Life Upon the Wicked Stage

The articles that form this volume are compiled from the pages of the New York Clipper. Covering the three decades of the 1860s through 1880s, they convey a na ve sentiment regarding the theatre of that day, self-conscious and protective, sensitive toward outside pressures and puritanical abuses, and self-critical of personal behavior within the little world of theatrical troupes. Here are marvelous first-hand accounts of the major theatres and players of the nineteenth-century American stage, compiled by Dr. William L. Slout, one of the best-known theatrical and circus historians of our time. Complete with reproductions of numerous contemporaneous illustrations, plus a comperhensive index.