{"id":6739,"date":"2025-05-02T13:43:32","date_gmt":"2025-05-02T17:43:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/?p=6739"},"modified":"2025-05-10T09:37:36","modified_gmt":"2025-05-10T13:37:36","slug":"leading-ladies-sarah-bernhardt-eleonora-duse-ellen-terry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/?p=6739","title":{"rendered":"Leading Ladies: Sarah Bernhardt, Eleonora Duse, Ellen Terry"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"pdfprnt-buttons pdfprnt-buttons-post pdfprnt-top-right\"><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F6739&print=pdf\" class=\"pdfprnt-button pdfprnt-button-pdf\" target=\"_blank\" ><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/plugins\/pdf-print\/images\/pdf.png\" alt=\"image_pdf\" title=\"View PDF\" \/><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F6739&print=print\" class=\"pdfprnt-button pdfprnt-button-print\" target=\"_blank\" ><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/plugins\/pdf-print\/images\/print.png\" alt=\"image_print\" title=\"Print Content\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>In the latter half of the 19<sup>th<\/sup> Century three actresses ruled supreme in the hearts of theatre-goers: the French Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923), the Italian Eleonora Duse (1858-1924), and the English Ellen Terry (1847-1928). They played all parts: from the classics of Shakespeare and Racine, through the romantics such as Dumas and d\u2019Annunzio, to the new naturalists such as Ibsen. They toured the world but acted only in their mother tongue. Their emotional intensity and stage presence communicated with their audiences even when their words were not understood. They were the first superstars: idolized by their public, celebrated by artists, and honored by poets. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse_bernhardt_terry-zz.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6759\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse_bernhardt_terry-zz.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"428\" height=\"428\" \/><\/a>Beginnings<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Both Ellen Terry and Eleonora Duse were born to parents who were travelling players, and both began acting in childhood. Eleonora Duse and her father continued acting after the death of Eleonora\u2019s mother in 1875. In 1879, Eleonora received her first rave reviews for her performances as Ophelia in <em>Hamlet<\/em> and Elettra in <em>Oreste<\/em> at the <em>Teatro dei Fiorentini<\/em> in Naples. She married a fellow actor in 1881 and had a daughter Enrichetta before the two separated.<\/p>\n<p>Although five of her siblings became professional actors, Ellen Terry was initially disillusioned with the theater. At the age of 16 years, she married the painter George Watts who was 30 years her senior. The marriage was unhappy, and Ellen left after a year to live with the architect Edward Godwin, with whom she had two children, Edith and Edward, who later used the fictitious surname, Craig, and who both became renowned theater-directors. Godwin encouraged Terry to act again and she was acclaimed as Portia in <em>The Merchant of Venice<\/em> in 1875, a role that she reprised many times over her career (Holyroyd, 2008, p 102). \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Sarah Bernhardt was the illegitimate daughter of a Jewish courtesan, and only came to the theater after finishing her education at a convent school. The Duc de Mornay, the half-brother of Napoleoon III and a patron of her mother, suggested that she audition for <em>Le Conservatoire national de musique et de declamation<\/em>. With his influence she was accepted, and studied there between 1860 and 1862. After leaving the conservatoire she acted at the <em>Od\u00e9on<\/em> theater but her initial roles were not successful. Though she continued to act, her main support over the next decade came from her life as a courtesan. She counted among her many lovers a Marshall of the French army, a Spanish banker, and a Turkish ambassador (Gottlieb, 2010, p 44). She likely had an affair with Victor Hugo when he directed his play <em>Ruy Blas<\/em> at the Com\u00e9die Fran\u00e7aise in 1872 (Gottleib, 2010, p 61). Though some 40 years her senior Hugo was still susceptible to female charms. Bernhardt had her first major triumph as Maria, Queen of Spain in <em>Ruy Blas,<\/em> and followed this by an acclaimed Ph\u00e8dre in Racine\u2019 tragedy in 1874.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>The Acting Companies<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Bernhardt\u2019s subsequent successes at the <em>Com\u00e9die Fran\u00e7aise<\/em> allowed her to obtain backers for her own company in 1880. She put on <em>La dame aux Cam\u00e9lias<\/em> by Alexandre Dumas fils, and then took her company on tour to London and the United States. She had affairs with her leading actors and was briefly married to a Greek diplomat. She attracted the attention of Victorien Sardou who wrote several plays for her, notably <em>F\u00e9dora<\/em> (1882), <em>Th\u00e9odora <\/em>(1884), <em>La Tosca<\/em> (1887) and <em>Cl\u00e9op\u00e2tre <\/em>(1890). She arranged with Alphonse Mucha to produce magnificent art-deco posters for her shows:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6726\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1777\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-300x208.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-1024x711.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-768x533.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-1536x1066.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/mucha-bernhardt-2048x1422.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Bernhardt became friends with artists and celebrities: Gustave Dor\u00e9, the illustrator of Dante, the portraitist Georges Clairin, Edward VII of England when he was Prince of Wales, and Louise Abb\u00e9ma, an impressionist painter and prominent lesbian. It is unclear how many of her friends were also lovers. