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GREEK TRAGEDY
GREEK TRAGEDY
BY
GILBERT NORWOOD, M.A.
FORMERLY FELLOW OF ST. JOHN’S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE
PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, CARDIFF
METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON
_First Published in 1920_
PREFACE
This book is an attempt to cover the whole field of Greek Tragedy.
My purpose throughout has been twofold. Firstly, I have sought to
provide classical students with definite facts and with help towards a
personal appreciation of the plays they read. My other intention has
been to interest and in some degree to satisfy those “general readers”
who have little or no knowledge of Greek. This second function is
to-day at least as important as the first. Apart from the admirable
progress shown in Europe and the English-speaking world by many works
of first-rate Greek scholarship, in the forefront of which stand Jebb’s
monumental Sophocles, Verrall’s achievements in dramatic criticism, and
the unrivalled _Einleitung_ of Wilamowitz-Moellendorff,—the magnificent
verse-translations of Professor Gilbert Murray, springing from a rare
union of poetic genius with consummate scholarship, have introduced
in this country a new epoch of interest in Greek drama among many
thousands who are unacquainted with the language. Even more momentous
is the fact that the feeling of educated people about drama in general
has been revolutionized and reanimated by the creative genius of Ibsen,
whose penetrating influence is the chief cause of the present dramatic
renaissance in Great Britain.
Two important topics have been given more prominence than is usual in
books of this kind: dramatic structure and the scansion of lyrics.
It might have been supposed self-evident that the former of these is a
vital part, indeed the foundation, of the subject, but it has suffered
remarkable neglect or still more remarkable superficiality of treatment:
criticism of the Greek tragedians has been vitiated time and again by a
tendency to ignore the very existence of dramatic form. It is a strange
reflection that the world of scholarship waited till 1887 for the mere
revelation of grave difficulties in the plot of the _Agamemnon_. Examining
boards still prescribe “_Ajax_ vv. 1-865,” on the naïve assumption that
they know better than Sophocles where the play ought to end. Euripides
has been discussed with a perversity which one would scarcely surpass if
one applied to Anatole France the standards appropriate to Clarendon.
Throughout I have attempted to follow the working of each playwright’s
mind, to realize what he meant his work to “feel like”. This includes
much besides structure, but the plot is still, as in Aristotle’s day,
“the soul of the drama”.
Chapter VI, on metre and rhythm, will, I hope, be found useful. Greek
lyrics are so difficult that most students treat them as prose. I have
done my best to be accurate, clear, and simple, with the purpose of
enabling the sixth-form boy or undergraduate to read his “chorus” with a
sense of metrical and rhythmical form. With regard to this chapter, even
more than the others, I shall welcome criticism and advice.
I have to thank my wife for much help, and my friend Mr. Cyril Brett,
M.A., who kindly offered to make the Index.
GILBERT NORWOOD
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. THE LITERARY HISTORY OF GREEK TRAGEDY 1
II. THE GREEK THEATRE AND THE PRODUCTION OF PLAYS 49
III. THE WORKS OF ÆSCHYLUS 84
IV. THE WORKS OF SOPHOCLES 132
V. THE WORKS OF EURIPIDES 186
VI. METRE AND RHYTHM IN GREEK TRAGEDY 327
INDEX 365
GREEK TRAGEDY
CHAPTER I
THE LITERARY HISTORY OF GREEK TRAGEDY
All the types of dramatic poetry known in Greece, tragic, satyric,
and comic, originated in the worship of Dionysus, the deity of wild
vegetation, fruits, and especially the vine. In his honour, at the
opening of spring, were performed dithyrambs, hymns rendered by a chorus,
who, dressed like satyrs, the legendary followers of Dionysus, presented
by song and mimic dance stories from the adventurous life of the god
while on earth. It is from these dithyrambs that tragedy and satyric
drama both sprang. The celebrated Arion, who raised the dithyramb to a
splendid art-form, did much[1] incidentally to aid this development. His
main achievement in this regard is the insertion of spoken lines in the
course of the lyrical performance; it seems, further, that these verses
consisted of a dialogue between the chorus and the chorus-leader, who
mounted upon the sacrificial table. Such interludes, no doubt, referred
to incidents in the sacred story, and the early name for an actor
(ὑποκριτής, “one who answers”) suggests that members of the chorus asked
their leader to explain features in the ritual or the narrative.
At this point drama begins to diverge from the dithyramb. With comedy
we are not here concerned.[2] The drama of the spring festival may be
called “tragedy,” but it was in a quite rudimentary state. Its lyrics,
sung by fifty “satyrs,” would altogether outshine in importance the
dialogue-interludes between chorus-leader and individual singers; the
theme, moreover, would be always some event connected with Dionysus.
