on behalf of certain of my brother dramatists,
either bow my head in frank humiliation, or strike out some ingenious
line of defence. ["Hear! Hear!"]

But, my lords and gentlemen, I shall, with your sanction, adopt neither
of those expedients; I shall simply beg leave to acknowledge freely, to
acknowledge without a blush, that what is known as popular success is, I
believe, greatly coveted, sternly fought for, by even the most earnest
of those writers who deal in the commodity labelled "modern British
drama." And I would, moreover, submit that of all the affectations
displayed by artists of any craft, the affectation of despising the
approval and support of the great public is the most mischievous and
misleading. [Cheers.] Speaking at any rate of dramatic art, I believe
that its most substantial claim upon consideration rests in its power of
legitimately interesting a great number of people. I believe this of any
art; I believe it especially of the drama. Whatever distinction the
dramatist may attain in gaining the attention of the so-called select
few, I believe that his finest task is that of giving back to a
multitude their own thoughts and conceptions, illuminated, enlarged, and
if needful, purged, perfected, transfigured. The making of a play that
shall be closely observant in its portrayal of character, moral in
purpose, dignified in expression, stirring in its development, yet not
beyond our possible experience of life; a drama, the unfolding of whose
story shall be watched intently, responsively, night after night by
thousands of men and women, necessarily of diversified temperaments,