IN CELEBRATION OF WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH

WE PAY TRIBUTE TO MARTHA MORTON.

Martha Morton made history when she spoke to the all male American 

Dramatists Club in 1907. She was considered the Dean of American Women Playwrights and had made millions of dollars with her plays before 1900.  The photo to the left shows her reading in her library.  For her play "A Fool of Fortune" she spent a year on Wall Street researching the plot in order to capture the terminology and dynamic of the stockbroker's office. We are thrilled to re-introduce this amazing pioneer to today's audience.

MARTHA MORTONʼS ADDRESS TO THE AMERICAN DRAMATISTSʼ CLUB, DELMONICOʼS, NEW YORK CITY, JANUARY 20, 1907 

The American Dramatistsʼ Club (founded in 1890 by Bronson Howard) invited, for the first time in its history, women playwrights to join them for their yearly dinner. Paying tributes to playwrights Charles Klein and J.I.C. Clarke, Bronson Howard introduced Martha Morton Conheim, who represented the women dramatists. The following is her address to the group.

     I take great pleasure, in the name of women writers for the stage, in thanking the president and members of the American Dramatistsʼ Club for the “privilege” of breaking bread with them this evening. A diplomatic function such as this is quite unusual, where representatives of two great dominions come together---dominions so near and alas so far apart. I mean the dominion of the sexes. It is really beautiful, the entente cordiale, which prevails this evening; as we sit together round the same board, holding hands, so to speak, exchanging the most flattering of sentiments, which we mean from our souls, whilst we sip the cup that cheers and inebriates. There is another cup which has been floating in the air above my head during this entire evening---which neither cheers nor inebriates---the cup of Tantalus. The woes of the unfortunate Grecian youth, imprisoned on the borders of the lake, whose sparkling waters arose just to his thirsty lips and receded, have echoed down the centuries and found a response in the hearts of the women dramatists; for whenever they think of the American Dramatistsʼ Club they cannot help seeing that awful cup of Tantalus floating gracefully toward her, and then floating away in an ultra-tantalizing manner. "

     

     I have been named the dean of the women playwrights and I am very proud to be classed among the veterans, in company with my dear friends, Mr. Bronson Howard, Mr. J.I.C. Clarke, Mr. Charles Doremus, Mr. Charles Klein and a handful of others. It was twenty years ago! How does a man feel when he has to say that? Is there a quick, sharp pang of regret, as he looks over his shoulder, and sees Youth and sweet Inexperience scampering away like rabbits with their ears turned backwards? Men have a way of carrying off their age with laughter and jests. I have never known a woman

who could do that, and my excuse for being able to look so far back is that I commenced very young. There is a fine German expression for it ----”Unverschamt jung,” which means neither shamefully nor shamelessly, but just “unashamed young,” so unashamed that I wrote plays and the men shook their heads and said the drama was going to the dogs, then they crept in through the stage door and watched that “green girl” direct a rehearsal and one of them came up to me and said: “Are you going to make a business out of this?” I trembled and felt like Martin Luther before the Council of Worms. I looked him straight in the eyes and answered fervently, “God help me, I must!” Then he put out a friendly hand and crushed my fingers into splinters and gave me the comforting assurance that a woman would have to do twice the work of a man to get one-half the credit.

    

      Since then I have been treated just as well and just as badly as a man. I have been hustled off the stage by the stage manager as the curtain was about to rise; I have been dragged on the stage after the curtain fell to bow my panic-stricken thanks to an applauding audience; I have been roasted, sizzled, frizzled to death, then resurrected and borne on the wings of praise up to a temporary heaven. I have had much success which was sweet, and a little failure which was valuable, and tonight I have reached the zenith of my ambition--I have been present at one of those mysterious Dramatistsʼ Club dinners. 

       My last sensation will be experienced when The Lambs come and beg me to write a skit for their next gambol---and why not? When once the torch of reason is set to that moldy old fence of tradition it ignites very rapidly; and today is a day of tradition- burning. Bonfires are being lit all over the world. We are beginning to understand many things that were riddles and that riddle of riddles--Woman--is beginning to understand herself. Ibsen is the sign-post where the roads cross between the past and the future. Thousands of Noras have crept silently out of narrow homes into the broad walks of life, crept silently up into every vocation, every profession. As a business factor, as a creator, woman has become a power in our drama.

      But still she is at a great disadvantage because she has no guild, and aside from the benefits derived by a people of our profession in having a common meeting place, there is that splendid satisfaction, after the first nightʼs production of oneʼs play, in being able to flee from the frigidity of the managerial office into the warmth of oneʼs own club where oneʼs fellow author slaps one on the back, saying, “My dear boy---I mean, my dear girl--splendid work! Splendid! It was so good I might have written it myself.!”

      Jesting aside, the time is ripe, the material at hand, and I am happy to announce officially that an association has been formed by the women writers for the stage, which is called “The Society of Dramatic Authors". Now, gentlemen, donʼt look up, this society will never be a cup of Tantalus to you, but there is something else hanging over your head, suspended by a single hair--the sword of Damocles--and when it falls, I hope it wonʼt hurt you too much. 

      

      Gentlemen, we are not going to blame you for something of which you were entirely innocent--your sex--we are not going to ostracize you because you are merely men---we invite you all! The president, secretary, treasurer---all who are present tonight, all who are absent, in fact, all dramatists are invited to come in and join us. The drama is universal---its unalterable laws are the same throughout the entire world---its form does not change. It is universal life crystallized into living pictures which differ in the different nations only in color and locality. All dramatists are one in their work; therefore as moderns we may make no restrictions of nationality or sex. The Society of Dramatic Authors has thirty-one charter members, thirty women and one man, a gentleman of broad views and “scientific” principles--Mr. Charles Klein.

And now, returning to the cup of many vintages which life holds to our lips, the wine of which now we sip and now we drain to the dregs--the Society of Dramatic Authors, born yesterday, is as yet only a cup of Promise--we extend to you the privilege of helping make us make it a cup of Fulfillment.

Theatre Magazine, March 1907

(Special thanks to Professor Sherry D. Engle for reprinting this speech in her book, “New Women Dramatists in America, 1890-1920” Palgrave Macmillan, NY 2007)

Martha Morton when she was dreaming about becoming

a playwright in a man's world.