Charles Haddon Chambers

The Tyranny of Tears Charles Haddon Chambers

"The Tyranny of Tears," a comedy of the emotions, is most ingeniously constructed on the simplest lines; it is a triumph of the commonplace. Played virtually by five characters, and with but one change of scene, it has that specious appearance of ease which is due to dexterity of craftsmanship. It is refreshing, free from theatrical expedients, and save perhaps for the somewhat accelerated wooing in Act Four, knots which we are accustomed to see snipped by the scissors of an erratic fate are here gently untangled by the fingers of probability. The germ of it, a matter of fortunate selection, is a human foible so universal that if a man is not conscious of it in his own proper person, he has not failed to smile over it among his neighbors: that combination of fondness and egoism out of which tyranny is legitimately born. This is the keynote; it announces itself speedily upon the raising of the curtain, and it is never for a moment after obscured by those modern subtilties calculated to provoke discussion among the elect. The hearer equipped with ordinary experience finds himself listening to it with an acquiescent stream of running comment. He knows this alphabet. It spells familiar words, and they come frequently. Here are commonplaces which he has failed perhaps to formulate; but now they flash upon the inward eye with a convincing vividness.