Two great changes were necessary before drama could enter on free
development: the use of impersonation in the interludes and the admission
of any subject at will of the poet. The first was introduced by Thespis,
who is said to have “invented one actor”. The second was perhaps later,
but at least as early as Phrynichus we find plays on subjects taken from
other than Dionysiac legends. It is said that the audience complained of
this innovation: “What has this to do with Dionysus?”[3]
Another great development is attributed to Pratinas—the invention of
satyric drama. The more stately, graver features and the frolicsome,
often gross, elements being separated, the way was clear for the free
development of tragedy and satyric into the forms we know. But satyric
work, though always showing playful characteristics and a touch of
obscenity, was never confounded with comedy. Stately figures of legend
or theology regularly appeared in it—Odysseus in the _Cyclops_, Apollo
in the _Ichneutæ_—and it was a regular feature at the presentations of
tragedy; each tragic poet competed with three tragedies followed by one
satyric play. When the latter form changed its tone slightly, as in the
work of the Alexandrian Pleiad,[4] it approximated not to comedy but to
satire.[5]
The Dorians claimed the credit of having invented both tragedy and
comedy.[6] There seems little doubt that they provided the germ, though
the glories of Greek drama belong to Athens. Arion, whose contribution
has been described, if not himself a Dorian, worked among Dorians at
Corinth, which Pindar,[7] for example, recognized as the birthplace of
the dithyramb. Moreover the lyrics of purely Attic tragedy show in their
language what is generally regarded as a slight Doric colouring.[8]
Aristotle[9] sums up the rise of tragedy as follows: “Tragedy ... was
at first mere improvization ... originating with the leaders of the
dithyramb. It advanced by slow degrees; each new element that showed
itself was in turn developed. Having passed through many stages, it
found its natural form, and there it stopped. Æschylus first introduced
a second actor; he diminished the importance of the chorus, and assigned
the leading part to the dialogue. Sophocles raised the number of actors
to three, and added scene-painting. It was not till late that the short
plot was discarded for one of greater compass, and the grotesque diction
of the earlier satyric form for the stately manner of tragedy. The iambic
measure then replaced the trochaic tetrameter, which was originally
employed when the poetry was of the satyric order, and had greater
affinities with dancing.... The number of ‘episodes’ or acts was also
increased, and the other embellishments added, of which tradition tells.”
We have but meagre knowledge of the drama before Æschylus, whose vast
achievement so overshadowed his predecessors that their works were little
read and have in consequence practically vanished. Tragedy was born
at the moment when, as tradition relates, THESPIS of Icaria in Attica
introduced the actor. Arion, as we saw, had already caused one of the
chorus to mount upon the sacrificial table or the step of the altar and
deliver a narrative, or converse with his fellow-choristers, concerning
Dionysus, using not lyrical metre, but the trochaic tetrameter.[10]
Thespis’ great advance was to introduce a person who should actually
present the character to whom Arion’s chorister had merely made
allusion: the action, instead of being reported, went on before the eyes
of the audience. This change clearly at once begets the possibility of
drama, however rudimentary. By retiring to the booth while the singers
perform their lyric, he can change his mask and costume and reappear
as another person; by learning and discussing what has been said by
his supposed predecessor, he can exhibit the play of emotion or the
construction of a plan.
If this was done by Thespis, he was the founder of European drama. His
_floruit_ may be assigned to the year 535 B.C., the date of the first
dramatic competition at Athens. But little is known of him. Aristotle
in his _Poetic_[11] does not mention his name. Far later we have the
remarks of Horace, “Diogenes Laertius,”[12] and Suidas. Horace tells[13]
that Thespis discovered tragic poetry, and conveyed from place to
place on waggons a company of players who sang and acted his pieces,
their faces smeared with lees of wine: “Diogenes Laertius” says that
Thespis “discovered one actor”. Suidas gives us the names of several
plays, _Phorbas_ or _The Trials_ (ἆθλα) _of Pelias_, _The Priests_,
_The Youths_, _Pentheus_. We possess four fragments alleged to belong
to these, but they are spurious. Aristotle,[14] moreover, affirms that
Tragedy was in the first place a matter of improvization. The conclusion
seems to be that Thespis did not “write plays” in the modern sense of the
phrase. He was much more like those Elizabethan dramatists who provided
“the words” for their actors, and for whom printing and publication were
only thought of if the play had achieved success upon the boards. He
stood midway between Æschylus and the unknown actor-poets before Arion
who improvized as they played.
The next name of importance is that of CHŒRILUS the Athenian, who
competed in tragedy for the first time during the 64th Olympiad (524-1
B.C.) and continued writing for the stage during forty years. He produced
one hundred and sixty plays, and obtained the first prize thirteen times.
Later generations regarded him as especially excellent in the satyric
drama[15] invented by his younger contemporary Pratinas. To him were
attributed the invention of masks, as a substitute for the wine-lees
of Thespis, and more majestic costume. We know by name only one of his
works, the _Alope_, which is concerned with the Attic hero Triptolemus.
A fragment or two reveal an unexpected preciosity of style; he called
stones and rivers “the bones and veins of the earth”.
