NOTE

In using for purposes of drama a personality of so wide and recent a fame as that of Abraham Lincoln, I feel that one or two observations are due to my readers and critics.

First, my purpose is that not of the historian but of the dramatist.  The historical presentation of my hero has been faithfully made in many volumes; notably, in England, by Lord Charnwood in a monograph that gives a masterly analysis of Lincoln’s career and character and is, it seems to me, a model of what the historian’s work should be.  To this book I am gratefully indebted for the material of my play.  But while I have, I hope, done nothing to traverse history, I have freely telescoped its events, and imposed invention upon its movement, in such ways as I needed to shape the dramatic significance of my subject.  I should add that the fictitious Burnet Hook is admitted to the historical company of Lincoln’s Cabinet for the purpose of embodying certain forces that were antagonistic to the President.  This was a dramatic necessity, and I chose rather to invent a character for the purpose than to invest any single known personage with sinister qualities about which there might be dispute.

Secondly, my purpose is, again, that of the dramatist, not that of the political philosopher.  The issue of secession was a very intricate one, upon which high and generous opinions may be in conflict, but that I may happen to have or lack personal sympathy with Lincoln’s policy and judgment in this matter is nothing.  My concern is with the profoundly dramatic interest of his character, and with the inspiring example of a man who handled war nobly and with imagination.

Finally, I am an Englishman, and not a citizen of the great country that gave Lincoln birth.  I have, therefore, written as an Englishman, making no attempt to achieve a “local colour” of which I have no experience, or to speak in an idiom to which I have not been bred.  To have done otherwise, as I am sure any American friends that this play may have the good fortune to make will allow, would have been to treat a great subject with levity._

J.D. Far Oakridge, July-August, 1918

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

This play was originally produced by the Birmingham Repertory Theatre last year, and it had a great success in Birmingham.  But if its author had not happened to be the artistic director of the Birmingham Repertory Theatre the play might never have been produced there.  The rumour of the provincial success reached London, with the usual result—­that London managers magnificently ignored it.  I have myself spoken with a very well-known London actor-manager who admitted to me that he had refused the play.