You can use slides, pictures, videos, and even your own voice recordings. Lisa uses PowerPoint to give her presentation. Use the WH questions to help prepare your presentation. Who? The people who come are the audience. Where? Where you have your presentation is the location. When? You choose what time of day and the length, how long, your presentation will be. Audience. Who will be listening to you? Who? How many? How much do they already know? What do they want? Location. Where will you give your presentation? Large or small room? Equipment available? Lighting? Tables and chairs? Time and length? What time of day and how long? Early in the morning? Right before or after lunch? Short or long presentation? Tom is trying to inform his audience of the different programs at his college. My teacher will train me on how to create a presentation. People give presentations to persuade others to do something. Jorge gives a presentation to sell his new computer game. Can you name the three most important things to do before giving a presentation? Prepare, prepare, prepare.


Good afternoon everyone. And I wanted to start by saying thank you very much to Azad, Marcos and the scientific committee for the invitation. For me, it's a great honor to be one of the speakers of the Toronto Perioperative Echo Symposium this year. And today I will present this study you all see on your screen, published in 2021 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, entitled Transes of a Geo-Eco Cardiography in Patients Undergoing Coronary Artery Bypass-Graft Surgery. And this study was performed in the USA with the lead of these five centers. For this presentation, I do not have any conflicts of interest to disclose. And my objectives today are to review the level of evidence of the use of TE insurgers of cabbages, to present the methodology and results of this study, and also to present two clinical cases when TE may have changed the surgical outcome in surgeries of cabbage. So we all know that interoperative TE is an important tool in cardiac surgical care that provides real-time assessment of the heart's structure and function, including global systolic and diastolic function, regional wall motion analysis, and both native and prosthetic valve function. It has the potential to reinforce or improve the palm preoperative diagnosis to guide the conduction of the operation in cardiac pulmonary bypass management and to confirm optimal cardiac function prior to transfer of care to the CVICU. Multiple studies have shown that interoperative TE is safe and has a low complication rate. And the existing guidelines recommending that interoperative TE is used in all open heart and thoracic surgical procedures, and that it should be considered in cabbage surgeries. This is a class 2A recommendation with level B of evidence, and this means that the benefit is greater than the risk, and that there are limitations in the populations or study designs used to support this evidence. However, when we look close into the evidence for the use of interoperative TE, we notice that this evidence is sparse based on prior studies that largely focus on whether TE changed the operative plan, rather than whether TE improved clinical outcomes. Indeed, there are a few studies that assessed outcomes, but they are all small and underpowered. So the authors made the hypothesis that for surgeries of cabbage, the use of TE would be variable across North America and associated with improved clinical outcomes. And they plan to perform a retrospective cohort study of TE using isolated cabbage patients using data from the STS adult cardiac surgery database. The overall study population included more than 1.25 million isolated cabbage performed from 2011 to 2019 across 1218 centers. And to study whether TE was associated with unplanned valve procedure, the population had to be restricted to patients included in newer versions of the STS database. For this reason, the study population for unplanned valve procedures included less patients, close to 830,000 cases performed between 2014 and 2019. The secondary outcome was operative mortality and operative mortality is defined in the STS database as all deaths, regardless of cause, occurring during the hospitalization in which the operation was performed even after 30 days. And all deaths, regardless of cause, occurring after discharge from the hospital but before the end of postoperative date 30. The secondary outcome was the association of TE usage with unplanned valve surgery due to unsuspected patient disease or anatomy. And other secondary outcomes included postoperative renal failure, postoperative prolonged mechanical ventilation, longer than 24 hours, postoperative prolonged ICU stay longer than two days, reoperations and hospital readmissions within the 30 days. The authors decided to include a propensity match score analysis to account for baseline differences and to better investigate the association of TE usage with outcomes. The propensity scores were calculated by logistic regression using the variables to the right side of your screen, all from the cabbage risk model in the STS scoring system. TE and non-TE cases with similar propensity scores were then matched one to one by a matching algorithm. Standardized differences before and after matching are presented in this graph, and after matching balance was acceptable with all standardizes differences lower than 10%. Another important information is that the authors decided to stratify patients in three groups to study patient risk was a modifier of the relationship between TE use and outcome. So they use the STS predicted risk to divide patients into low moderate and high risk of operative mortality. Moving to the results of this study. Let's start with the utilization of TE during cabbage procedures. Of the more than 1.2 million isolated cabbage procedures performed in more than 1200 centers, almost 54% of the patients had interoperative TE. This figure represents the percentage of cabbage patients receiving interoperative at each one of the 1218 centers across North America rank ordered by proportion per center. So we can see that some centers using all patients while others don't use it at all. And this is variable and was found to be not associated with the site's volume of cabbages. As you can appreciate the percentage of isolated cabbage patients receiving TE increased over time from 40% in 2011 to more than 60% in 2019. The authors then present their demographic clinical and site characteristics of both groups in this long table of results that I invited you all to analyze later on. And when comparing both groups, their results show that looking at the group of patients where TE was used. There was a higher risk profile with higher rates of chronic lung disease, diabetes, heart failure, myocardial infarction, shock, arrhythmia and valvular heart disease. Also, TE was used more commonly patients with ACS on presentation in emergent and urgent cases and was associated with a higher rate of interoperative mechanical circulatory support. Another interesting analysis looking at postoperative course of both groups showed that the group of patients with interoperative TE had higher postoperative complications and mortality rates, including higher rates of renal failure, cardiac arrest, hospital readmission and major morbidity. Indeed, cabbage patients who received interoperative TE had a 12.5% rate of major morbidity or mortality compared with 11.6% for those who did not receive interoperative TE. Now let's look at the results comparing groups after the propensity score matching and these results had good evidence with all caveats of a retrospective cohort. They were able to match more than 560,000 patients that had TE done with 560,000 patients that had not. And after analyzing both groups, they found greater odds of longer ICU stay in renal failure and lower risk of operative mortality in the group that had TE used interoperatively. And when looking at groups stratified by the STS risk, TE was associated with lower odds of death in the high and intermediate risk groups, but not in the low risk group as you can see in the figure to the right side of your screen. For the outcome of unplanned valve surgery in the cohort of more than 830,000 patients, 0.32% of the cases required unplanned valve procedure and the mitral valve was devolved with most of the interventions. After the propensity score matching, they were able to match more than 340,000 patients from each group and found nearly five-fold higher odds of unplanned valve procedure in the group of patients who had interoperative TE regardless of their STS risk group. Wrapping up, the use of TE for isolated cabbage patients is recommended by guidelines with a moderately strong level of recommendation, but evidence that it improves outcomes is lacking. It is unlikely that a prospective RCT could be effectively conducted, so inference from large observational studies like this is necessary to support guideline recommendations. In their discussion, the authors revealed their most relevant results and used them to support the use of interoperative TE to improve outcomes in patient undergoing isolated cabbage, particularly amongst the highest risk patients. The outcomes may not be affected by TE in cabbage patients who are considered at low risk. To explain how TE could improve outcomes, the author presents possible mechanisms. Firstly, TE could reveal unexpected structural changes leading to changes in the operative plan as seen in their results with more unplanned valve operations at time of isolated cabbage. Secondly, TE after winning from CPB can identify new regional emotional