PRATINAS of Phlius, in the north of the Peloponnese, is said to have
competed with Æschylus and Chœrilus in the 70th Olympiad (500-497
B.C.). His great achievement, as we have said, was the invention of
satyric drama. Fifty plays are attributed to him, of which thirty-two
were satyric. Hardly any fragments of these are extant, but we get some
conception of the man from a _hyporchema_ in which he complains that
music is encroaching upon poetry: “let the flute follow the dancing
revel of the song—it is but an attendant”. With boundless gusto and
polysyllabic energy he consigns the flute to flames and derision.
At length we reach a poet who seems to have been really great, a
dramatist whose works, even to a generation which knew and reverenced
Æschylus, seemed unworthy to be let die—PHRYNICHUS of Athens, son of
Polyphradmon, whose first victory occurred 512-509 B.C. It is said that
he was the first to bring female characters upon the stage (always,
however, played by men). The following dramas are known by name:
_Egyptians_; _Alcestis_; _Antæus_ or _The Libyans_; _The Daughters of
Danaus_; _The Capture of Miletus_; _Phœnician Women_ (_Phœnissæ_);
_The Women of Pleuron_; _Tantalus_; _Troilus_. The _Egyptians_ seems
to have dealt with the same subject as the _Supplices_ of Æschylus;
so does the _Danaides_; these two dramas may have formed part of a
trilogy. The _Alcestis_ followed the same lines as the Euripidean play;
it is probable, indeed, that the apparition of Death with a sword
was borrowed by Euripides from Phrynichus. The _Antæus_ related the
wrestling-match between Heracles and his earth-born foe. The manner in
which Aristophanes[16] refers to the play shows that the description of
the wrestling-bout was still celebrated after the lapse of a century. The
_Pleuroniæ_ treated of Meleager and the fateful log which was preserved,
and then burnt in anger, by his mother Althæa.
Two plays were specially important. The _Phœnissæ_ (produced in 476),
celebrated the victory of Salamis, had Themistocles himself for choregus,
and won the prize; its popularity never waned throughout the fifth
century. We are told that the prologue was spoken by an eunuch while he
placed the cushions for the Persian counsellors; further—an important
fact—that this person, at the beginning of the play, announced the defeat
of Xerxes. The _Capture of Miletus_, less popular in later days—no
fragments at all are to be found—created even more stir at the moment.
Miletus had been captured by Darius in 494 B.C., Athens having failed to
give effective support to the Ionian revolt. While the distress and shame
excited by the fall of the proudest city in Asiatic Greece were still
strong in Athenian minds, Phrynichus ventured to dramatize the disaster.
Herodotus tells how “the theatre burst into tears; they fined him a
thousand drachmæ for reminding them of their own misfortunes, and gave
command that no man should ever use that play again”.[17]
Few lost works are so sorely to be regretted as those of Phrynichus.
The collection of fragments merely hints at a genius who commanded the
affection of an age which knew his great successors, a master whose
dignity was not utterly overborne by Æschylus, and whose tenderness
could still charm hearts which had thrilled to the agonies of Medea
and the romance of Andromeda. The chief witness to his popularity is
Aristophanes, who paints for us a delightful picture[18] of the old men
in the dark before the dawn, trudging by lantern-light through the mud
to the law-court, and humming as they go the “charming old-world honeyed
ditties” from the _Phœnissæ_. In another play[19] the birds assert that
it is from their song that “Phrynichus, like his own bee, took his feast,
food of the gods, the fruit of song, and found unfailingly a song full
sweet”. One or two snatches survive from these lyrics, lines from the
_Phœnissæ_ in the “greater Asclepiad” metre which is the form of some
of Sappho’s loveliest work, and a verse[20] from the _Troilus_ which
Sophocles himself quoted: “the light of love on rosy cheeks is beaming”.
It is clear that for most Athenians the spell of Phrynichus lay in his
songs; succeeding poets he impressed almost equally as a playwright. It
has already been mentioned that Euripides seems to have borrowed from
the _Alcestis_. Æschylus, especially, was influenced by his style, and
in the _Persæ_ followed the older poet closely. Indeed the relation
between the _Persæ_ and the _Phœnissæ_ is puzzling, but ancient authority
did not hesitate to say that the later work was “modelled on” the
earlier.[21] It is no question of a _réchauffé_ to suit the taste of
a later age, like the revisions of Shakespeare by Davenant and Cibber,
for the two tragedies are separated at the utmost by only seven years;
rather we appear to have a problem like the connexion between _Macbeth_
and Middleton’s _Witch_. Perhaps the soundest opinion is that the
younger playwright wished to demonstrate his own method of writing and
his theory of dramatic composition in the most striking way possible—by
choosing a famous drama of the more rudimentary type and rewriting it
as it ought to be written. Two features in the _Phœnissæ_ seem to lend
support to this view. Firstly, the prologue was delivered by a slave
who was preparing the seats of the Persian counsellors. The _Persæ_
expunges the man and his speech, presenting us at once with the elders in
deliberation. Nothing is more characteristic of the architectonic power
in literature than the instinct to sweep away everything but the minimum
of mere machinery; at the first instant we are in the midst of the plot.
