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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Notwithstanding the pre-eminence of George Henry Boker in our dramatic literature before the Civil War, an eminence not seriously threatened in America except by Robert Montgomery Bird, no accurate account of his life has been published and nowhere is available even a trustworthy statement of the productions of his plays. Several of his dramas remain unpublished in manuscript and even their existence is known apparently to but few. I shall not. attempt here to go into detail concerning his life, but will endeavor to give the facts concerning his plays that have come to light in the course of my examination of the Boker manuscripts kindly placed at my disposal by Mrs. George Boker, the daughter-in-law of the dramatist.
1 Since this was written, a brief statement concerning the dates of his plays has been published by the present writer in his Representative American Plays, New York, 1917.
1a This date of the production of the play is based on a written statement by Mr. Boker, found among the mss.
2 Statement of receipts from Walnut Street Theatre, Boker mss.
3 Charles Durang, History of the Philadelphia Stage, 1749-1855, Third Series, Chapter cxii.
4 Durang, op. cit., Third Series, Chap. cxxii.
5 P. 26, ed. of 1848.
6 R. H. Stoddard, George Henry Boker, in Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 857 (June 1890).
7 Boker mss.
8 Durang's History of the Philadelphia Stage, Third Series, Chapter cxii.
9 Boker mss.
10 Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 866.
11 Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 863.
12 Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 864.
13 Boker mss.
14 History of the Philadelphia Stage, Third Series, Chapter cxxvi.
15 Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 866.
16 Boker mss.
17 Lippincott's Magazine, vol. xlv, p. 864.
18 Boker mss. According to Brown's History of the New York Stage (vol. i, p. 403), the play held the boards till October 5th.
19 The characters of Quaestor, Aedile, Scoros, Dromo, or Nuntius, are not included in Glaucus. Saphax, a freedman, and Dudas, a Roman gentleman, are omitted from Nydia, but form part of the list of characters in Gloucus.
20 Figures for Philadelphia performances in December 1851 and in April 1855 are not available.
21 Letter from the office of the Star Theatre, New York, to Mr. Boker, October 1, 1883.