TALENT and that accumulation of talent which we call genius obey a kind of natural law in their manifestation. Musicians discover themselves first: history is full of musical prodigies who began to play or compose before they were ten. Then come mathematicians. Poets are generally setting the world on fire before they are twenty. But dramatists, novelists, and philosophers take longer to mature.
Shortly after the war, Noel Coward was hailed as the new prodigy of the English theatre; and indeed, since 1921 his performance has been prodigious. He has written so many plays (the spring of 1925 he had three running simultaneously in London), he has composed so many songs, so much music, and has himself acted in so many smash hits (or such sensational failures), that it is no wonder if he gives the impression of having gone too fast. That he has occasionally become world-weary he freely admits. Now at the age of thirty-seven he takes time off to write the first half of his autobiography, a book which, like his plays, is witty, observant, sensitive, and best when read aloud.
Present. Irnlientive (Doubleday, Doran, $3.00) is delightfully self-conscious. Mr. Coward’s flair for comedy never found happier expression — partly because he is shamelessly honest about his ego and its humiliations, partly because of his delicious skill with words, and partly because of his acute theatre-sense. Hut this is more than a book of humor. It is a story of poverty, of a devoted, plucky mother who ran a boarding house against heavy odds; of a precocious boy with little learning who squirmed his way into the theatre when he was eleven years old and has seldom had it out of his mind since; of a youth who was badly spoiled by success, but recovered; of a man remarkably talented as a dramatist, producer, and musician; of an individual self-confident and yet uncertain about his future.
I understand it is good ‘theatre’ to-day to dismiss lightly the plays of Noel Coward. If one wishes to be condescending, it is easy to remark the absence of depth in this self-portrait, to compare the range of Mr. Coward’s writing with that of his older contemporary, Eugene O’Neill, even to disparage the amazing swiftness with which Mr. Coward composes. But such criticism overlooks the fact that this is a highly selective book: a book written with impudence, a marvelous light touch, and — diffidence. It should be taken for the entertainment it contains, entertainment as plentiful and genuine as I can remember in any memoir of the stage.