Secondly, the prologue at once announced the disaster. Nothing was left
but the amplification of sorrow, a quasi-operatic presentation by the
Phœnician women who formed the chorus. Here again the _Persæ_ provides a
most instructive contrast.
From the fragments, from ancient testimony, and from the recasting of the
_Phœnissæ_ which appeared instinctive or necessary to Æschylus, we gain
some clear conception of Phrynichus. A lyrist of sweetness and pellucid
dignity, he has been compared[22] to his contemporary Simonides; the
graceful phrases in which Aristophanes declared that Phrynichus drew his
inspiration from the birds recall to us the “native wood-notes wild” of
Shakespeare’s earlier achievement. As a playwright in the strict sense
he is, for us, the first effective master, but still swayed by the age
of pure lyrists which was just reaching its culmination and its close in
Pindar—so greatly swayed that the “episodes” were still little more than
interruptions of lyrics which gave but a static expression to feeling.
ÆSCHYLUS, the son of Euphorion, was born at Eleusis in 525 B.C. At the
age of twenty-five he began to exhibit plays, but did not win the prize
until the year 485. The Persian invasions swept down upon Athens when
Æschylus had come to the maturity of his powers. He served as a hoplite
at Marathon[23] and his brother Cynegirus distinguished himself even on
that day of heroes by his desperate courage in attempting to thwart the
flight of the invaders. That the poet was present at Salamis also may
be regarded as certain from the celebrated description in the _Persæ_.
He twice visited Sicily. On the first occasion, soon after 470 B.C., he
accepted the invitation of Hiero, King of Syracuse, and composed _The
Women of Etna_ to celebrate the city which Hiero was founding on the
slope of that mountain. Various stories to explain his retirement from
Athens were circulated in antiquity. Some relate that he was unnerved
by a collapse of the wooden benches during a performance of one of his
plays. Others said that he was defeated by Simonides in a competition:
the task was to write an epitaph on those who fell at Marathon. According
to others he was chagrined by a dramatic defeat which he sustained at the
hands of the youthful Sophocles in 468. A fourth story declared that he
was accused of divulging the Eleusinian Mysteries in one of his plays,
and was in danger of his life until he proved that he had himself never
been initiated. These stories are hard to accept. Possibly he wrote
something which offended against Eleusinian rule, and was condemned
to banishment or possibly to death, which (as often occurred) he was
allowed to escape by voluntary exile. We cannot suppose that he pleaded
ignorance[24] seriously; a man of his genuinely devout temperament, and
a native of Eleusis, must assuredly have been initiated. A second visit
to Sicily was taken after he had again won the prize with the _Oresteia_.
He never returned. Story tells how he was sitting on the hillside near
the city of Gela when an eagle, flying with a tortoise in its claws in
quest of a stone whereon to crush it, dropped its prey upon the bald head
of the poet and killed him. He left two sons, Euphorion and Bion, who
also pursued the tragic art—a tradition which persisted in the family for
generations.
Æschylus is too great a dramatist to receive detailed treatment in the
course of a general discussion; a separate chapter must be allotted to
this. At present we shall consider only his position in the history of
tragedy.
The great technical change introduced by Æschylus was that he “first
introduced a second actor; he diminished the importance of the chorus,
and assigned the leading part to the dialogue”.[25] The two last
statements are corollaries of the first, which describe a deeply
important advance. It has been said above that the drama was founded
by the man who “invented one actor”; at the same time it is easy to
realize how primitive such drama must have been. The addition of another
actor did not double the resources of tragedy, rather it increased
them fifty-fold. To bring two opposed or sympathetic characters face
to face, to exhibit the clash of principles by means of the clash of
personalities, this is a step forward into a new world, a change so great
that to call Æschylus the very inventor of tragedy is not unreasonable.
This meagre equipment of two actors was found sufficient by two of the
fifth-century masters for work[26] of the highest value. The further
remark of Aristotle that Æschylus “diminished the importance of the
chorus” follows naturally from the vast increase in the importance of the
“episodes”.
Revolutionary as Æschylus was, he did not attain at a bound to a
characteristic dramatic form of his own and then advance no farther. In
his earliest extant play, the _Supplices_, the alterations mentioned
above are certainly in operation, but their use is tentative. The chorus
is no doubt less dominant than it had been, but it is the most important
feature, even to a modern reader. To an ancient spectator it must have
appeared of even greater moment. The number of singers was still fifty,
and the lyrics, accompanied by music and the dance of this great company,
occupy more than half of our present text. We have left Phrynichus
behind, but he is not out of sight.