abnormalities, right heart failure, pericardial effusions or aortic injuries. Finally, a high risk TE leads to changes in the course of immediate postoperative therapy in the CV ICU, which may explain the fact that TE was associated with a longer ICU length of stay. Examples of therapies affected by echocardiography would include inotrop titration and management of right heart failure. Interestingly, TE use was associated with increased risk of renal failure, and this may be a result of a confounding that was not measured. But an alternate hypothesis is that TE use is associated with different patterns of vasoactive medication medications or inotrop use or fluid management strategies, which in turn can predispose to kidney injury. The conclusion of this study is that one point of the 1.3 million isolated cabbage procedures across more than 1200 centers. TE was associated with greater frequency of unplanned changes to the proposed surgery and lower operative mortality. And these findings support the use of TE for isolated cabbages to improve outcomes in the high and intermediate risk patients. In the last part of this presentation, I present two cases when I believe TE was useful and may have changed outcomes both performed in the last year. The first case is a high risk patient, 78 years old patient known to have a skimmy dilated cardiomyopathy with a low EF 22 at 25%. Mild AI, moderate MR, moderate TR and pulmonary hypertension, book it for a cabbage times three. After induction, this is the baseline TE exam and we don't need any quantitative method to assess this LB function once it's obvious that it is severely depressed as advertised. So here's the two chambers and then the long axis and the trans gastric in short axis. Knowing that this patient has mild AI previously documented the surgeon asked me to confirm this finding. And the aortic valve long axis with colors showed as small jets compatible with mild AI. So I confirmed the previous finding to the surgeon. Besides, not an impressive just an extension here you can see the vina contract of almost three millimeters again compatible with mild AI. The surgical team at this moment decided to use an integrated perfusion of the coronary arteries to deliver cardioplasia and arrest the heart. So after we go and bypass, I noticed that this heart needed 2.2 liters of cardioplasia to arrest, and that attracted my attention. Although no electrical activity on the ECG I decided to look at the heart using the echo. And this is what I found a dilated heart dilated LV with the smoke and compatible with low flows and backwards flows across the mitral valve as you can appreciate. I also identified flows across the earth valve. And that was the source of the LV dilatation. The flow was flowing back to the LV and then back to the left atron. The trans gastric bill confirmed LV distention and my concern here was myocardial protection during the cardiopulmonary bypass. So convinced that this was suboptimal, I suggest that the surgeons change their protection strategy, which they agreed and switch it from integrate to retrograde their fusion, venting the aortic root and decompressing the left ventricle. Unfortunately, I don't have an image of the empty left ventricle to show now. The mouth bypass was relatively smooth with minimal inotropic support of epinephrine three micrograms per minute. And here are some views, for example, this four chambers mid exophageal. And then a two chambers and the long axis. And finally the trans gastric short axis. So here are the pre and post images compared showing better contractility post pump with the caveat of different loading conditions and inotropic support. But the concern about pre protection did not confirm. So here is the two chambers comparison, long axis view pre and post plan.  You never know what would have happened if they kept the integrate perfusion. Maybe the outcome will be the same, but I am convinced that this was a good call that might have changed the result. The second case now is a low risk patients, 69 years old patient with the history of hypertension, dyslipidemia, obesity and smoking, found to have triple vessel coronary disease on a checkup routine by his family physician. This is the only function on the underground elected to have a cabbage times three. So post induction tea exam confirmed normal LV systolic function in the mid exophageal four chambers. Same in the two chambers. And here the three chambers are long axis room and good LV function in the trans gastric short axis room, and also in the trans gastric two chambers. So I'm just curious to go bypass, come time was 95 minutes. Among the three graphs this patient received the lead to lead. And coming off bypass him or him or dynamically the patient was stable, but my initial impression in this media exophageal four chambers view is that the lateral wall is not the same. I don't see much thickening here. And I had the same impression when I saw the interior wall in the two chambers view. And when I saw this long axis view I was convinced that although the hemodynamics was stable, something was wrong with the interior and lateral walls of the LV. And the surgeons agreed. So we went back on bypass a second time, and they found a dissection of the leader, or the IMA. They were able to redo the anastomosis with the led after resecting the dissected region in the native archery. And we came off bypass second time. And this time we see a hyper dynamic hard with the better thickening of the lateral wall. Same thing the anterior wall in this two chamber view. And much better in the anti receptor wall here in this long axis view. So let's compare the three moments now pre bypass in the left post bypass one in the center and post bypass two in the right side of her screen. So here's a four chambers. Clearly normal here hyper dynamic here and something is wrong with the entire lateral wall here. Same thing here in the two chambers view. So normal here, hyper dynamic here but contracting well. And here, something is wrong with the anterior wall. And here the long axis view. So normal here, something is wrong with the eight or an anti receptor wall. And here's much better than the first one run. And that's all. I hope you guys enjoyed and once again, thank you very much for offering me the opportunity to be part of this fantastic meeting.


Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Oh, sucked. To our stupider axe d'idiot, I'm Corbett and this is Richard the third who's sitting next to a pianist. Ah! Please follow Johnny. Crash has spoke all over your juicy content and India in the Cricut World Cup. That's true, probably why you're wearing that it is true. It is true, I couldn't roll the cup time. Sorry. I don't know where it is. Oh, yeah. I had Micah's. No, it's okay. Okay. We know you love India. But good luck. We'll get him, India. Today, a new trailer dropped this morning. Oh, a teaser, sorry. It's called Article 15, okay? I think it's the guy from Unda Huntahun. Okay. And so that's what he was doing in the beginning. Yeah, I get it. Which guys, it's not that actor. Yep, yep. It's not the actor I was having a problem with. Go back and watch it and you'll remember it. You'll see what I say. No one wants to watch it. It's our worst review because of you. Here we go. That gave me chills, actually, a little bit. So I don't... I forgot we were watching the teaser, so when it started to end, I'm like, oh, it's a teaser. Oh, man. It was just getting started. Yeah, some teasers, that one didn't show you much, they just wanted you to get excited for the trailer. Well, yeah, what it told us, true, based on true events, and it seemed to do something with India getting its independence. Well, what I think it has to do with is... Or the rights for the citizens. The rights. I think what it has to do with is that when the Constitution was drafted in 1950, Article 15 talked about, and I'm guessing, you will not discriminate against caste, religion, gender, creed, any of those things, but it's one thing for that to be put on paper. It's another thing for that to be lived out in people's lives because as we know, as much as there is great freedom and plurality and acceptance and individuality, there are enormous differences in pockets where there is extreme prejudices based on those things, and they're not supposed to be there. It's kind of like stuff we have here in America, where we've got stuff on our Constitution about freedom of speech and things that are people who are supposed to be able to do whatever you want to choose, and it's on paper, but it's being violated. I think that's what this is going to be about, something about that. That's my guess. Yeah. Well, I mean, it looked good. I mean, from the tiny bit we saw, we'll have to obviously wait for the trailer, but yeah, if it's, it was, it kind of gave me the gooseies because like when it was reading off the Constitution, and they were, I'm guessing the people were fighting against the government for whatever they were trying to do. I guess my suspicion would be for being hypocritical, for saying that the government has the words, but is not enforcing those words. That's my suspicion. Yeah. So please let us know and obviously we'll be here for the trailer on Thursday. Yeah. Yeah. So this is cool. Yeah. That's all I can say about that short little trailer there. And I bet we'll get, without spoilers, you guys probably know what this is all about as far as the event is concerned. Yeah. It's like, OK, if it's Article 15 and they're talking about these things, but I'm pretty sure I know what this is about. Yeah. So share that with us without giving us spoilers. Good luck with that. Yeah.


