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his little crippled legs. This is great drama. It is great because it is universal in its appeal. Its action tells of the exultant triumph of faith over weakness. It catches the heart in a quick stricture of sympathetic understanding. It brings tears to all eyes. For who has not felt the great need of faith to overcome some human weakness?
This bit of quoted Coppee narrative has possibilities of strong drama. Let us suppose the woman playing the cymbals to be the wife of the ringmaster, and that she and the clown are in love with one another. These lovers both hate and fear the brute of a ringmaster, upon whom they are financially dependent. They are, too, under the domination of his superior physical power. The ringmaster, knowing the situation, takes fiendish delight in torturing the two. During the scene's progress — with the interested audience watching — the ringmaster treats his wife contemptuously. Such an action on his part brings the situation to a crisis. It enrages the clown to the breaking point of endurance. All of his rising passion of hate, heretofore held in restraint by fear, breaks its bounds. He leaps furiously upon the ringmaster, and possibly kills him.
In such action we have drama. For it is the expression in action of tense inner emotional conflict.
Other dramatic situations may be built from the elements of drama in this narrative story. The student is advised and urged to use his imagination and create, among these characters, other relationships which might lead to conflict and dramatic action. How might the woman feel, and what might she do when watching her lover struggle so angrily with her husband? Then there are the four young athletes, and the blind clarinet player. Weave them into your action. What sort of dramatic conflict would they express?
VALUE OF ANALYSIS
It is excellent practice to analyze stories in this fashion. Bronson Howard, the first American dramatist who possessed a real technique (save Bartley Campbell), was once asked how he learned to write drama.
"By analyzing plays," he replied.
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