Transcriber’s Note:
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
ÆT 65
LIFE
OF
EDWIN FORREST,
THE AMERICAN TRAGEDIAN.
CHAPTER XIV.
NEWSPAPER ESTIMATES.—ELEMENTS OF THE DRAMATIC ART, AND ITS TRUE STANDARD OF CRITICISM.
The newspaper in some countries has been a crime and inothers a luxury. In all civilized countries it has now become anecessity. With us it is a duty. It is often corrupted and degradedinto a nuisance. It ought to be cleansed and exaltedinto a pure benefaction, a circulating medium of intelligence andgood will alone. Certainly it is far from being that at the presenttime. It is true that our newspapers are an invaluable and indispensableprotection against all other tyrannies and social abuses;and their fierce vanity, self-interest, and hostile watchfulness ofone another keep their common arrogance and encroachmentspretty well in check. If they were of one mind and interest weshould be helplessly in their power. From the great evils whichso seriously alloy the immense benefits of the press, Forrestsuffered much in the latter half of his life. The abuse he metirritated his temper, and left a chronic resentment in his mind.Two specimens of this abuse will show something of the nettlingwrongs he encountered.
A Philadelphia newspaper stigmatized him in the most offensiveterms as a drunkard. Now it was a moral glory of Forrestthat, despite the temptations to which his professional career exposedhim, he was never intoxicated in his life. The newspaperin question, threatened with a libel suit, withdrew its words withan abject apology,—a poor satisfaction for the pain and injury ithad inflicted.
The other instance was on occasion of the driving of Macreadyfrom the stage of the Astor Place Opera House. A New Yorknewspaper, in language of studied insolence, called Forrest theinstigator and author of the outrage. “Mr. Forrest succeededlast night in doing what even his bad acting and unmanly conductnever did before: he inflicted a thorough and lasting disgrace434upon the American character.” “To revenge himself onMr. Macready he packed the house and paid rowdies for drivingdecent people away.” “With his peculiar tastes he will probablyenjoy the infamy and deem it a triumph.” Forrest, instead ofcowhiding the writer of this atrocious slander,—as s