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In 1899, the theater built by Baron Haussmann on the Place du Ch\u00e2telet in Paris was renovated and renamed the <em>Th\u00e9\u00e2tre Sarah-Bernhardt<\/em>, a name it retained until the German occupation in 1941 when it was called the <em>Th\u00e9\u00e2tre de la Cit\u00e9<\/em> because of Bernhardt&#8217;s Jewish ancestry (Gottlieb, 2010, p 139).<\/p>\n<p>Duse formed her own acting company in 1885. She had a prolonged affair with Arrigo Boito, who was later to serve as Verdi\u2019s librettist for <em>Otello<\/em> and <em>Falstaff<\/em>. \u00a0Boito provided her with the play <em>Cleopatre<\/em>, a translation of Shakespeare\u2019s <em>Anthony and Cleopatra<\/em> in 1887. The illustration below shows the competing Cleopatras of Duse and Bernhardt (Rader, 2018, pp 83-84):<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6717\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2300\" height=\"2560\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-scaled.jpg 2300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-270x300.jpg 270w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-920x1024.jpg 920w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-768x855.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-1380x1536.jpg 1380w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/cleopatras-duse-and-bernhardt-1840x2048.jpg 1840w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2300px) 100vw, 2300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In 1895 Duse had an affair with the poet and playwright Gabriele d\u2019Annunzio. He wrote the play <em>La Gioconda<\/em> (1899) for her. However, later in 1899 when he sent his masterpiece <em>La citt\u00e0 morta, <\/em>based on Ancient Greek tragedies, to her rival Sarah Bernhardt, Duse ended their affair. Nevertheless, she later performed in both this play and in d\u2019Annunzio\u2019s <em>Francesca da Rimini<\/em> (1901) about the tragic love affair between Francesca and her brother-in-law Paolo Malatesta, as told in Canto 5 of Dante\u2019s <em>Inferno<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>When Duse toured Russia in 1891, she impressed the young Anton Chekhov. Duse was to become the model for Irina Arkadina in <em>The Seagull<\/em> (1895). During her tour of Russia, Duse presented Ibsen\u2019s <em>A Doll\u2019s House<\/em>. She was particularly fond of the role: Nora, the name of the heroine, is a diminutive of her own name (Rader, 2018, p 103). She later included other Ibsen plays in her repertoire, and visited the playwright in Oslo in 1904. After 1910, Duse had a long relationship with Lina Poletti, a poet, playwright and open Lesbian, but this was likely no more than friendship (Weaver, 1984, pp 286-290).<\/p>\n<p>In 1878 Henry Irving and Ellen Terry formed a partnership to reopen the Lyceum Theatre in London. For the next 20 years, they acted together to great acclaim. Their repertoire centered on Shakespeare \u2013 <em>Hamlet<\/em>, <em>The Merchant of Venice, Rome and Juliet, Macbeth,<\/em> and <em>Much Ado about Nothing <\/em>\u2013 but they also presented other plays \u2013 <em>Becket<\/em> by Tennyson,<em> Olivia<\/em> by W. G. Wills derived from <em>The Vicar of Wakefield,<\/em> and<em> King Charles I<\/em> by William Havard. It is not known whether their relationship extended beyond the theater. Below are woodcuts of Irving and Terry by Terry\u2019s son Edward Craig from about 1895.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6723\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2555\" height=\"1898\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig.jpg 2555w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig-300x223.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig-1024x761.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig-768x571.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig-1536x1141.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/irving-and-terry-by-edward-craig-2048x1521.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2555px) 100vw, 2555px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Terry kept up a long epistolary relationship with Bernard Shaw, who found her an intelligent and witty correspondent. Despite the many letters, however, they only met occasionally. Terry played Lady Cicely Waynefleete in Shaw\u2019s <em>Captain Brassbound\u2019s Conversion<\/em> in 1906, one of her last important roles. In 1958 a set of eighteen unsigned love poems to Ellen Terry went on auction. Though attributed to Shaw (Werner, 1980), these poems were probably written by Christabel Marshall, who was Terry\u2019s secretary for several years. Christabel ultimately changed her name to Christopher Marie St John, and became the romantic partner of Terry\u2019s daughter Edy Craig (Holroyd, 2008, pp 321-330). \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Portraits<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Bernhardt, Duse and Terry were the beauties of their day. They were the subject of glamorous portraits such as Michele Gordigiani\u2019s 1896 portrait of Duse and Georges Clairin\u2019s 1876 portrait of Bernhardt:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6719\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1942\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-300x228.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-1024x777.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-768x582.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-1536x1165.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-bernhardt-paintings-2048x1553.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The following are portraits of Sarah Bernhardt as Cleopatra by Georges Rochegrosse (1890), of the young Ellen Terry by her husband George Watts (1864) and of Eleonora Duse by Giovanni Boldini (1895):<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6729\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1017\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-300x119.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-1024x407.