Images of Eva Le Gallienne: Reflections of Androgyny

Abstract

Twenty years after Louis Jacques Daguerre. invented modern photography, Dion Boucicault incorporated the camera as a crucial plot device in his play, The Octoroon. When his character Salem Scudder discovers a freshly taken photograph lying by the body of a murder victim, he holds up the picture as evidence and cries: “Jacob M'Closky, ‘t was you murdered that boy! Here you are, in the very attitude of your crime….’ Tis true! The [camera] can't lie.”