It is necessary at this point to give some account of the life of
SOPHOCLES and his position in dramatic history, though a detailed
discussion of his extant work must be reserved for a separate chapter. He
was born about 496 B.C., the son of a well-to-do citizen named Sophillus,
and received, in addition to the usual education, more advanced training
in music from the celebrated Lampros. The youth’s physical beauty was
remarkable, and at the age of sixteen he was chosen to lead the choir of
boys who performed the pæan celebrating the victory of Salamis. Nothing
more is known of his life till the year 468, when he produced his first
tragedy. One of his fellow-competitors was Æschylus, and we are told[27]
that feeling ran so high that the Archon, instead of choosing the judges
by lot as usual, entrusted the decision to the board of generals;
they awarded the victory to the youthful Sophocles. For sixty years he
produced a steady stream of dramatic work with continuous success. He
at first performed in his own plays—his skill in the _Nausicaa_ gained
great applause—but was compelled to give this up owing to the failure of
his voice. The number of his plays was well over a hundred, performed in
groups of four, and he won eighteen victories at the City Dionysia; even
when he failed of the first prize, he was never lower than the second
place.[28] His genius seems even to have increased with advancing age;
he was about ninety when he wrote the _Œdipus Coloneus_. Sophocles took
a satisfactory if not prominent part in public life,[29] being twice
elected general, once with Pericles and later with Nicias. He served
also as Hellenotamias—a member, that is, of the Treasury Board which
administered the funds of the Delian Confederacy. It is an interesting
comment on the early part of the _Œdipus Coloneus_ that the poet acted
as priest of two heroes, Asclepius and Alcon. He had several sons, the
most celebrated of whom was Iophon, himself a tragedian of repute. A
famous story relates that Iophon, being jealous of his illegitimate
brother, brought a suit to prove his father’s insanity, with the intent
to become administrator of his estate. The aged poet’s defence consisted
in a recitation of the _Œdipus Coloneus_ which he had just completed, and
the jury most naturally dismissed Iophon’s petition. He died late in 406
B.C., fully ninety years old, a few months later than Euripides, and not
long before the disaster of Ægospotami. The Athenian people mourned him
as a hero under the name of Dexion, “The Entertainer,” or “Host,” and
brought yearly sacrifice to his shrine.
The personality of Sophocles stands out more definitely before the
modern eye than that of perhaps any other fifth-century Greek. His social
talent made him a noted figure whose good sayings were repeated, and of
whom the gossips as well as the critics loved to circulate illustrative
stories. He seemed the embodiment of all that man can ask. Genius, good
health, industry, long life, personal beauty, affluence, popularity, and
the sense of power—all were his, and enjoyed in that very epoch which,
beyond all others, seems to have combined stimulus with satisfaction.
Salamis was fought and won just as he had left childhood behind. His
adolescence and maturity coincided with the rise and establishment of
the Athenian Empire; he listened to Pericles, saw the Parthenon and
Propylæa rise upon the Acropolis, associated with Æschylus, Euripides,
Aristophanes, and Thucydides, watched the work of Phidias and Polygnotus
grow to life under their fingers. Though he carried into the years of
Nestor the genius of Shakespeare, he was yet so blessed that he died
before the fall of Athens. Phrynichus, the comic poet, wrote: “Blessed
was Sophocles, who passed so many years before his death, a happy man and
brilliant, who wrote many beautiful tragedies and made a fair end of a
life which knew no misfortune”.[30] Sophocles’ own words[31] come as a
significant comment:—
μὴ φῦναι τὸν ἅπαντα νικᾷ λόγον.
τὸ δ’, ἐπεὶ φανῇ,
βῆναι κεῖθεν ὅθενπερ ἥκει,
πολὺ δεύτερον ὡς τάχιστα.
“Best of all fates—when a man weighs everything—is not to be born, and
second-best beyond doubt is, once born, to depart with all speed to that
place whence we came.”
Of his social charm there are many evidences. He gathered round him a
kind of literary club or _salon_. Some hint of the talk in this circle
may be gathered from the fragment of Ion’s _Memoirs_ which tells how
when the poet came to Chios he engaged in critical battle with the local
schoolmaster concerning poetical adjectives, and quoted with approbation
Phrynichus’ line λάμπει δ’ ἐπὶ πορφυρέαις παρῇσι φῶς ἔρωτος. He was a
friend of Herodotus, from whom he quotes more than once, and to whom he
addressed certain elegiac verses. With regard to his own art, we possess
two remarks of deep interest. The first is reported by Aristotle:[32] “I
depict men as they ought to be, Euripides depicts them as they are”. It
is excellent Attic for “he is a realist, I am an idealist”. Nevertheless,
he esteemed his rival; when he led forth his chorus for the first time
after the news of Euripides’ death in Macedonia had reached Athens, he
and his singers wore the dress of mourning. The second remark is a brief
account[33] of his own development: “My dramatic wild oats were imitation
of Æschylus’ pomp; then I evolved my own harsh mannerism; finally I
embraced that style which is best, as most adapted to the portrayal of
human nature”. All that we now possess would seem to belong to his third
period, though certain characteristics of the _Antigone_ may put us in
mind of the second.[34]
Apart altogether from his glorious achievement in actual composition,
Sophocles is highly important as an innovator in technique. The changes
which he introduced are: (i) the number of actors was raised from two to
three;[35] (ii) scene-painting was invented[35]; (iii) the plays of a
tetralogy were, sometimes at any rate, no longer part of a great whole,
but quite distinct in subject;[36] (iv) it is said[37] that he raised the
number of the chorus from twelve to fifteen, was the first tragedian to
use Phrygian music and to give his actors the bent staff and white shoe
which they sometimes used.