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-768x305.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-1536x610.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/painted-heads-2048x814.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ilya Repin made a striking charcoal sketch of Duse during her tour of Russia in 1891:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6720\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1999\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-300x234.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-1024x800.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-768x600.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-1536x1199.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-by-repin-1891-2048x1599.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Photographs<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Nic\u00e9phore Ni\u00e9ce took the first photograph in 1822. By the middle of the 19<sup>th<\/sup> Century photography had become widespread. Felix Nadar, the first genius of photographic portraiture, produced several images of the young Sarah Bernhardt in the early 1860s.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6727\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1769\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-300x207.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-1024x708.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-768x531.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-1536x1062.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nadar-bernhardts-2048x1416.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The following is Adam Begley\u2019s description of the portraits:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Loosely wrapped in a white burnoose, or in a shiny black velvet cloak, both garments voluminous, their folds teasingly suggestive, she leans on a truncated fluted column\u2014a vulgar prop Nadar would have laughed at a decade earlier. It doesn&#8217;t matter: the eyes are otherwise occupied, caressing her flawless skin, her calm pensive face, her untamed hair. It&#8217;s not just that she appears to be naked under her wrap\u2014the portraits carry an erotic charge that&#8217;s complicated and enhanced by the withdrawn, private ex-pression and a whisper of melancholy. The air of mystery is especially strong when she&#8217;s wearing the black velvet and looking off to her right, almost in profile; the focus is slightly blurred, her bright eyes distant and enigmatic. Her sole ornament, a cameo earring, less a decoration than an echo in miniature, draws attention to her elfin ear, deliberately exposed and adding to the impression of nakedness. (Begley 2017, p 110)<\/p>\n<p>Richard Howard\u2019s poem <em>Hommage to Nadar \u2013 Sarah Bernhardt<\/em> (2004) celebrates both the photographer and his subject:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 120px;\">Often enough you were naked under the cloak<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 in those days; gentlemen drank <br \/>and waited, murmuring deprecations<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 till the cloak dropped and your arms<br \/>which would dishevel the world \u2013 those white serpents,<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hugo called them \u2013 were exposed,<br \/><br \/>thin as your legs, thin and white, but rusted here,<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 then here, the rest white and hard . . .<br \/>Not yet:\u00a0 you have not yet had success on the stage,<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 and if you were a mother two <br \/>years back, Maurice never knew his father \u2013 <br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 did you? A nun, you wanted<br \/><br \/>to be a nun, and became a sculptor, one<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 craning female torso sent<br \/>each year to the Salon, ardent clay ladies<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 in postures of possession.<br \/>Mortal will is already your mode, undressed,<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 uncombed, probably unwashed \u2013 <br \/><br \/>you are the child he wrote in French for, Oscar<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 who understood your crying<br \/>need and overheard, just thirty years too late,<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 the voice of Salome, pure<br \/>gold bangles on a tin wire pulled to breaking,<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 and of course the wire did break.<br \/><br \/>You seem to be regarding, on cue but still<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 offstage, in the studio,<br \/>the resonant hells your talent sanctified<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 for decades of unbelievers.<br \/>and taught your century its lesson, dying<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 in <em>La Gloire<\/em>, your last <em>rel\u00e2che<br \/><br \/><\/em>attended by a house of fifty thousand:<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 dazed Paris, unforgiving,<br \/>relented for your farewell tour of duty<br \/><br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 which was to doubt if either<br \/>the Heavenly City or that wan shade of it<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 our dreams have perpetuated<br \/><br \/>can function, flourish or even form unless<br \/>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 it include its opposite,<br \/>unless in heaven there is hell. Divine Sarah.<\/p>\n<p>The poem mentions that Bernhardt was also a competent sculptor. Oscar Wilde wrote <em>Salom\u00e9 <\/em>in French expressly for Bernhardt although she never played the role. <em>La Gloire<\/em> is likely a late performance in d\u2019Annunzio\u2019s <em>La gloria <\/em>which had been translated into French. The theatrical term <em>en <\/em><em>rel\u00e2che<\/em> is used to describe the days when a play is not performed so that the actors can rest. The English idiom is that the theater is \u201cdark.