CHAPTER IX
WILLIAM SHARP ("FIONA MACLEOD")
There were relations other than that of a common purpose between William Sharp and the Irish writers of the Celtic Renaissance. He was a friend of Mr. Yeats, a correspondent of Mr. Russell, and the chief commentator in the English reviews on the work of the Irish group of its writers. At one time, after 1897, the relationship promised to be very close, indeed. William Sharp, experimenting in psychics with Mr. Yeats, found occasion to interest him in "Fiona Macleod," and as a result of that interest Mr. Yeats came to think the new writer might write Celtic plays for performances he intended to arrange for Irish literary organizations. Thus it is that Mrs. Sharp has to include in her memoir of her husband a long letter to "Fiona Macleod" from Mr. Yeats, in which he suggests: "The plays might be almost in some cases modern mystery plays. Your 'Last Supper,' for instance, would make such a play." Mr. Sharp, apparently, did not follow up this suggestion, but shortly after the first performances of "The Irish Literary Theatre" in 1899 he wrote the two plays that, together with "Vistas," comprise all the dramatic writing that he has to his name. That "The Immortal Hour" and "The House of Usna" were intended for "The Irish Literary Theatre," I think there is little doubt, and it was only, I take it, when circumstances dic-
