It is, in fact, part of the dialogue of the play, only
that it happens to be inaudible. A soliloquy, on the other hand, has no
real existence. It is a purely artificial unravelling of motive or
emotion, which, nine times out of ten, would not become articulate at
all, even in the speaker's brain or heart. Thus it is by many degrees a
greater infraction of the surface texture of life than the spoken
letter, which we may call inadvisable rather than inadmissible.
Some theorists carry their solicitude for surface reality to such an
extreme as to object to any communication between two characters which
is not audible to every one on the stage. This is a very idle pedantry.
The difference between a conversation in undertones and a soliloquy or
aside is abundantly plain: the one occurs every hour of the day, the
other never occurs at all. When two people, or a group, are talking
among themselves, unheard by the others on the stage, it requires a
special effort to remember that, as a matter of fact, the others
probably do hear them.
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