\u201d Bernhardt continued working until a few days before her death. \u201cFifty thousand\u201d is the estimated number who attended her funeral in 1923.<\/p>\n<p>Terry and Duse were also photographed extensively. The following illustration shows a portrait of Ellen Terry by Julia Margaret Cameron taken in 1864, and a portrait of Eleonora Duse by Edward Steichen taken in 1903. The latter was taken using a soft focus, a style popular at the beginning of the 20<sup>th<\/sup> Century but eschewed by later photographers.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6735\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1517\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-300x178.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-1024x607.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-768x455.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-1536x910.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-and-duse-photos-2048x1214.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Costumes<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Bernhardt, Terry and Duse all revelled in their costumes. Those of Ellen Terry were particularly striking. Edward Burne-Jones designed her outfits for Guinevere and Lawrence Alma-Tadema for Imogen. The most memorable of her costumes was the \u201cbeetle-dress\u201d that she wore as Lady Macbeth. The gown, designed by Alice Laura Comyns-Carr and made by Ada Cort Nettleship, is embellished with green iridescent beetle wing-cases that shimmer under stage lighting. The dress has recently been <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationaltrust.org.uk\/visit\/kent\/smallhythe-place\/dressing-lady-macbeth-exhibition\">restored<\/a>. The illustration below shows the dress and a painting of Terry as Lady Macbeth by John Singer Sargeant (1888).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6724\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"2344\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-300x275.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-1024x938.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-768x703.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-1536x1406.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/lady-macbeth-dress-2048x1875.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Lithographs<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Lithography was invented in 1796 and come to prominence over the following century as a means for producing inexpensive color prints. William Nicholson published a set of <em>Twelve Portraits<\/em> in 1899: lithographic reproductions of hand-coloured woodcuts. Among those represented was Sarah Bernhardt. Eleonora Duse was included in a second set of portraits which came out in 1902.These portraits are shown below. In 1906 Nicholson produced for the Ellen Terry Jubilee Banquet a lithographic scroll showing all the major roles from her career. The middle section shows Ellen Terry as Lady Teazle from <em>The<\/em> <em>School for Scandal<\/em> (1877), Olivia from <em>Olivia<\/em> (1878), Ophelia from <em>Hamlet<\/em> (1878), Queen Henrietta Maria from <em>King Charles I<\/em> by William Havard (1879), and Portia from <em>The Merchant of Venice:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6728\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2428\" height=\"2219\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs.jpg 2428w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs-300x274.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs-1024x936.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs-768x702.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs-1536x1404.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/nicholson-lithographs-2048x1872.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2428px) 100vw, 2428px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Audio Recordings<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In the early years of the 20<sup>th<\/sup> Century, it became possible to record the sounds of voices. Both Ellen Terry and Sarah Bernhardt were recorded. Although the recordings are noisy and the studio recordings very different from an actual performance, the listener can get some sense of how they sounded on the stage.<\/p>\n<p>The recording of Ellen Terry giving Portia\u2019s speech about mercy was taken in 1911. The words of the speech follow together with a painting by George Baldry of Terry as Portia in an 1895 production. Terry\u2019s presentation is restrained but convincing:<\/p>\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-6739-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-quality-of-mercy-1911.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-quality-of-mercy-1911.mp3\">https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/terry-quality-of-mercy-1911.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6732\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1527\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-300x179.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-1024x611.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-768x458.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-1536x916.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/portia-2048x1222.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>I could not find any audio recordings of Eleonora Duse. We must content herself with a description by Arthur Symons, the British critic and poet who lived for a while in Italy and who translated several of d\u2019Annunzio\u2019s works:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">And then that voice of hers! It can be sweet or harsh, it can laugh or cry, can be menacing or caressing. And how every word tells! Every word comes to you clearly, carrying exactly its meaning: and, somehow along with the words, an emotion, which you may resolve to ignore, but which will seize on you, which will go through and through you. Trick or instinct, there it is, the power to make you feel intensely; and that is precisely the final test of a great dramatic artist. (Symons, 1926, p 99)<\/p>\n<p>The following is an excerpt from a 1910 recording of Sarah Bernhardt in the role of Ph\u00e8dre. Ph\u00e8dre the wife of Theseus has fallen passionately in love with her stepson Hippolytus. She confesses her shame and asks him to punish her with death.