The points named under (iv) are of small importance save the change in
the number of _choreutæ_, but that is a detail which can scarcely be
accepted, Æschylus during part of his career employed fifty _choreutæ_,
and it is extremely improbable that the number sank as low as twelve,
only to rise slightly again at once. The invention of scene-painting is
clearly momentous; it became easy to fix the action at any spot desired,
and a change of scene also became possible. Æschylus, of course, in his
later years made use of this development. The other two points are vital.
Though the stage gained immensely by the introduction of a third actor,
little perhaps need be said on the point. An examination of the early
Æschylean plays, and even of the _Choephorœ_ or _Agamemnon_, side by
side with the _Philoctetes_ or _Œdipus Coloneus_, will make the facts
abundantly clear. In the crisis of _Œdipus Tyrannus_ (for example) the
presence of Jocasta,[38] while her husband hears the tidings brought by
the Corinthian, does not merely add to the poignancy of the scene; it may
almost be said to create it.
The last change, that of breaking up the tetralogy into four disconnected
tragedies, is equally fundamental. The older poet was a man of simple
ideas and gigantic grasp. His conceptions demanded the vast scope of a
trilogy, and perhaps the most astonishing feature of his work is the
fact that, while each drama is a splendid and self-intelligible whole,
it gains its full import only from the significance of the complete
organism. Sophocles realized that he possessed a narrower, if more
subtle, genius, and moulded his technique to suit his powers. Each of
his works, however spacious and statuesque it may seem beside _Macbeth_,
_Lear_, or even _Hippolytus_, shows, as compared with Æschylus, a
closeness of texture in characterization and a delicate stippling of
language, which mark nothing less than a revolution.
Tradition tells that EURIPIDES was born at Salamis on the very day of
the great victory (480 B.C.); the Parian marble puts the date five years
earlier. He was thus a dozen or more years younger than Sophocles.
His father’s name was Mnesarchus; his mother Clito is ridiculed by
Aristophanes as a petty green-grocer, but all other evidence suggests
that they were well-to-do; Euripides was able to devote himself to
drama, from which little financial reward could be expected, and to
collect a library—a remarkable possession for those days. He lived
almost entirely for his art, though he must, like other citizens, have
seen military service. His public activities seem to have included
nothing more extraordinary than a single “embassy” to Syracuse. Unlike
Sophocles, he cared little for society save that of a few intimates,
and wrote much in a cave on Salamis which he had fitted up as a study.
The great philosopher Anaxagoras was his friend and teacher; several
passages[39] in the extant plays point plainly to his influence. It was
in Euripides’ house that Protagoras read for the first time his treatise
on the gods which brought about the sophist’s expulsion from Athens.
Socrates himself is traditionally regarded as the poet’s friend. Aulus
Gellius[40] says that he began to write tragedy at the age of eighteen;
but it was not till 455 B.C. (when he was perhaps thirty) that he
“obtained a chorus”—that is, had his work accepted for performance. One
of these pieces was the _Peliades_; he obtained only the third place. By
the end of his life he had written nearly a hundred dramas, including
satyric works, but obtained the first prize only four times: his fifth
victory was won by the tetralogy which included the _Bacchæ_, performed
after his death. His influence was far out of proportion to these scanty
rewards.[41] On any given occasion he might be defeated by some talented
mediocrity who hit the taste of the moment. When he offered the _Medea_
itself he was overcome, not only by Sophocles, but by Euphorion; yet his
vast powers were recognized by all Athens. Euripides was married—twice it
is said—and had three sons. Late in his life he accepted an invitation
from Archelaus, King of Macedonia; after living there a short time in
high favour and writing his latest plays, he died in 406 B.C. He was
buried in Macedonia and a cenotaph was erected to his memory in Attica.
Further light both on the career and works of Euripides has recently
been provided by an interesting discovery. In 1912 Dr. Arthur S. Hunt
published[42] extensive fragments of a life of the poet by Satyrus,
from portions of a papyrus-roll found at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt by Dr.
Grenfell and Dr. Hunt. Satyrus lived in the third century before
Christ: our MS. itself is dated by its discoverers “from the middle
or latter part of the second century” after Christ. The most striking
points are (i) Satyrus quotes the fragment of the _Pirithous_ dealt
with below,[43] attributing it, as was often done, to Euripides, and
saying that the poet “has accurately embraced the whole cosmogony of
Anaxagoras in three periods”;[44] (ii) there are new fragments, on the
vain pursuit of wealth; (iii) the poet was prosecuted for impiety by the
statesman Cleon; (iv) we read that Euripides wrote the proem for the
_Persæ_ composed by his friend the musician Timotheus; (v) Satyrus, in
discussing _peripeteia_, mentions “ravishings, supposititious infants,
and recognitions by means of rings and necklaces—for these, as you know,
are the back-bone of the New Comedy, and were perfected by Euripides”.
