Paul Green Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Stark Young

Critical Essay by Stark Young

As I ponder [the performance of In Abraham's Bosom] it seems moving and profound. Certainly the course of its struggle is full of tragic despair…. There is, too, a certain wise balance of parts in the dramatic elements; the white people mean to be kind, but they are as lost in the midst of a race situation as the Negro is; they are moved now by human or affectionate impulse and now by a blind racial instinct and an arbitrary, desperate sense of self-preservation. The climaxes in the play are strong and bold. I seem, as I think of it, to have been present at a full, passionate story, told by a poet. Certainly this material that Mr. Green attempts is ambitious of power and devastation and beauty; we are in very deep waters with such subject matter as he employs.

But what I remember last is that for three-fifths...
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