Abe Lincoln in Japanese

In Tokyo this month the Japs are getting a stage lesson in democracy--and liking it. In a freezing but always well-filled theater, the progressive Zenshinza troupe is performing a four-hour-long version of John Drinkwater's generation-old Abraham Lincoln. The stilted, undramatic play is nothing in itself to warm audiences up. Neither is the name of Lincoln, which to most Japs is far more hazy than hallowed--even though Emperor Hirohito has a "cherished" bust of him in his temporary palace. But the production, with popular, 5 ft. 7 in. Actor Chojuro Kawaraskai playing Lincoln, shows great technical skill; and the theme of Emancipation arouses great interest.

The Japs in the audience--half of them women, most of them students and office workers--seldom applaud the recital of the Gettysburg Address; they are seldom sure, for that matter, whether Lincoln or Drinkwater wrote it. But afterwards many Japs slip backstage and tell the actors how much they admire the speech. Most Allied civilians who attend the show (the theater is out of bounds for the military) find it so long-winded that they duck out before the end. The only criticism they have voiced is that Lincoln's trousers are much too nattily creased. Accordingly, before one recent performance, while top-hatted "Secretary Seward" squatted crosslegged, eating rice with chopsticks, "President Lincoln" went busily to work rumpling his trousers. Then President Lincoln--who in real life looks more like Field Marshal Rommel--put on foot pads and high-heeled shoes to shamble onstage, a real, live six-footer.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.