A discussion of Euripides’ surviving work will be found in a separate
chapter. Our business here is to indicate his position in the development
of technique. Though he is for ever handling his material and the
resources of the stage in an original and experimental manner, the
definite changes which he introduced are few. That many of his dramas
are not tragedies at all but tragicomedies, is a development of the
first importance. Another fact of this kind is his musical innovations.
The lyrics of his plays tend to become less important as literature and
to subserve the music, in which he introduced fashions not employed
before, such as the “mixed Lydian”; it is impossible to criticize some
of his later odes without knowledge, which we do not possess, of the
music which he composed for them and the manner in which he caused them
to be rendered. Hence the loose syntax, the polysyllabic vagueness of
expression, and the repeated words—features which irritated Aristophanes
and many later students.
Another novelty is his use of the prologue. Since this is properly
nothing but “that part of the play which precedes the first song of
the whole chorus,”[45] prologues are of course found in Æschylus and
Sophocles. The peculiarity of the Euripidean prologue is that it tends to
be non-dramatic, a narrative enabling the spectator to understand at what
point in a legend the action is to begin. It is from Euripides’ use of
the prologue that the modern meaning of the word is derived.
Aristophanes in his _Frogs_ makes a famous attack upon most[46] sides
of Euripides’ art as contrasted with that of Æschylus. But it is often
forgotten that, damned utterly as the younger tragedian is, Æschylus by
no means escapes criticism. Many of the censures put into Euripides’
mouth are just and important; it seems likely that Aristophanes is
practically quoting his victim’s conversation; the remark[47] about
Æschylus that “he was obscure in his prologues,” is no mere rubbish
attributed to a dullard. That Euripides did criticize his elder is a
fact. The _Supplices_[48] contains a severe remark on the catalogue
of chieftains in the _Septem_; the elaborate sarcasm directed in the
_Electra_[49] against the Recognition-scene of the _Choephorœ_ is even
more startling. Besides this, Aristophanes seems to quote remarks of
Euripides on himself and his work: “When I first took over the art from
you, I found it swollen with braggadocio and tiresome words; so the first
thing I did was to train down its fat and reduce its weight”.[50] His
comment on dialogue is no less pertinent: “With you Niobe and Achilles
never said a word, but I left no personage idle; women, slaves, and
hags all spoke”.[51] Finally, there is the perfect description of his
own realism[52]: οἰκεῖα πράγματ’ εἰσάγων, οἷς χρώμεθ’, οἷς σύνεσμεν, “I
introduced life as we live it, the things of our everyday experience”.
Such sentences as these reflect unmistakably the conversation of a
playwright who was jealous for the dignity and the progress of his art.
Though during his own time Euripides was hardly equal in repute to his
two companions, scarcely had his Macedonian grave closed over him than
his popularity began to overshadow theirs. Æschylus became a dim antique
giant; Sophocles, though always admired, was too definitely Attic and
Periclean to retain all his prestige in the Hellenistic world. It was
the more cosmopolitan poet who won posthumous applause from one end of
the civilized earth to the other. From 400 B.C. to the downfall of the
ancient world he was unquestionably better known and admired than any
other dramatist. This is shown by the much larger collection of his
work which has survived, by the imitation of later playwrights, and
by innumerable passages of citation, praise, and comment in writers
of every kind. He shared with Homer, Vergil, and Horace the equivocal
distinction of becoming a schoolbook even in ancient times. Nine of our
nineteen plays were selected for this purpose: _Alcestis_, _Andromache_,
_Hecuba_, _Hippolytus_, _Medea_, _Orestes_, _Phœnissæ_, _Rhesus_, and
_Troades_. It is not easy to see what principle of selection prompted the
educationists of the day: _Andromache_ and _Hippolytus_ do not strike a
modern reader as specially “suitable”. Owing to their use in schools they
were annotated; these _scholia_ are still extant and are often of great
value. In the Byzantine age the number was reduced to three: _Hecuba_,
_Orestes_, _Phœnissæ_.
Among the numerous lesser tragedians of the fifth century five hold a
distinguished place: Neophron of Sicyon, Aristarchus of Tegea, Ion of
Chios, Achæus of Eretria, Agathon of Athens.