Chapter 26 of Autobiography of an Actress by Anna Cora Mollett. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Kelly Taylor. We left New Orleans about the middle of March, 1853, in the Queenly Magnolia. The young nephew, Stanislaus, whom I mentioned in the preceding chapter, was again my gallant escort. In four days we reached Memphis. Six years before, I had promised Henry Clay not to pass that city again without appearing there in my professional capacity. I never traveled on the southern portion of the Mississippi River since the spring when we spent those pleasant days on board the Alexander Scott. We arrived in Memphis on Sunday morning. The next evening I made my debut in Parthenia. I had been ill during my whole stay in New Orleans and was now making a desperate struggle within disposition. I found the audience particularly inspiring. The engagement promised to be brilliant in the extreme. As the curtain fell upon each act of Ingomar, I found it more and more difficult to proceed, but I knew from experience that a strongly concentrated will could master the infirmities of an exhausted physique. I invoked to my aid all the mental energy that could obey the summons and ended the play successfully. The next night I was announced to appear as Mrs. Holler. If I had been governed by common prudence, I had almost written common sense. I should not have attempted the performance, but long habit and the example of others had accustomed me to make light of physical ailments when they interfered with my professional duty. I had seen many an actor walk majestically upon the stage and play a part with thrilling effect who, the instant he was out the range of the footlights, sank down, unable to speak or to stand from the excess of acute suffering. I have often seen actors fall into long fits of swooning and, on recovering, be forced to return to the stage and continue their embodiments. I remember one occasion in England when an actor who was personating my father drew down the displeasure of an audience by his feeble and uncertain delivery of the text. How little they suspected that he was dying at that very moment. Three days afterwards, he departed this life. Mrs. Glover's Last Night in London is an instance of indomitable energy that characterizes the votary of the stage in this conflict with external circumstances. She rose from an illness which her physician had pronounced fatal to enact Mrs. Malaprop in the comedy of the Rivals on the occasion of her farewell of the stage. The instant the performance was over, her temporary strength evaporated. She was incapable of answering the summons of the audience, of crossing the stage before the footlights and courtesying to her acknowledgments. At their clamorous demand to behold her once more, she was placed in an armchair in the center of the stage, surrounded and supported by a galaxy of distinguished performers who had congregated in honor of her farewell. The curtain rose, she feebly bowed her thanks, heard you, smiled upon the bouquets that fell in a floral deluge around her. The curtain descended upon her last triumph. She was taken home and in two days breathed her last. A host of similar instances might be given to illustrate how difficult it is for an actor to admit the possibility of his physical condition interfering with the discharge of his public duty.  Mrs. Holler has but few words to speak in the first act, and those I manage to utter, and those with difficulty. For a fresh attack of bronchitis was added to insipid malaria. In the second act, I scarcely entered upon the stage before I began to be aware that I had miscalculated my powers. The third time I attempted to speak, I found my voice had entirely departed. Again and again, I tried to force out a sound, but my lips opened and closed again noiselessly. Dr. S., who afterwards attended me, used to say that he never witnessed an exhibition at once so comical and so painful. The lips moving without producing the faintest articulation, the look of consternation quickly followed by an expression of resolution not to be vanquished, the impotent battle with the inevitable. But I was conquered. I could not speak, and I could not have maintained an erect position much longer. The considerate manager, Mr. Charles, who occupied the stage with me, instantly apologized to the audience and the curtain fell. For nine days I remained dangerously ill. Dr. S. advised that I should be removed the instant that I could bear the journey. He gave it as his medical opinion that, although it was hardly possible for me to rally in that atmosphere, I would recover rapidly once I reached the other side of the mountains. We left Memphis on the twelfth day of our sojourn there, and, traveling slowly, arrived at my sister's residence in Philadelphia in ten days more. As Dr. S. predicted, I began to revive as soon as we passed the mountains and was soon convalescent. At this period Mrs. Warner was about to leave America, where she had encountered a series of most heartbreaking trials. The autumn previous I had promised her my services for a benefit, at any time when she chose to call upon me. I thus hoped to make amends, in a slight degree, for the losses and the discomfortures which had waylaid her whole path in a foreign land. She was now just recovering from a dangerous illness, or rather was supposed to be recovering. Late tidings bring the sad intelligence of her lapse, which is feared to prove fatal. She was to receive a complimentary benefit at the Howard Athenium and requested the fulfillment of my promise. I consented to act Desdemona to her Amelia, and went to Boston for that purpose about the middle of May. On the morning of the benefit Mrs. Warner was still unable to leave her apartment, the benefit, however, took place, and thronged attendance proved the high estimation in which she was held by an American public. Mrs. M. Jones filled the role of Amelia in Mrs. Warner's stead. I represented Desdemona, Mr. Marshall Othello. I once more used my voice with great facility, but the exertion consequent even upon so unarduous performance made me conscious of unusual deficiency of strength and elasticity. I had arranged to make an extensive western tour during this summer, which was to be my last upon the stage, but l'un promise du dispose. I had never recovered entirely from my attack in Memphis. Early in June I was again taken seriously ill. After six weeks of suffering, which surpassed in severity all my previous experiences of what mortality can endure, my father insisted that I should be brought to his residence at Ravenswood and placed under the care of the celebrated Dr. M. Whose eminence, as both surgeon and physician, has been recognized in both hemispheres, and has even rendered him famous on olden classic ground. I had lost all power of locomotion and was thoroughly helpless, but had made not a few journeys before on temporary beds, placed in railway cars and in carriages, and was now forced to this sad necessity again. I must say that I greatly preferred my seat of hay in the corner of the old ox cart, dolted us over the frozen wiles of Indiana. My faithful sister May, at whose house in Boston I had been residing, accompanied me. We reached our father's dwelling in safety, and I was born to the sunny white curtain chamber, where I am now reclining. Month after month has glided away. The flower-sinted summer has buried her perfumes and flown. The crimson-fingered autumn has trampled her tinted foliage underfoot and departed. Winter is beginning to show his hard-featured and frost-bitten face, and finds this little chamber still my compulsory abiding place. There have been no flower gatherings, no garden ramblings for me since June. Day after day I have looked out with longing eyes upon the gardens beneath my window, and watched the flowers, then enameled the fair earth, one by one, pale on their stems, wither and disappear. The last dolly has just dropped its head and died. There are a cluster of pine trees that look in at one of my windows, and I have found daily delight, I may say, actual comfort in gazing at their emerald beauty. I know every branch, every little twig, almost every little bird, which, through the summer, has sat in the bowels and made vocal air with his mattin' songs. The wind plays through those pine tree branches, as on an instrument, with a muffled musical sound, like that of the human voice, called by singer's availed voice. I have never heard wind sighing through any other trees produce the same hushed, murmuring melody. And what gloriously golden sunsets I have beheld through those pine tree branches, as I lay looking out at the sky. What soft moonlit shinings, what brilliant starlight gleamings. One of my chief amusements is watching the setting sun, that at each departure assumes some farewell robe of varied splendid. And sometimes I amuse upon life's early dawn that broke, flooding the horizon with radiance, upon the storms that gathered before morning has passed, upon clouds that parted at noonday, to let through and unlook forward effusions, as I dreamily gaze at the sun, going down with mellow glory, I think of a sunset of peace that may be given for such a life's closing. I lift my eyes, and they fall upon the pine trees again. But now the rich green of their plumy foliage is taking a rusty hue for winter, as he strides on with ice-shod feet, has breathed upon them coldly. The clustering cones that brownly spangled the boughs have ripened, and the wind is shaking them to the ground, like hopes that fall to plant the seeds of new hopes. I shall see the snow enshroud the pine tree branches and still be a prisoner.  Patience may pour upon the spirit her medicinal balm. Hope may sit enthroned in the heart, shining with steadfast luster. Memory unfolding her tablets may point to some bright and consoling records. The voices of tenderness may fall in music on the pain-quickened ear. The holy ties of kinship, the adamantine chains of friendship may be drawn closer than ever. Let my future be cast where it may, I must, perforce, look back with loving remembrance upon the pleasant little chamber beneath my father's roof, where, if I have suffered much, I have rejoiced more. The ten sisters have never again been gathered in the paternal home, but each one not separated by the ocean has come, in turn, to shed her sweet influence around the couch of the invalid, some to spend but days, some weeks and some months. And the tender second mother has flitted in and out each day, drawing the sunshine after her and performing thoughtful offices of love. And the younger sisters, whose home I now share, have gladdened the room with their blooming presents, their praddling tongues, and the fateful attendant who has journeyed with me by land and by sea, has proved as devoted and as patient by the couch of sickness, as she was cheerful and intrepid in our far-off wanderings. And last, though ever first, shall I not reverently speak of your precious visits to our cheerful chamber, my father? Shall I say no word of you who, through the varied vicitudes of my life, sustained and encouraged me in all my strenuous exertions, you who consoled me under all my hard trials, you whose own unconquerable energy has taught me how to battle with life's ills, whose example of smiling fortitude has shown me how to be victorious over inflexible circumstance, whose recognition of divine providence, even in things most minute, has strengthened my faith, whose daily acts have given to your precepts double weight, you who forgot the shortcomings of my wayward girlhood and opened your arms, your heart to me, without breathing one