Modern photoplay writing, its craftsmanship; a manual demonstrating the structural and dramatic principles of the new art as paracticed by the modern photoplaywright (1922)

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Foreword THE demand for a manual presenting the essentials of playwriting for the screen from the latest point of view, a point of view necessitated by recent changes in the industry, has led the author of this book to hope that it will fill the long-existing hiatus in the working libraries of our screen authors. Since the publication of his first book,* the author has not altered his attitude toward the purely photographic and mechanical aspects of the art. A certain amount of knowledge of these is indispensable to the scenarist or synoptist, especially to the staff continuity writer; but no quantity of it will make a playwright even from promising material; for it is the art of playwriting which primarily concerns our future screen-dra- matists. Happily, the author's attitude has been largely justified by recent changes in the industry. Let us hope that the newer era will encourage more talent than was developed by the blatant and short-sighted policies of the past. The author has seen the principles set forth in this book effectively applied in the work of many authors for the screen, including his own; and he, therefore, ventures to hope that the aspirant of talent will find in the following chapters the groundwork of constructive or synthetic theory essential to the successful writer of synopses for the screen; he believes that adherence to the *Photoplay Making, 1915.