Another Pinero play. Biting satire this time, ironic comedy - not a farce. The Big Drum, a novel being written by Phil, one of the main characters, is "an attempt to portray the struggle for notorietyÑfor self-advertisementÑwe see going on around us to-day." "Oh, I believe any world would content me that's totally different from the world I've lived in so long; any world that isn't flat and stale and stifling; that isn't made up of shams, and petty aims and appetites; any world thatÑwell, such a world as you used to picture, Phil, when you preached your gospel to a selfish, common girl under the chestnuts in the AllŽe de Longchamp and the Champs-ElysŽes! ... I've been waitingÑwaiting for youÑin my dreamsÑfor ten years! "