reproach? May I not record those things of you and say that to you I owe the possession of some of those qualities which have rendered your own struggles in life blessed, which have made manifest the softening uses of sorrow? Surely this is a tribute which a child may pay to a father, even in the world's full hearing. I do not attempt to restrain the outgushing of my spirit when I speak to you. My memoirs would neither be truthful nor complete if they contained no chronicle such as I have written above. Two-thirds of those memoirs have been penned in this quiet little chamber I have described, penned during intervals from suffering and a period of slow convalescence. When I fully recover my health, as the distinguished physician mentioned above, who has expended his skill upon me for nearly five months is confident that I shall do, I purpose taking a brief farewell of my profession in some of the principal cities of the union. I desire to leave that profession as calmly and as deliberately as it was entered, for I shall bid it adieu with those objects, imperiously summoned by which I first bore the name of actress, happily accomplished. I will here answer a question in relation to the stage which I am frequently asked. There are some who may be profited by the reply. Are you fond of the stage? has been the inquiry put by many lips during the past eight years. There is a species of aristocratic affectation existing amongst the members of the profession which induces many of them to declare that they detest their own vocation, that they dislike nothing so much as acting, etc. I have heard this assertion again and again from the mouths of the most successful performers, and all affectation seems to me so inconsistent with true talent that I could not but listen in wonder. But, as I have said, to declare that the stage is distasteful is looked upon as a sign of professional aristocracy. By on part, I answer frankly, I have received intense delight from the personation of some characters. The power of swaying the emotion of the crowd is one of the most thrilling sensation that I have ever experienced. Yet I have not found in the profession the kind of absorbing fascination which I have often heard described as inseparable from the stage. There are too many incongruous elements mingled with every dramatic triumph for the charm, if any, to be complete. Without looking upon the theatre as a cesarean bower, without entertaining a passion for the stage, I have a quiet love for the drama, which, heaven forbid, with my convictions in regard to its use, I should ever shrink from acknowledging. Without some decided attachment for the profession, I cannot conceive how the fatigues, the vexation, the disappointment's incident, even upon the most successful theatrical career, could be supported. Let me hear Venture to warn any enthusiastic young aspirant against adopting the stage, unless her qualifications, not to use a much abused word, say her mission, seem particularly to fit her for such a vocation, unless she be strongly impelled by the possession of talents which are unquestionable, unless she be enamored of art itself. But that the dangers of the profession are such that they are generally accredited to be, I do not believe.  The subject is not one into which I can fully enter, but let me say that the woman who could be dazzled by the adulation bestowed upon her talents as an actress would be dazzled and led astray in the blaze of a ballroom, in the excitement of social intercourse in any situation where those talents could be displayed, in any position where she could hear the false goslings of a flattering tongue, and from these where will she be shielded, except in utter seclusion. But to return to the subject from which I wandered, unless the actress in anticipation is willing to encounter disappointment in myriad unlooked foreshaves, to study incessantly and find that her closet study is insufficient, to endure an amount and kind of fatigue which she never dreamed of before, if she feel the grasshopper a burden and the crumpled rose leaf and inconvenience to her slumber, I would bid her shun the stage. But if she be prepared to meet petty as well as formidable trials, the former are more often difficult to bear than the latter. If she be sustained by some high purpose, some strong incentive, if she act in obedience to the dictates of the strong lawgiver duty, then let her enter the profession boldly. By gracing help to elevate the stage, and add hers to the purifying influences which may dwell within the walls of the theatre as securely as in any other temple of art. Let her bear in mind that the sometimes degraded name of actress can be dignified in her own person. Let her feel, above all things, that the actress must excite reverence as well as admiration. The crowd must honor as well as worship. They can always be made to do the latter at the feet of genius. They can only be compelled to do the former when genius sheds its halo around higher attributes. End of Chapter 26 Chapter 27 of Autobiography of an Actress by Anna Coral-Mullet This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Kelly Taylor I have been for eight years an actress. In the exercise of my vocation I have visited many theatres throughout this land and in Great Britain. This fact perhaps gives me some right to speak upon the stage as an institution, upon its uses and abuses, for I speak in all humility, albeit said, from actual knowledge and personal experience. My testimony has at least the value of being disinterested, for I was not bred to the stage. I enter upon it from the bosom of private life. None who are linked to me by affinity of blood ever belong to the profession. I am about to leave it of my own choice, and I bid it farewell in the midst of a career which, if it has reached its meridian, has not, as yet, taken the first downward inclination. I can have no object in defending the drama apart from the impulse to utter what I believe to be the truth, and an innate love and reverence for dramatic art. The stage is not an insignificant pastime. History teaches us that it is an institution which has existed almost from time immemorial, protected by the laws, consecrated by the dramatic teachings of the divine and sages, and accepted as a mode of instruction, as well as diversion in almost all lands. It is a school most important in its operations, most potent in its admonitions, most profusely productive of good or evil influences. The actor sways the multitude, even as the preacher and the orator, often more powerfully than either. He arouses their slumbering energies, elevates their minds, calls forth their loftiest aspirations, excites their purest emotions, or, if he be faults to his trust, a perverted instrument, he may minister to viviated taste, and help to corrupt, to enervate, to debase. It is impossible, says a writer in Edinburgh Review, for a person unacquainted with dramatic representations to understand the effect produced on a mixed mass of people when a striking sentiment is uttered by a popular actor. The conviction is instantaneous. Hundreds of stormy voices are awakened. The spirit of every individual is in arms, and a thousand faces are lighted up, which a moment before seemed calm and powerless, and their impression is not so transient as might be thought. It is carried home and nursed till it ripens. It is a germ which blossoms out into patriotism or runs up rank into prejudice or passion. It is intellectual property honestly acquired. Men are often amused and sometimes instructed by books, but a tragedy is a great moral lesson, read to two senses at once, and the eye and the ear are both held in alliance to retain the impression which the actor has produced. Lord Bacon tells us, the drama is as history brought before the eyes. It presents the images of things as if they are present, while history treats of them as things past. Sir Joshua Reynolds says, every establishment that tins to the cultivation of the pleasures of the mind as distinct from those of the sense may be considered as inferior schools of morality, where the mind is polished and prepared for higher attainments. Disraeli, the elder, declares that the stage is a supplement to the pulpit, where virtue, according to Plato's sublime idea, moves our love and affection when made visible to the eye. It was in the age of the wise Solon, something more than 2,400 years ago, that the rude dramatic attempts of Thespus awoke the admiration of the Athenians. The performances he instituted were a species of monologue, relieved by Chorus. Upon this imperfect foundation, the Nomal Escalus built the classic drama and gained the name of the father of tragic song. Since that period in those countries where civilization has made the most rapid progress, where the social tone has been the most elevated, her taste and refinement have superseded mere sensuality, the drama has held her most prosperous sway. Dramatic art was at its zenith in Rome during the Augustan age, in Greece, when Escalus, Sophoclese, and Euripides taught in her dramatic temples, in France during the so-called Golden Reign of Louis XIV, when Cornell and Racine wrote, not merely moral, but absolutely religious plays, and even Voltaire impressed Piety into his tragedies, that his other works are pervaded with an opposite spirit does not alter this fact. Dr. Isaac Watts, the distinguished divine, says, what a noble use have Racine and Cornell made of Christian subjects in some of their best tragedies. In England the drama, though often lamentably misused and degraded, shed glory upon the reins of Elizabeth and Anne, and has held an increasing honor at the present epoch, the most peaceful and prosperous with which that kingdom has ever been blessed. Let us go back further, even to the period of the First Christian Era, and learn whether the outcry against theaters is justified by the records of antiquity. There were theaters in Jerusalem when our Savior came upon the earth, yet by no sign does he point them out as fatally pernicious, by no word, no implication even does he denounce them. There were theaters at Damascus, at Ephesus, at Antioch, at Corinth, at Athens, at Thessalonica, at Philippi, at Alexandra, at Rome. The apostles preached the gospel in those cities, and reproved many vices, yet no syllable of rebuke do they designate the theater as immoral. It is likely if an institution, which was to perpetuate itself down to the present day, were essentially demoralizing, it would have escaped the breadth of their holy denunciation. St. Paul is called the most learned of the apostles, and in his teaching he quotes from three Greek dramatic poets, from Erastus of Sicilia, from Epaniades of Crete, from Menander, the Athenian, thus giving his own countenance to the theater by his familiar use of dramatic poetry. In the sacred scripture, there is not a single passage which, by any fair interference, can be distorted into a condemnation of theatrical entertainments, and yet how many sincere and truth-loving Christians believe it their duty to raise a hue and cry against the stage. A distinguished clergyman of our own land lately remarked from the pulpit that he feared there were many persons even among denouncers of the drama who were beneath a taste for the stage rather than above it, conveying the idea that the cultivation of those intellectual taste and moral sympathies which find their gratification in dramatic performances was a step in moral advancement, which many unsympathizing decryers of the stage would not or could not take. The parables are truth enveloped in fiction. The drama merely represents in actions what