SWAN SONGS.

This week, over the course of twenty-four hours, I saw three plays about suicide. I think I can say without fear of successful contradiction that this is a record. Of the twenty-four actors that I counted on the various stages, three did themselves in; one actually shot himself in the head three times--a victim of artistic license, not of poor marksmanship. The theatrical mortality rate was, therefore, well above the national average of .01 per cent (approximately 10.7 of every hundred thousand citizens). From this statistical analysis, I deduce that not only is the theatre dying but the characters onstage are dropping like flies.

Until the final beat of Terrence ...