Now the question is:  which is really made ridiculous by this ridiculous episode of the prohibition of Maeterlinck’s “Monna Vanna,” England or Mr. Redford?  Mr. Redford is a gentleman of whom I only know that he is not himself a man of letters, and that he has not given any public indication of an intelligent interest in literature as literature.  If, as a private person, before his appointment to the official post of censor of the drama, he had expressed in print an opinion on any literary or dramatic question, that opinion would have been taken on its own merits, and would have carried only the weight of its own contents.  The official appointment, which gives him absolute power over the public life or death of a play, gives to the public no guarantee of his fitness for the post.  So far as the public can judge, he was chosen as the typical “man in the street,” the “plain man who wants a plain answer,” the type of the “golden mean,” or mediocrity.  We hear that he is honest and diligent, that he reads every word of every play sent for his inspection.  These are the virtues of the capable clerk, not of the penetrating judge.  Now the position, if it is to be taken seriously, must require delicate discernment as well as inflexible uprightness.  Is Mr. Redford capable of discriminating between what is artistically fine and what is artistically ignoble?  If not, he is certainly incapable of discriminating between what is morally fine and what is morally ignoble.  It is useless for him to say that he is not concerned with art, but with morals.  They cannot be dissevered, because it is really the art which makes the morality.  In other words, morality does not consist in the facts of a situation or in the words of a speech, but in the spirit which informs the whole work.  Whatever may be the facts of “Monna Vanna” (and I contend that they are entirely above reproach, even as facts), no one capable of discerning the spirit of a work could possibly fail to realise that the whole tendency of the play is noble and invigorating.  All this, all that is essential, evidently escapes Mr. Redford.  He licenses what the Times rightly calls “such a gross indecency as ’The Girl from Maxim’s.’” But he refuses to license “Monna Vanna,” and he refuses to state his reason for withholding the license.  The fact is, that moral questions are discussed in it, not taken for granted, and the plain man, the man in the street, is alarmed whenever people begin to discuss moral questions.  “The Girl from Maxim’s” is merely indecent, it raises no problems.  “Monna Vanna” raises problems.  Therefore, says the censor, it must be suppressed.  By his decision in regard to this play of Maeterlinck, Mr. Redford has of course conclusively proved his unfitness for his post.  But that is only one part of the question.  The question is:  could any one man be found on whose opinion all England might safely rely for its dramatic instruction and entertainment?  I do not think such a man could