Swords

by Sidney Howard

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

172 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1921

About the author

Sidney Coe Howard was an American playwright and screenwriter. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1925 and a posthumous Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay in 1940 for the screenplay for Gone with the Wind. This was the first time a posthumous nominee for any Oscar won the award. He had been twice previously nominated for his adaptations of the Sinclair Lewis novels Arrowsmith , and Dodsworth .

Reviews

[Perry Whitford · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bold attempt to write a medieval play for an early 20th century audience, set in Italy during the days of the Guelphs and Ghibellines.

The heroine is Fiamma, a beautiful and pious young woman whose prayers heal the sick, held prisoner by a besotted German general. She is a representation of the Virgin Mary, described by the playwright as 'an altogether human Empress, devoted to her servants, none too scrupulous, temperamental, exacting, very feminine, wholly glorious.'

The villain is called Canetto, a Machiavellian court jester who sings songs and prances around the stage one minute then cuts out somebody's tongue the next. The drama involves a game of wits between the evil jongleur and the virtuous Madonna. (Canetto: "In you, I meet my first antagonist...")

A simple stage set, a tense and melodramatic premise, the play demands superlative acting from the two leads. Canetto will stop at nothing to bend Fiamma to his will, using both her husband and child to break her. But her beauty and virtue are themselves powerful weapons:

'She is like the summer sun.
She shines, and in an hour
The flower of man's loyalty is withered...
There is no sword so perilous as her smile.'

I discovered online that the play opened in September 1921 and closed a month later, so it obviously wasn't a success. The first time I read it I was intrigued but found the dialogue a little stiff. The second time I read it I admired it move.

Sidney For Howard later won an Oscar for the screenplay of Gone With the Wind. He obviously liked a good melodrama.