<\/p>\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-6739-2\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/bernhardt-phedre-1910.mp3?_=2\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/bernhardt-phedre-1910.mp3\">https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/bernhardt-phedre-1910.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6731\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2377\" height=\"1258\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt.jpg 2377w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt-300x159.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt-1024x542.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt-768x406.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt-1536x813.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre_excerpt-2048x1084.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2377px) 100vw, 2377px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>In the Words of the Poets. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The young Oscar Wilde was quite taken by Terry\u2019s performance of Portia. The following is his sonnet to the actress. Since I could not find any image of the golden dress, I have paired the sonnet with a portrait of Terry by Forbes-Robertson from about the same time:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6737\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1670\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-300x196.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-1024x668.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-768x501.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-1536x1002.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/wilde-portia-poem-2048x1336.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Wilde was perhaps even more impressed by Sarah Bernhardt in <em>Ph\u00e8dre<\/em>. The accompanying photograph was taken by Felix Nadar\u2019s son Paul:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6730\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1527\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-300x179.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-1024x611.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-768x458.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-1536x916.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/phedre-wilde-2048x1222.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The young playwright Edmond Rostand, author of the wildly successful Cyrano de Bergerac (1897) wrote several plays for Sarah Bernhardt, among them <em>La<\/em> <em>Samaritaine<\/em> (1897), about the Samaritan women who gave up a life of sin to follow Christ, and <em>l\u2019Aiglon<\/em> (Eaglet, 1900) about the Napoleon\u2019s son. At a celebratory dinner in 1896 he presented a sonnet in praise of Sarah:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6715\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2325\" height=\"1040\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt.jpg 2325w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt-300x134.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt-1024x458.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt-768x344.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt-1536x687.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/A-Sarah-Bernhardt-2048x916.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2325px) 100vw, 2325px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The sonnet is mainly remembered for the line <em>Reine de l\u2019Attitude ed Princesse des Gestes. <\/em>No one could strike a pose as well as Sarah. The following is the death of <em>La Dame aux Cam\u00e9lias<\/em>, probably from a production in the early 1900s:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6734\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1935\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-300x227.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-1024x774.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-768x581.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-1536x1161.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-in-dame-xb-2048x1548.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In 1907, the American poet Sara Teasdale published four sonnets in honor of Eleonora Duse. The following sonnet about her performance in Francesca da Rimini was set to music by Robert Owen. Below is a performance by soprano Jamie Reimer and pianist Stacie Haneline:<\/p>\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-6739-3\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Sonnets-to-Duse-Op.-102_-No.-4.mp3?_=3\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Sonnets-to-Duse-Op.-102_-No.-4.mp3\">https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Sonnets-to-Duse-Op.-102_-No.-4.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6721\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1618\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-300x190.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-1024x647.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-768x485.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-1536x971.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-teasdale-2048x1294.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Imaginings<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It is difficult for us to understand the effect these actresses had on their audiences. We have some general idea:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Ellen Terry lives on as the eternal girl actress, the symbol of health, youth, and energy, in contrast with Duse, the suffering, mature woman. Between them stands Bernhardt, the creature of passion and power, larger than life and dangerously unpredictable. (Stokes et al, 1988, p 10).