the parable and similar fictions inculcate by written or oral teaching. The play is but the dramatized form of the poem, the novel, history, or the parable, and the mind is more vividly impressed by what it sees enacted than by what it hears related. Take, for instance, the parable of the prodigal son. There can be no one so obtuse as to not admit the force and beauty of the illustration intended to be conveyed in it. Suppose that some dramatist to enforce the lesson of paternal forgiveness upon the minds which can be more deeply penetrated by visible symbols than by lecture throws the parable into dramatic form bringing out in appropriate language the whole moral of the story and has it represented in a theater. Does the mere translation of the parable into represented action render it pernicious? In this illustration we have the whole principle of the drama. A few seasons ago this very parable was produced as a spectacle at Drury Lane under the name of Aziel. It met with a very decided success. I am not certain, but my impression is that it was translated from the French. Dr. Isaac Watts, the author of Divine Hymns, thus alludes to the fitness of scriptural subjects for dramatic exposition. If the trifling and incredible tales that furnish out a tragedy are so armed by art and fancy as to become sovereign of the rational powers to triumph over the affections and manage our smiles and our tears at pleasure, how wondrous a conquest might be obtained over a wide world and reduce it at least to sobriety if the same happy talent were employed in dressing scenes of religion in their proper figures of majesty, sweetness, and terror. The affairs of this life, with reference to a life to come, would shine brightly in a dramatic description. This is high authority in favor of the drama. As a strong aid to my own imperfectly expressed arguments in Ditt's defense, I call a few opinions from sources which command reverence out of the multitude that might be given did space allow. The authorities, I shall cite, are such as should make any man pause before he ventures unconditionally to denounce the stage. Marcus Aurelius, an emperor distinguished for his piety says, tragedies were first brought in and instituted to put men in mind of worldly chances and causalities. After the tragedy, the Comedia Ventus, or ancient comedy, was brought in, which had the liberty to invade against personal vices, being therefore, through this, her freedom and liberty of speech of very good use and effect to restrain men from pride and arrogance to which end it was that diogenes took also the same liberty. Martin Luther, on the subject of the stage, says, in ancient times the dramatic art has been honored by being made subservient to religion and morality, and in it, the most enlightened country of antiquity in Greece, the theater was supported by the state. The dramatic nature of the dialogues of Plato has always been justly celebrated, and from this we may conceive the great charm of dramatic poetry. Action is the true enjoyment of life, nay, life itself. The great bulk of mankind are either from their situation or their incapacity for uncommon efforts, confined within a narrow circle of operation. Of all amusements, therefore, the theater is the most profitable, for there we see important actions when we cannot act importantly ourselves. It affords us a renovative picture of life, a compendium of whatever is animated and interesting in human existence. The susceptible youth opens his heart to every elevated feeling. The philosopher finds a subject for the deepest reflections on nature and constitution of man. In another work, Martin Luther says, and indeed Christians ought not altogether to fly and abstain from comedies, because now and then gross tricks and dallying passages are acted therein, for then it will follow that, by reason thereof, we should also abstain from reading the Bible. Therefore it is of no value that some allege such and the like things, and for these causes would forbid Christians to read or act comedies. The Reverend Dr. Knox in his essays says, There seems to me to be no method more effectual of softening the ferocity and improving the minds of the lower classes of the great capital than the frequent exhibitions of tragical pieces in which the distress is carried to the highest extreme and the moral is at once self-evident, affecting and instructive. The multitudes of those who cannot read or if they could have neither time nor abilities for deriving much advantage from reading are powerfully impressed through the medium of the eyes and ears, with those important truths which, while they illuminate the understanding, correct and modify the heart. Benevolence, justice, heroism, and the wisdom of moderating the passions are plainly pointed out and forcibly recommended to those savage sons of uncultivated nature who have few opportunities and would have no inclination for instruction if it did not present itself in the form of delightful amusement. Philip Malachthon says, On frequent reflection concerning the manners and discipline of mankind, I greatly admire the wisdom of the Greeks who at the commencement exhibited tragedies to the people by no means for the purpose of mere amusement, as is commonly thought, but much more on this account, that by the consideration of heinous examples and misfortunes they might turn their rude and fierce spirits to moderation and the bridling of undue desires. These things, therefore, were acted, beheld, read, and listened to, both by the philosophers and the people, not as mere romances, but as instructions for the government of life. Men were thus warned of the causes of human calamities, which in those examples they saw brought on an increase by depraved desires. Lord Bacon says, Dramatic poesy, which has the theater for its world, is of excellent use, if soundly administered. The stage can do much, either for corruption or discipline. Dr. Blair, one of the most eminent of divines says, Dramatic poetry has, among civilized nations, been always considered a rational and useful entertainment and judged worthy of careful and serious discussion. As tragedy is a high and distinguishing species of composition, so also, in its general strain and spirit, it is a favorable to virtue, and, therefore, though dramatic writers may, sometimes like other writers, be guilty of improprieties, though they may fail in placing virtue forcibly in due point of light, yet no reasonable person can deny tragedy to be a reasonable species of composition. Taking tragedies complexly, I am fully persuaded that the impressions left by them upon the mind are, on the whole, favorable to virtue and good dispositions, and, therefore, the zeal which some pious men have shown against the entertainment of the theater must rest only on the abuse of comedy, which indeed has frequently been so great as to justify very severe censures against it. I am happy, however, to have it in my power to observe that, of late years, a sensible reformation has begun to take place in English comedy. Sir Philip Sidney says, Comedy is an imitation of the common errors of our life, which the poet represented in the most ludicrous sort, that may be, so it is possible, that any beholder can be content to be such a one. And little reason have any men to say that men learn the evil by seeing it so set out. Since there is no man living, but by the force truth has in his nature, no sir nurse seeeth these men play their parts, but wisheth them in pastrinum, so that the right use of comedy will, I think, by nobody be blamed, and much less the high and excellent tragedy that openeth the greatest wounds and showeth forth the ulcers that are covered with tissue, that makeeth kings fear to be tyrants, and tyrants to manifest their tyrannical humors, that, with stirring the effects of admiration and commiseration, teacheth the uncertainty of the world, and upon how weak foundations gilded roofs are buildeth. Dr. Gregory, in his legacy to his daughter, says, I know no entertainment that gives much pleasure to any person of sentiment or humor as the theater. Sir Walter Scott says, the supreme being who claimed the seventh day has his own, allowed the other six days of the week for the purposes merely human. When the necessity for daily labor is removed, and the call of social duty fulfilled, that of moderate and timely amusements claims its place, as a want inherent in our nature. To relieve this want and fill up the mental vacancy, games are devised, books are written, music is composed, spectacles and plays are invented and exhibited. And if these last have a moral and virtuous tendencies, if the sentiments expressed tend to rouse our love of what is noble, and our contempt of what is mean, if they unite hundreds in a sympathetic admiration of virtue, of whore and suvice, or the origin of folly, it will remain to be shown how far the spectator is more criminally engaged than if he had passed the evening in the idle gossip of society, in the feverish pursuits of ambition or in the unsated and insatiable struggle after gain, the grave employments of the present life, but equally unconnected with our existence hereafter. Were it not presumption I should be inclined to differ with the assertion of the last line, for can the manner in which we employ a single moment here be unconnected with our existence hereafter? I think not. The testimony of such minds and such men in favor of the stage are at least worthy of attentive consideration, and, be it observed, they address themselves to the most conscientious Christians as more or more than to the man who makes no particular profession of religious faith. The stage, in almost all lands, and for a long series of years, has been protected and encouraged by governments. Would this have been the case if legislators had not found it conducive to the general well-being of all communities, and even a medium of political as well as of social and moral utility? Kalkraft, in his able and scholarly defense of the stage, mentions the act of parliament from which the patent of the present theatre royal in Dublin, mentioned in an earlier chapter of these memoirs, is derived as containing these words in the preamble, whereas the establishing a well-regulated theatre in the city of Dublin being the residence of the chief governor or governors of Ireland will be productive of advantage and tend to improve the morals of the people, etc. And the patent itself contains the royal intention and the expectations distinctly expressed in these words, that the theatre in future may be instrumental to the cause of virtue and instruction to human life. After which follow various restrictions, forbidding any performances, tending to profaneness, disloyalty, or indecency. If then, the stage be an institution acknowledged by the protection of governments as much as any which of passion for literature or art or science among men has established, is there not more wisdom in helping to elevate and guide its operations than in denouncing and transducing the institution itself. Art is either right or it is wrong. The sanctioning of voices of the ages have pronounced it to be right. One branch of art includes the drama.  