3-082-405 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Miss Ellen Terry as Guinevere in "King Arthur," at the Lyceum, 1895. Engraving from a photograph. 'It is fitting that the years which have passed over Ellen Terry's head should touch but lightly an actress who to a whole generation has embodied all that is tender and pathetic and gracious in the illusions of youth...In Mr. Comyns Carr's drama Miss Terry weaves the old spell, which makes Guinevere's sin human and yet ideal, legendary yet lifelike, passionate in love, ethereal in remorse. It is of the earth, and yet it belongs to the sovereign elements which spiritualise the passion of Guinevere and Lancelot into haunting music. What is more delightful than the thrill of girlish happiness in the wood, when the Queen finds her whole world on Lancelot's breast, careless of the ring of hate that is closing round them! What is more moving than her abasement in the hour of Arthur's death! It is at such moments that we feel the romantic tradition to be supreme, though its authority is threatened by insurgents who clamour for Ibsen'. From "Illustrated London News", 1895.