I have seen Talma a second time in the part of Nero in the Britannicus of
Racine; Mlle Georges played the part of Agrippina. Talma was Nero from head
to foot; his very entry on the stage gave an idea of the fiery and
impatient character of the tyrant, and in the scene between him and his
mother Agrippina nothing could be better delineated. The forced calm of
Agrippina, while reproaching her son with his ingratitude, and the
impatience of Nero to get rid of such an importunate monitress, were given
in a style impossible to be surpassed. Talma's dumb show during this scene
was a masterpiece of the mimic art. If Talma gives such effects to his
roles in a French drama, where he is shackled by rules, how much greater
would he give on the English or German stages in a tragedy of Shakespeare
or Schiller!
Blank verse is certainly better adapted to tragedy than rhymed
alexandrines, but then the French language does not admit of blank verse,
and to write tragedies in prose, unless they be tragedies in modern life,
would deprive them of all charm; but after all I find the harmonious pomp
and to use a phrase of Pope's "The long majestic march and energy divine"
of the French alexandrine, very pleasing to the ear.
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