The drama is either an instrument of good or evil as it is rendered the one or the other by the use or abuse. This is the various truism. The theater, like the press, is one of the most powerful organs for the diffusion of salutary or pernicious influences. Vicious books are often printed. But shall we therefore extribute the press? Plays of questionable morality are sometimes enacted. But is that a cause for abolishing the stage? Sacrificing for a temporary abuse the great and permanent use? False doctrines and what are called heresies have been preached from many a pulpit and have led to the most fearful consequences. But shall the church therefore be column-nated? At the bar the most flagrant wrongs have grown out of the perversion of legal exposition. But shall law therefore be banished from the land? Corrupt judges have given unjust sentences. Shall the bench therefore be denounced? Physicians have destroyed instead of preserving life. Shall the science of medicine therefore be set a sign? Forgeries have been committed. Shall penmanship therefore wholly be forbidden? And yet if in one case abuse counteract use, why not in all? A royal governor of Virginia, Sir William Berkeley, said, I thank God that there are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we shall not have them these hundred years, for learning has brought disobedience and heresies and sex into the world, and printing has divulged them, and libel against the best governments God keep us from both. This assertion is literally true, but the royal governor looked on the side of the question. The invaders against the theaters do precisely the same. Because there are abuses, most unquestionably separable from the use, is that a wise or just argument for the holy indignation often expressed against the theater and its upholder, about as wise and just as Sir William Berkeley's objections to the diffusion of knowledge. Reform the errors of the stage if you would serve the cause of human progress. No manager will produce plays that do not draw. It lies then with audiences to pronounce what representations shall receive their suffrages. The drama's laws, the drama's patrons make. But there lately have been a marked improvement in the class of plays offered to the public. The manager would be a bold one who, at the Howard Athenium, in Boston or at Neblos in New York, would produce a play of decided immoral tendency. His theater would soon be closed, even without any loud denunciations from outraged supporters. The community would forsake the establishment and leave the beggardly account of empty boxes to proclaim their disapproval. Numerous other theaters in this country, as in England, are becoming more and more cautious in their choice of plays to be enacted within their walls. In England the voice of the licensor is a check upon the representation of immoral dramas. In this country the voice of the people is a far more powerful organ than that of any royal licensor in exerting a similar control. Passages, even in Shakespeare, were listened to by audiences a few years ago without manifestations of displeasure, are now entirely omitted by actors and, if spoken, would inevitably be hissed. I do not mean to assert that there are not passages left which ought to be expunged, but I believe that, in time, they will not be tolerated. And I know that is the fault not of the actor but of the audience, if their ears are ever offended. The actor is supposed to speak only what is set down for him, and, according to strict regulations of some theaters, he would be heavily fined if he deviated upon his own responsibility from the text. There are plays in abundance which the most pious parent make take his children to witness with profit. Men who have won the highest distinctions, not through their genius only, but for the piety impurity of their lives, have devoted their talents to writing for the stage. More than 200 English clergymen have been dramatic authors. The Archbishop Gregory Nazyazin wrote sacred dramas from the histories of the Old and New Testament which were enacted upon the stage at Constantinople. From the stage, pagan plays were consequently banished. Apollonaris, Bishop of La de Silla, wrote scriptural tragedies and comedies. In ancient times, mysteries and moralities were not only written but acted by the clergy. Sir Thomas Moore, the renowned statesman, both wrote and acted interludes as they were called. Milton wrote the tragic poem of Samson Agonasties and the mask of Arcades and Comus. The latter still keeps on the stage. In the preface to his Samson Agonasties, he writes, Tragedy, as it is anciently composed, hath ever been held the greatest, moralist, and most profitable of all the poems. Hitherto, men in the highest dignity have labored not a little to be thought able to compose a tragedy. Dr. Edward Young, the author of Night Thoughts, wrote the tragedies of the Revenge, Berserys, and the Brothers. The latter was enacted for the express purpose of adding the proceeds to the fund for the propagation of the gospel in foreign lands. The eloquent Reverend C. Maturin is the author of Bertram, a favorite character of many distinguished tragedians, also of Manuel, Fradolfo, and Osman the Renegade. The Reverend H. Millman, author of History of Christianity, wrote Fazio, in which the genius of Miss O'Neill shone preeminent. He also wrote Belshazzar's Feast, The Fall of Jerusalem, and The Marder of Antioch. The Reverend Dr. Crowley wrote Catiline, a comedy which has been represented with great success, entitled Pride Shall Have a Fall. The Pius Addison wrote The Tragedy of Cato, The Comedy of the Drummer, and The Opera of Rosamund. Dr. Johnson wrote The Tragedy of Irene. Coleridge wrote Two Tragedies, Remorse and Zopolja, and translated Schiller's Warnstein. Thompson, Goldsmith, Ms. Hannah Moore, Ms. Joanna Bailey, and Ms. Mitford have all contributed to the drama. To these, did space permit, I might add the names of many other authors, as noted for their religious attributes as their great gifts. The soundest philosophers have declared that intellectual recreation was needful to the well-being and mental health of men, and they have pronounced the stage to be one of the highest sources of such recreation. That rational amusement is a necessity of man's nature, imperatively demanded. Pindar and Aristotle have given their testimony. The former says, rest and enjoyment are universal physicians. The latter, that it is impossible for men to live in continual labor. Reposing games must succeed to cares and watching. The night amusement with instruction is to give relish to nourishment. The man whose energies are worn out with daily struggles and life, when he sees portrayed the sterner battle of some other life on the mimic world called the stage, forgets the cares that press too heavily on his own heart and paralyze its strength. He passes out of the narrow circle in which his selfhood is hourly bound. His faculties are quickened and refreshed by listening to sparkling wit. The finest cores within his bosom are stirred by the breath of the poet's inspirations. Emotions, devotional, heroic, patriotic, or soothingly domestic sweep over his prostrate spirit and lift it up from the contact with the dust of realities. He returns to his labor's invigorated, strengthened, or elevated by the relaxation. In our working day community, it is so such men that the theatre performs one of its chief usage. But there are other uses which address themselves to the mass. Pope tells us, to make mankind, in conscious virtue bold, live o'er such scene and be what they behold, for this the tragic news first trod the stage, commanding tears to stream through every age. And even stern crab has said, Yet virtue owns the tragic news a friend, fable her means, morality her end. She makes the vile virtue yield applause, and her own scepter while they break her laws, for vice in others is a port by all, and villains triumph when worthless fall. Shakespeare, the great mind reader, the most thorough grasper of all subtleties of human characters, wrote no fiction when he said, guilty creatures sitting at a play have, by the very cunning of the scene, been struck so to the soul that presently they have proclaimed their malfactions. The annals of the stage contain a number of startling instances where this has been literally the case. Markable one is recorded in the life of the English actor Ross. In my own comparatively brief experience upon the stage, I have been an eyewitness to salutary effects of this description. One occasion I have related in an earlier chapter of these memoirs. If the acting of a play has been instrumental in causing joy among the angels of heaven over one center that repenteth, what stronger proof can there be that the theater is a useful institution? If the lingering abuses in our theaters are to be reformed, it can only be done by the mediation of good men, not so absolute in goodness as to forget what human frailty is, who, discarding the illiberal spirit which denounces without investigating, will first examine the reasons of existing abuses, then help to remedy them by their own present amongst the audience. That the very worst abuse with which any theater can be taxed may be abolished has been proved at the Howard Athenaeum in Boston, the museum, and indeed all the theaters in that city for five years, and at the kneeblows in New York for a period even longer. I allude to the demoralizing effect of allowing any portion of the theater to be set aside for the reception of a class who do not come to witness the play. I believe there have been other theaters in this country where this outrage upon morality is not tolerated, and the establishments have been as prosperous as those above mentioned, but this is a difficult topic for a woman to touch upon. I cannot close these remarks upon the drama and the stage without a few words on the true position of actors. On this subject very erroneous impressions exist in the minds of those who do not frequent theaters. They are apt to look upon the actor as belonging to a distinct portion of the community, dwelling on the outside of a certain conventional pale of society which he is allowed to enter only by courtesy, unless it is broken through by the majesty of transcendent talents. Let us examine his social and political state in ancient times when the stage first sprang into existence. The profession of an actor was looked upon as honorable among the Greeks. Some of the highest offices of the state were held by players. Escalus, who framed the regular drama, held command at Marathon under Militeides. He was at once actor and author. Sophocles was a man of high rank and served under great Pericles. He was raised to the office of Archon. He appeared in his own tragedies and sang on stage the music of the lyre. Euripides, who also acted in his own productions, was a distinguished officer. The actor Neotolamus was also a tragic poet, was an ambassador and an important mission. Aristodemus was also employed on a momentous embassy. At the solicitation of Demosthenes, he received the reward of a golden crown bestowed for the faithful administration of public affairs. Cicero himself was the intimate friend of Roscus, his early tutor. The great orator says of the equally great actor, the excellences of Roscus became proverbial. The greatest praise that could be given to men of genius in that particular profession was that each was a Roscus in his art. Lilius, called the wise, and Scipio Africanus, the younger, were the warm friends and associates of the actor Terence. Julius Caesar mentions meander and Terence with respectful admiration. The noble Brutus thought it was no waste of time to journey from Rome to Naples solely to see an excellent company of comedians. Their performances delighted him so much that he sent them to Rome with letters to Cicero. They were honored with the latter's immediate patronage. Actors in all ages have been the special favorites of monarchs and high dignitaries. In modern times, from Mrs. Sidon's down to the present day, they have, in common