The Failure of English Realism

Abstract

Great acclamation for realism in the theatre tends to be cyclical. While the form itself may always be with us, every so often it becomes fashionable again, especially in England, and is praised a little more than it deserves. Recently it has been the playwrights who work in the idiom of the Royal Court and Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop who have been given rather more critical notice than their achievements warrant. Both the Royal Court and Miss Littlewood have followed, in their preoccupation with working-class life, all similar fashions before them. Real life always seems to live in a particularly unfashionable district. This can be an occasional welcome change from too much costumed romanticism; but apparent verisimilitude in speech or setting does not insure a genuine and perceptive authenticity.