afterword
Writers usually speak deprecatingly of their “early works” for they like to feel that their talents have greatly expanded with maturity. It is certainly true that the continued exercise of a craft breeds competence in it, but in writing there are other things besides competence. There are certain organic values, such as intensity of feeling, freshness of perception, moral earnestness and conviction. These are virtues that may exist in beginning writers and unfortunately they may exist more in the beginning than in the later stages. When I look back at “Stairs to the Roof” which I wrote six years ago—it seems like sixty years ago—I see its faults very plainly, as plainly as you may see them, but still I do not feel apologetic about this play. Unskilled and awkward as I was at this initial period in my playwriting, I certainly had a moral earnestness which I cannot boast of today, and I think that moral earnestness is a good thing for any times but particularly for these times. I wish I still had the idealistic passion of Benjamin Murphy! You may smile as I do at the sometimes sophomoric aspect of his excitement but I hope you will respect, as I do, the purity of his feeling and the honest concern which he had in his heart for the basic problem of mankind which is to dignify our lives with a certain freedom.