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Article ANECDOTES OF THE LATE HUGH KELLY. ← Page 2 of 6 →
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Anecdotes Of The Late Hugh Kelly.
friends gave out it was Woodward ' s misconception of his part that principally promoted it , aided by the malice of those enemies who formerly made head against his dramatic productions ; but the fact was , it was carried down by its own lead . Party malice had a good deal subsided by this time , and as far as it appeared by the complexion arid conduct of the audiencethey gave it a fair and equitable trial .
, The p lot of this play , as far as we can remember ( for it was never printed ) , turned upon a man who , attempting to do every thing by the rig id rules of reason and abstraction , felt most of his plans counteracted by the customs and habits of the world . How far this may be dramatized in skilful hands , is another question ; but it . was far above Kelly ' s grasp ; such a subject required strong views and nice discriminations of
character ; it likewise required such a selection of incidents as were proper to elucidate that character -. but in all those our Author was deficient ; he had but one forte in dramatic writing , and that was sentimental dialogue ; deprive him of that , and you left him very little - pretensions indeed .
The disappointment of this comedy ftuck so close to our Author ' s heart , both in point of interest as well as fame , that he determined never to write for the Stage again . ' He had been called to the bar about two years before this , and though he had at that time qualified himself verylittle for the practice of the profession , he resolved now to advert to it as the great object of his pursuit ; for this purpose he gave up all his literary engagements ( which were very profitable to him ) and
, reserving only to himself the character of Barrister , he had now , in a great degree , to begin the world again ; to exchange lig ht congenialreading for the severer ftudies of the law ; and what was much more serious to him , to give up what was little short of a certainty , for all the precariousness of a new profession .
Our Author ' s usual prudence here forsook him , and his error should be a warning to others in similar circumstances . Kelly from his Editorship , the Theatre , and holding in a variety of other respects " the pen of a ready . writer , " could make little less than one thousand pounds ' per year ( at least in such years as he brought out anew play ) . Here was a kind of certainty for himself , his wife , and a family of five or six Childrenand this he altogether relinquished for a profession in which
, neither his natural inclination , his education , or even occasional ftudies , had fitted him .. He did not weigh sufficiently in his own mind the difficulty of beginning any learned profession with success between thirty and forty years of age : nor the many examples which were before his eyes of Barristers' properly educated for their profession , with considerable talents and connexions , who were obliged to wait four , five ,
six , nay sometimes ten years , before any accident drew them forward into any thing like a profitable practice . He should have likewise considered the peculiarity of his own situation , which , in point of fortune , age , and connexions , could not brook such a delay , and that , by this total change , he likewise gave up the established fame of an Author of some celebrity , to mingle in the train of juvenile ambulators . of Westminster-hall .
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Anecdotes Of The Late Hugh Kelly.
friends gave out it was Woodward ' s misconception of his part that principally promoted it , aided by the malice of those enemies who formerly made head against his dramatic productions ; but the fact was , it was carried down by its own lead . Party malice had a good deal subsided by this time , and as far as it appeared by the complexion arid conduct of the audiencethey gave it a fair and equitable trial .
, The p lot of this play , as far as we can remember ( for it was never printed ) , turned upon a man who , attempting to do every thing by the rig id rules of reason and abstraction , felt most of his plans counteracted by the customs and habits of the world . How far this may be dramatized in skilful hands , is another question ; but it . was far above Kelly ' s grasp ; such a subject required strong views and nice discriminations of
character ; it likewise required such a selection of incidents as were proper to elucidate that character -. but in all those our Author was deficient ; he had but one forte in dramatic writing , and that was sentimental dialogue ; deprive him of that , and you left him very little - pretensions indeed .
The disappointment of this comedy ftuck so close to our Author ' s heart , both in point of interest as well as fame , that he determined never to write for the Stage again . ' He had been called to the bar about two years before this , and though he had at that time qualified himself verylittle for the practice of the profession , he resolved now to advert to it as the great object of his pursuit ; for this purpose he gave up all his literary engagements ( which were very profitable to him ) and
, reserving only to himself the character of Barrister , he had now , in a great degree , to begin the world again ; to exchange lig ht congenialreading for the severer ftudies of the law ; and what was much more serious to him , to give up what was little short of a certainty , for all the precariousness of a new profession .
Our Author ' s usual prudence here forsook him , and his error should be a warning to others in similar circumstances . Kelly from his Editorship , the Theatre , and holding in a variety of other respects " the pen of a ready . writer , " could make little less than one thousand pounds ' per year ( at least in such years as he brought out anew play ) . Here was a kind of certainty for himself , his wife , and a family of five or six Childrenand this he altogether relinquished for a profession in which
, neither his natural inclination , his education , or even occasional ftudies , had fitted him .. He did not weigh sufficiently in his own mind the difficulty of beginning any learned profession with success between thirty and forty years of age : nor the many examples which were before his eyes of Barristers' properly educated for their profession , with considerable talents and connexions , who were obliged to wait four , five ,
six , nay sometimes ten years , before any accident drew them forward into any thing like a profitable practice . He should have likewise considered the peculiarity of his own situation , which , in point of fortune , age , and connexions , could not brook such a delay , and that , by this total change , he likewise gave up the established fame of an Author of some celebrity , to mingle in the train of juvenile ambulators . of Westminster-hall .