with other artists, been received in the highest society and been treated with marked distinction. The stage at this moment is graced by members of the profession who have been honored guests of nobles and whom the magnates of more than one land have been proud to welcome as their fire signs. The odium which has attached itself to some whose talents were as a brilliant setting which lacked the center gem of paramount value can cast no more real blemish upon those who have not merited the same approach than the despotism of one king can darken the rain of his successors. If I have somewhat warmly pleaded the cause of the stage and the actor, I hope my testimony has been given as though I stood in the courts of Ariopagus, where no flowers of rhetoric were permitted to adorn and falsely color the pleader's simple statement. I have looked upon the citation of facts as my strongest arguments. These, I think, will be patiently heard and justly weighed by the impartial tribunal of the American public before which I stand to add my feeble voice to those already raised against the wrongs received by the stage, the drama and the profession. To the members of that profession whose labors and honors I shall soon cease to share, I would say, in bidding them farewell, that there are many amongst them whom I esteem, some to whom I am warmly attached, and more whose career I shall watch with anxious interest. I would beg them to believe that I sympathize in their tools, I comprehend their sacrifices, I appreciate their exertions, I respect their virtues, and I cherish the hope that, in ceasing to be ranked amongst their number, I shall not be wholly forgotten by them. In writing these memoirs, although they are expressly designed for publication, I have endeavored to divest myself of all remembrance of the reader, in the same degree that I should mentally abstract and separate myself from an audience while interpreting a character upon the stage. By accomplishing this desired end I have been enabled to give a more unreserved transcript of events than would have been otherwise possible. In an autobiography there seems a degree of egotism in the constant use of the first person singular, from which I have sought in vain some method of escape. For any consequent trenching upon the borders of good taste, I hope to be pardoned as for an unavoidable literary trespass. I have endeavored to write a simple and faithful narrative, unambitious, unembellished, nothing extenuated, and assuredly setting down nothing in malice. It is for the public to judge how imperfectly I may have executed my task. I lay down my pen with a sense of relief, which is in itself agurdium, for I have fulfilled my promise. Leave here the pages with long musings curled, and write me new my future's epigraph. End of Autobiography of an Actress, or Eight Years on the Stage by Anna Cora-Mollett


So, I know a lot of you guys are like, I don't want to do English teaching, I'm not interested. Hini, I get you, okay? English teaching can be boring sometimes. Like after I did it for two years I was like, I'm done, okay? Hey guys, it's Seneke and Hazina girl and today I want to talk to you guys about how you can get a part-time job when you come live in Japan. So let's get right into it. Okay, so before I even start this video, I just wanted to mention three things that you should know before you even look for a part-time job. First thing, in Japan you can only work a maximum of 28 hours if you're coming here as a student. Second thing, Japanese jobs typically only pay once a month. They will only pay you your full monthly salary at the end of the month. So if you're used to like getting paid twice a week or once a week or whatever in your home country, just be prepared that you're only going to get paid once at the end of the month. There are jobs that offer like weekly salary or daily salary even, but you have to like specifically look for them and they're kind of hard to find. So keep that in mind. And then the third thing you should know is, and this is from my personal experience, you should give yourself a little bit of time to be able to adjust before you find a job. I know some of you guys are like, I'm going to land in Japan and find a job in two weeks. Well, let me tell you, giving yourself that much of a tight deadline is really just going to put you in such a tough situation because if I'm being honest with you, adjusting to a new country while also trying to find a job is kind of hard to do at the same time. So I just suggest that you give yourself at least two to three months of, you know, prepared savings and money put aside for living expenses because you don't want to be stuck in a situation where you haven't found a job yet and you don't want to do for money. Okay, so now that we've gotten that out of the way, let's get right into the tips. So the way I want to do this is I'm going to give you guys tips plus my own personal experience. But I hope these tips are helpful for you guys because I have done lots of part-time jobs in my day, honey. Okay, let me tell you, if I were to start right now to start naming them, I don't even know. It's probably more than 10 for sure. And if you guys didn't know, I've been living here for four years. So of course I've gotten the chance to see the kind of part-time jobs that are good, see the part-time jobs that are not so good. And I'm going to give you guys the real T, the real advice. Okay, number one, the first tip I have for you is if you're coming here as a student, you should ask your school for job advice. So first of all, if you guys didn't know, I came here as a Japanese language student and my school at the time had like a whole board with a bunch of job listings. The cool thing about that is that at least you know for a fact that those jobs are cool with having foreigners working there and you probably will get several options that are like specifically for foreigners. Like maybe they're looking for people to teach a specific language that isn't English or they want like you know specific people from a certain country to work at like a restaurant from that country or something like that, you know? So I think that's a great option to just start off. If you're looking for something you don't know where to start, ask your school. They definitely have some kind of like board or some kind of center where you can like find jobs. So just ask around. Number two is make sure to check out a website called MyNabiBaito. And basically this website has so many different job listings. I mean you can find anything from restaurants to working at a store to working for a small boutique to working for a little bread shop. You can find anything. It has tons of different bite those is what they call them in Japanese or part-time jobs. And basically yeah, you can find whatever your heart desires. And this website is actually a website that Japanese people use to find jobs and it just so happens to be the website that I use to find my first job. So if you guys didn't know, my first job ever in Japan was at a hotel and this hotel was really well known. And essentially I found the job on MyNabiBaito. I just looked it up and I found this job that was pretty good. And if you guys didn't know, minimum wage in Japan is like roughly 1,000 yen. But this job paid 1,300 yen. So I quickly you know just like contacted people in charge. They told me to come in for an interview and then after I passed it I went into their offices to do the documents and had a job. So this job was cool because all I did was I would pick up plates and I would just kind of bring them back to the washing like the dishwashing area. And then I got paid 1,300 an hour for that and I also got free hotel food which is the bomb.com. So that was really nice. And the cool thing about that job too is that it didn't require that much Japanese. Like I just I wasn't having full conversations with the guests. I would talk with them sometime if they were like really interested in knowing like a lot of them are like, what country are you from? Which country are you from? And I was just like, um, Kanata-jintas, kawaii, steaky. And that was that was it. It was a good way to like practice my Japanese a little bit. I could hear what people were talking about. I listened to the conversations. But at the end we would just thank the guests and say like, Arigatou gozaimashita. And then we would clean up the venue and that's it. That's what I got paid to do. So I did that job for like about six months. I left because at the end I found out that there was some shady business going on in the hotel and I wasn't feeling it and I was like, I don't know about this. I need to leave. So I mean you can work at a hotel too, but honestly it's to your own discretion. Make sure that it's a hotel that like is proper and nice and good. Um, so yeah, that was my first job. Alright, so the second tip I have for you guys is use social media websites. I don't know why I said that like Trump. Was there a reason for that? I don't know. Um, but basically if you guys didn't know, um, you can look for jobs via like Instagram or even Facebook. I mean, I've only really heard of people finding jobs on Instagram, not really Facebook, but I'm sure it's possible. If you look up like forums or if you use hashtags to search for certain jobs, you'll definitely find different options. And actually what I did, which I wish I didn't, but at the same time I'm like, I'm pretty happy because it ended up finding me a job anyways. I used Craigslist and I know what you guys are thinking. Oh my God. Senna, you used Craigslist? Okay, wow. You were really desperate. But no, um, you would be surprised. In Japan, Craigslist is actually pretty trustworthy. You can get like furniture. I've gotten furniture from Craigslist. Um, you can get like free items from people who are leaving the country. Craigslist is mostly just used as like a forum and it's rather safe in Japan. Of course, there are some sus websites, some sus posts from people that you're not sure if they're technically legal. So use your common sense when you're looking things up on Craigslist. I don't highly recommend it to be honest with you, but I'm just telling you my truth. I ended up finding an English teaching job on Craigslist, which became my second job in Japan. This job was definitely one of my favorites. I did this job for two years, guys, for two whole years. It was super easy, super fun for me because I love kids. I love teaching. And so I was basically just, yeah, having fun teaching these kids English and I would come in twice a week. I would go there every Wednesday and Saturday. And Wednesdays I would just work for, I think like four or five hours. And then on Saturdays I would work from like six to eight hours depending on the shift. Yeah, it was just like one of those jobs that you do and you're like, am I even working? That's how I felt. Amazing. So if you guys are anything like me and you want to use Craigslist because you're just curious, you want to see what it's like, my number one suggestion would be contact the people directly. So use Craigslist as a way to see the job listing, but make sure you find like whatever other website or other social media platforms that prove that this company is legit and contact them directly through their websites or whatever the case may be. Because yeah, just Craigslist can be fishy sometimes. Okay, so be careful, be safe. Next up on the list is do an internship. Now I know what you guys are thinking. Um, Senna, how is an internship going to get me a job? Last I checked most internships are not paid. That is not wrong. However, an