Barrett H. Clark papers

Writer, editor, and actor, Barrett Harper Clark was born on August 26, 1890 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada to S. Henry and Anna M. Fralick Clark. Clark studied at the University of Chicago (1908-1912), spending two years in Paris, but did not complete his degree. While still a student Clark began teaching drama at Chautauqua, New York (1909-1917), an educational summer camp for adults. He also taught at Columbia University and Bryn Mawr (1928-1931).

Following graduation Clark worked as an actor and assistant stage manager in a company run by Minnie Maddern Fiske (1912-1913). Clark then worked as a literary editor for Samuel French, a company specializing in publishing drama, in New York (1918-1936). During this period Clark also served as the dramatic editor of Drama Magazine (1924-1931) and as a member of the board of directors for the Drama League America (1915-1926). When the U.S. entered WWI Clark served as the dramatic director at Camp Humphreys, Virginia, a U.S. military training camp. In 1936 Clark left Samuel French to become the executive director of the Dramatists Play Service.

In 1916 Clark married Cecile Matilda Smith, with whom he had three children: Nancy, Molly, and Barrett.

Throughout his life Clark sustained a writing career. Early in his career he translated into English a number of plays by French authors: Hervieu’s The Labyrinth (1913), Three Modern Plays from the French (1914), Four Plays of the Free Theater (1914), Four Plays of Emile Augier (1915), Three Plays of Donnay (1916), Sardou’s Patrie! (1915), Hyacinthe-Loyson’s Apostle (1916), Curel’s False Saint (1916), and Brieux’s Artists’ Families (1918), among others.

He wrote a number of books about drama, including: The Continental Drama of Today (1914), British and American Drama of Today (1915), Contemporary French Dramatists (1915), Study of the Modern Drama (1925), and An Hour of American Drama (1930). Clark also wrote a practical manual, How to Produce Amateur Plays (1917-25), which provided guidance for laypeople producing plays. In his chapbook, Speak the Speech (1930), Clark considers "standard English" and its impact on theatre. In Oedipus or Pollyanna (1927) Clark argues against censorship, re-visiting an issue he had earlier explored in Jurgen and the Censor (1919). Clark published an article about Eugene O'Neill in the New York Sun (May 18, 1919), and after this initial acquaintance, he went on to write a biography Eugene O’Neill (1926) and Eugene O’Neill Bibliography (with R. Sanborn) (1931). In 1928 Clark published Professor Clark, a Memoir.

Clark also edited the fifty-eight volume World’s Best Plays (1915-1926) and was the first editor of America's Lost Plays (1940-1965), a twenty volume series that brought attention to obscure plays by American dramatists from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Clark edited and co-edited a number of other works pertaining to theatre, including: Walter Prichard Eaton’s Plays and Players (1916), Masterpieces of Modern Spanish Drama (1917), European Theories of the Drama (1918), Representative One Act Plays by British and Irish Authors (1921), One-Act Plays (1929), Favorite American Plays of the 19th Century (1943), and Nine Modern American Plays (1951).

Clark died on August 5, 1953 in Briarcliff, New York.