The Innocents

The Innocents Synopsis

Excerpt from The Innocents: A New Play

This, as it seems to me, 18 what Mr. Archibald is implying in the agonizing close of his play. But it is not the meaning of The Innocents. A work of art, as this is, has many meanings, and they vary with the time and the audience. One may be moved by a work of art, as audiences are by this one, without being able to reduce its significance to a set formula. Indeed, that one cannot do so (provided, also that one is moved) is often a sign that a work of art has pretensions beyond the transient.

So, if we are a little puzzled by The Innocents, let us not blame either ourselves or the play. Let us ask ourselves only whether we were filled with a vague, troubling sense of the evil that exists in the world, in us, and even in the very heart of innocence. If we do have this sense, the play has given us much of what it has to give.

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