internship can at least get your foot in the door, sis. Okay? Because sometimes that's all you need. You just need to be able to show your face and say, hey look at me, I'm talented and I'm capable and I can do a job if you want me to. And then that could lead to other things. In my case, that's exactly what happened. A friend of mine was like, hey, my company is looking for interns and would you be interested? And I was like, ah, heck yes. So I did this internship, it was like for a few days. It was for like an event. They just needed people to like, you know, help guide the customers. Yeah, I was essentially helping to translate. I was talking with customers that were coming into the exhibit. I was explaining them a little bit what the exhibit was about. And that's how I ended up landing myself a part-time job. Because I was talking to the boss and saying, hey, I'm doing English teaching right now but I really, really, really want a fashion job. Do you have any jobs available? And sure enough, they did. I was introduced to somebody who was the manager at a really nice store in Harajuku. And he said, yeah, I would love to have you. We have tons of foreign customers that come into the store. We need somebody who's bilingual, who can talk to the customers in English and in Japanese. And I was like, I'm your girl, hire me. And that's what they did. So I went for an interview. I talked to the lady who, you know, was a boss at the store. She loved me and I started working there. And I did that job for about, I want to say like a year on and off. And that was a really fun job because it was in a field that I actually really loved. And that's my other tip for you guys too. If you're coming to Japan because you want to work in a specific field, make sure you're looking for jobs in that field. Because it's going to give you experience working in Japan and it's also going to give you a sense of what it's like to work in that specific industry. So yeah, I know it might sound weird but do an internship even if it's not paid. Make sure that it's like a short internship like just a few days or something. And you know, you never know. It could land you a job, you know what I'm saying? Also, one thing before we even continue by the way guys, I don't know if you guys noticed something but one thing that keeps coming up is the fact that my friends have a big part to do in the jobs that I've gotten in Japan. So my number one suggestion to you if you have any takeaway to take from this video, it's just talk to friends. Networking is literally the easiest way to get a job. Look for jobs through friends.  And honey, believe me, you will be surprised.  So I know a lot of you guys are like, I don't want to do English teaching. I'm not interested. Honey, I get you, okay? English teaching can be boring sometimes. Like after I did it for two years, I was like, please, I'm done, okay? And that's why working at a share house is a great option. Because listen, two things you need in Japan, okay? Two main things. One, a source of income, and two, a roof over your head. So guess what? If you want to kill two birds with one stone, you can do that because you can not only live there, but you can also get paid at the same time while you're living there. And if you guys didn't know, I actually did that as well. A friend of mine told me that there was a share house that was looking for people who could live there and also work there at the same time. And I said, I'm up for it. Why not? So after a year of living in an apartment with some friends, I decided to move out of there and to move to this share house and I worked there for, I want to say, roughly a year. And at the same time, you know, I was living there so I could just, like, come out of my PJs and I could be super chill and have fun. And of course, I made tons of friends too. That was the best part. I met so many cool people when I was living there. And if you guys are curious, actually, the share house where I used to work is called Haxan. I made a video while I was there showing, like, what the share house looks like. So if you guys are curious to see that, I will leave a link in the description. You guys can check out the video and I'll also leave a description link to the actual share house itself. So make sure you guys go check that out. I would love to talk to you guys about all these jobs that I've done, like, so many crazy stories. So many crazy stories. Let me tell you. But definitely working at the share house was one of my more exciting jobs. It was something so different and really unusual. And it was just such a great, awesome chance to meet new people, make money, and work from home. So highly recommend. All right. So tip number seven is try a self-managed job. Now, I know what you guys are thinking. Self-managed, sent out, I'm no entrepreneur. I do not have any experience working for myself. I don't know what the heck that is like. What's the paycheck going to be? I'm a little scared what's going on. Okay, listen up. You do not have to be a professional entrepreneur to be able to make money on your own in Japan. There are three different things that I've done in the past that gave me money from self-managing my own time. And these are jobs I highly recommend for you guys as well. So I'm going to start with the first one. The first one I did was an English tutoring job. Now I know what you guys are thinking. Center, how is that different from an English teaching job? Well, it actually is. So English teaching is when you're working for a school, the school will actually provide the supplies that will give you the materials and they make up the lesson plan. So all you have to do is show up. You have to learn what the lesson plan is, figure out how you're going to use the supplies, and then you just teach the kids. And back then I was actually working as an English teaching assistant. So I would just assist the teacher who was already teaching. But English tutoring is a little bit different. I actually had to prepare the materials myself. I had to make a lesson plan for myself. And I basically was the teacher, the everything, the end-all, be-all of the English tutoring job that I was doing. This job, actually, the first one I got was, again, through a friend, she was English tutoring some kids and she said, I'm actually leaving Japan. Do you want to tutor them? And I said, why not? And actually I'm pretty sure my friend found that tutoring job through a website. So I'll try to ask her for the link and then I'll put it in the description for you guys. But yeah, that's a great option and you can tutor kids in any language. It doesn't have to be English, it can be French, it can be Portuguese, it can be German, it can be Russian. If you speak a language of any kind, other than English, you can tutor kids. And you can also tutor adults, too, actually. There are people who are looking for, like, serious tutors. I'm not talking about language exchange, okay?  There are people who are looking for that, whether they're kids or adults. So, yeah, just do your research, look a little bit online, and you'll see what you'll find. The second thing I did that was a self-managing job was I did babysitting, which, again, was through referral because after tutoring those five kids, I think all the moms could see that I loved kids so much. And so one of the moms actually recommended me to another friend of hers who was looking for an English-speaking babysitter. So what I did was, whenever that, you know, mom was looking for somebody to take care of her child, she would hit me up, she'd say, hey, Senna, are you free on such-and-such weekend? And I'll be like, yeah, sure. And so I'd go over to their house and I would babysit the kids. Now, obviously babysitting is one of those things where, like, not everybody can do it, you know what I'm saying? Because, like, if you don't like kids, then obviously babysitting is not for you. Don't do it. You don't have to force yourself, okay? But if you do like kids, just get involved with a lot of kid-related things. And most likely the parents will either refer you or you can even use a website that will, like, offer different babysitting jobs. And, yeah, babysitting is super fun. If you love kids, I highly recommend it. And then the third and final self-managed job that I did was I did a graphic design slash a social media manager job. And if you guys didn't know, that's something that I absolutely love to do. Like, I've created music videos in the past. I would manage other people's social media platforms for them. And I love doing graphic design. Anything that requires a computer and something artistic, I am super down for it. Basically, since I was already doing that for a friend of mine, it was kind of like an internship that I did.  And basically just to help rebrand the whole coffee shop and to manage their social media. So I did that for, I think, about four or five months. And that was super fun, too. Like, that was a job that was cool because I was managing myself. I was essentially hired as a freelancer to do this kind of job. And it required a lot of communication. I only did this later in my years, you know, once I was more comfortable in Japan. And yeah, I was doing that up until very recently, actually. So yeah, if you guys have some kind of special skill, it could be anything, okay? If you can fix computers, if you can sing songs, if you are good at dancing, whatever this case may be, you know, just offer your services to the world.  And you'd be surprised.  Okay, so last but not least, this is the last tip I have for you guys. And this one is actually probably my favorite by far because it's what I'm doing right now. And that is acting slash modeling slash voice acting. If you guys didn't know, in Japan, there is a big need for foreigners to do like acting jobs or modeling jobs or even voice acting jobs. And so if you guys are interested in doing something like that, you can basically just like look up an agency that does that.  It's one of the first agencies that I joined. I highly recommend it because it's super fun and it also pays really well as well. And yeah, if you guys didn't know, that's what I'm doing right now and it's what I've been doing for the past like year now on and off. I've done acting jobs like I've, well not like full on acting jobs, but I've been like featured in commercials as an extra. I've also been featured in the music videos as an extra. And then I also started doing modeling a little more seriously recently. I'm sure you guys have seen if you follow my Instagram, which if you don't, go check me out right here. And again, like I said, I'll have a link down in the description to the agency that I know of the biggest one that I've heard of really that does all three. And yeah, you guys can go check it out for yourselves. And that's it. That's all the tips I have for you guys. I hope that was easy to understand and I hope that you guys learned something. I hope you guys can, you know, find something that's perfect for you, especially if you don't want to do English teaching. Believe me, there are tons of other job options for you guys. Okay. So if you guys enjoyed watching this video, make sure you check out the two videos that I'll have right over here. This one is going to be things that I wish people told me before I came to Japan. Okay. Because there's a lot of stuff that nobody told me. And this one's going to be about how you can convince your parents to let you come to Japan. And even if you're, you know, an adult and you're grown, I'm sure you'll love it. So click on it. Okay. Bye. Is the battery going to die? Oh, no. Oh, no.