<\/p>\n<p>And yet<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Whatever audiences perceived in the work of Bernhardt, Terry and Duse, it was clearly something that took them beyond the immediate and into wider, deeper areas of themselves. This special quality is forever inaccessible to us now, since it died with them and with the time in which they lived. It is also something that challenges historical analysis, just as it challenged description by those contemporaries who struggled to express the inexpressible in the restricting language of their reviews and articles. (Stokes et al., 1988, p 11).<\/p>\n<p>So to conclude, I would like to imagine them when they played roles that to me are special. I shall do this in the order of performance. First would be Ellen Terry as Beatrice in the early 1880s. It must have been marvelous to watch her spar with Henry Irving in <em>Much Ado About Nothing<\/em><strong>. <\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6725\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1812\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-300x212.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-1024x725.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-768x543.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-1536x1087.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/much-ado-2048x1449.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>And then I would have found myself enthralled by the performance of Sarah Bernhardt as Hamlet in the 1890s. She thought of Hamlet much as I do: as a man who is determined to do the right thing, who hesitates not from a weakness of will, but because he needs to be certain before he acts. This is completely different from the idea that Hamlet was someone who just could not make up his mind.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6733\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1793\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-300x210.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-1024x717.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-768x538.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-1536x1076.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/sarah-bernhardt-as-hamlet-2048x1435.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>And finally, I would have been transfixed by Eleonora Duse as Hedda Gabler in the first few years of the 20<sup>th<\/sup> Century.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-6718\" src=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1710\" srcset=\"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-scaled.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-768x513.jpg 768w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-1536x1026.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/duse-as-hedda-2048x1368.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>References<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Begley, A. (2017). <em>The great Nadar: the man behind the camera<\/em><u>.<\/u> Tim Duggan Books (Penguin).<\/p>\n<p>Gottlieb, R. (2010). <em>Sarah: the life of Sarah Bernhardt<\/em>. Yale University<\/p>\n<p>Holroyd, M. (2008). <em>A strange eventful history: the dramatic lives of Ellen Terry, Henry Irving and their remarkable families<\/em>. Chatto &amp; Windus.<\/p>\n<p>Howard, R. (2004). <em>Inner voices: selected poems, 1963-2003<\/em>. Farrar, Straus &amp; Giroux.<\/p>\n<p>Huret, J. (1899). <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/sarahbernhardt00hureuoft\/page\/188\/mode\/2up\"><em>Sarah Bernhardt<\/em><\/a>. Chapman &amp; Hall.<\/p>\n<p>Izard, F. (1915). <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/heroinesofmodern00izarrich\/page\/n7\/mode\/2up\"><em>Heroines of the modern stage<\/em><\/a><em>.<\/em> Sturgis &amp; Walton.<\/p>\n<p>Rader, P. (2018). <em>Playing to the gods: Sarah Bernhardt, Eleonora Duse, and the rivalry that changed acting forever<\/em>. Simon &amp; Schuster.<\/p>\n<p>Stokes, J., Booth, M. R., &amp; Bassnett, S. (1988). <em>Bernhardt, Terry, Duse: the actress in her time<\/em>. Cambridge University Press.<\/p>\n<p>Symons, A. (1926). <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/eleonoraduse0000arth\/page\/n5\/mode\/2up\"><em>Eleonora Duse<\/em><\/a>. Elkin Matthews.<\/p>\n<p>Teasdale, S. (1907). <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/sonnetstoduseoth00teasrich\/page\/n7\/mode\/2up\">Sonnets to Duse and other poems<\/a>. Poet Lore Company.<\/p>\n<p>Weaver, W. (1984). <em>Duse, a biography<\/em>. Thames &amp; Hudson.<\/p>\n<p>Werner, J. (1980). <em>Lady, wilt thou love me?\u202fEighteen love poems for Ellen Terry attributed to George Bernard Shaw<\/em>. Stein and Day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the latter half of the 19th Century three actresses ruled supreme in the hearts of theatre-goers: the French Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923), the Italian Eleonora Duse (1858-1924), and the English Ellen Terry (1847-1928). They played all parts: from the classics of Shakespeare and Racine, through<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":271,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,13,6,118,5],"tags":[990,982,985,979,980,989,984,988,360,983,987,992,986,991,981],"class_list":["post-6739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-art","category-literature","category-painting","category-photography","category-poetry","tag-alphonse-mucha","tag-anton-chekhov","tag-cleopatra","tag-eleonora-duse","tag-ellen-terry","tag-felix-nadar","tag-gabriele-dannunzio","tag-george-watts","tag-hamlet","tag-henrik-ibsen","tag-macbeth","tag-merchant-of-venice","tag-much-ado-about-nothing","tag-phedre","tag-sarah-bernhardt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6739"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6760,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6739\/revisions\/6760"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/creatureandcreator.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}