But the
action is not really shaped by the influence of "the city." It might
have taken practically the same course if the family had remained at
home. The author had failed to establish a logical connection between
his theme and the incidents supposed to illustrate it.[1]
Fantastic plays, which assume an order of things more or less exempt
from the limitations of physical reality, ought, nevertheless, to be
logically faithful to their own assumptions. Some fantasies, indeed,
which sinned against this principle, have had no small success. In
_Pygmalion and Galatea_, for example, there is a conspicuous lack of
logic. The following passage from a criticism of thirty years ago puts
my point so clearly that I am tempted to copy it:
As we have no scientific record of a statue coming to life, the
probable moral and intellectual condition of a being so created is
left to the widest conjecture. The playwright may assume for it any
stage of development he pleases, and his audience will readily grant
his assumption.
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