NEOPHRON is an enigmatic figure. It would seem that he was an important
forerunner of Euripides. Not only do we learn that he wrote one hundred
and twenty tragedies and that he was the first to bring upon the stage
“pædagogi” and the examination of slaves under torture; it is said also
that his _Medea_ was the original of Euripides’ tragedy so-named.[53]
“Pædagogi” or elderly male attendants of children are familiar in
Euripides, and the “questioning” of slaves is shown (though not to
the audience) in the _Ion_.[54] As for the third point, we have three
fragments which clearly recall the extant play—a few lines in which
Ægeus requests Medea to explain the oracle, a few more in which she
tells Jason how he shall die, and the celebrated passage which reads
like a shorter version of her great soliloquy when deciding to slay her
children. There is the same anguish, the same vacillation, the same
address to her “passion” (θυμός). Such a writer is plainly epoch-making:
he adds a new feature to tragedy in the life-time of Sophocles. The
realism of everyday life and the pangs of conscience battling with
temptation—these we are wont to call Euripidean. But some have denied
the very existence of Neophron as a dramatist: the fragments are
fourth-century forgeries, or Euripides brought out a first edition[55]
of his play under Neophron’s name. Against these views is the great
authority of Aristotle,[56] who, however, may have been deceived by
the name “Neophron” in official records. An argument natural to modern
students, that a poet of Euripides’ calibre would not have borrowed and
worked up another’s play, is of doubtful strength. Æschylus, as we have
seen, probably acted so towards Phrynichus. The best view is probably
that of antiquity. We may note that Sicyon is close to Corinth, and that
a legend domestic to the latter city might naturally find its first
treatment in a playwright of Sicyon.
ARISTARCHUS of Tegea, whose _début_ is to be dated about 453 B.C., is
said by Suidas to have lived for over a hundred years, to have written
seventy tragedies, two of which won the first prize, and one of which
was called _Asclepius_ (a thank-offering for the poet’s recovery from
an illness), and to have “initiated the present length of plays”.[57]
This latter point sounds important, but it is difficult to understand
precisely what Suidas means. For though the average Sophoclean or
Euripidean tragedy is longer than the Æschylean, Aristarchus began work
later than Sophocles and no earlier than Euripides. It has been thought
that Suidas refers to the length of dramas in post-Euripidean times, but
of these we have perhaps no examples.[58] Aristarchus’ reputation was
slight but enduring. Ennius two and a half centuries later translated
his _Achilles_ into Latin; the same work is quoted in the prologue of
Plautus’ _Pœnulus_. A phrase[59] from another play became proverbial.
A more distinguished but probably less important writer was ION of
Chios, son of Orthomenes, who lived between 484 and 421 B.C. A highly
accomplished man of ample means, he travelled rather widely. In Athens he
must have spent considerable time, for he was intimate with Cimon and his
circle, and produced plays the number of which is by one authority put at
forty. Besides tragedy and satyric drama, he wrote comedies, dithyrambs,
hymns, pæans, elegies, epigrams, and scolia. He was, moreover,
distinguished in prose writing: we hear of a book on the _Founding of
Chios_, of a philosophic work, and of certain memoirs.[60] This latter
work must be a real loss to us, if we may judge from its fragments. In
the fifth century B.C. no one but a facile Ionian would have thought it
worth while to record mere gossip even about the great; for us there is
great charm in an anecdote like that of the literary discussion between
Sophocles and the schoolmaster, or the exclamation of Æschylus at the
Isthmian Games.[61] Ion would seem to have been less a great poet than
a delightful _belletrist_; the quality is well shown in his remark[62]
that life, like a tragic tetralogy, should have a satyric element. One
year he obtained a sensational success by winning the first prize both
for tragedy and for a dithyramb; to commemorate this he presented to each
Athenian citizen a cask of Chian wine. He died before 421, the date of
Aristophanes’ _Peace_,[63] wherein he is spoken of as transformed into a
star, in allusion to a charming lyric passage of his:—
ἀώϊον ἀεροφοίταν
ἀστέρα μείναμεν ἀελίου λευκοπτέρυγα πρόδρομον.
“We awaited the star that wanders through the dawn-lit sky, pale-winged
courier of the sun.”
His tragedies,[64] though they do not appear to have had much effect
on the progress of technique or on public opinion, were popular.
Aristophanes, for instance, nearly twenty years after his death, quotes
a phrase from his _Sentinels_[65] as proverbial, and centuries later the
author of the treatise _On the Sublime_[66] wrote his celebrated verdict:
“In lyric poetry would you prefer to be Bacchylides rather than Pindar?
And in tragedy to be Ion of Chios rather than—Sophocles? It is true
that Bacchylides and Ion are faultless and entirely elegant writers of
the polished school, while Pindar and Sophocles, although at times they
burn everything before them as it were in their swift career, are often
extinguished unaccountably and fail most lamentably. But would anyone
in his senses regard all the compositions of Ion put together as an
equivalent for the single play of the Œdipus?”
ACHÆUS of Eretria was born in 484 B.C., and exhibited his first play
at Athens in 447. He won only one first prize though we hear that he
composed over forty plays, nearly half of which are known by name. That
he was second only to Æschylus in satyric drama was the opinion held by
that delightful philosopher Menedemus[67] the minor Socratic, the seat of
whose school was Eretria itself, Achæus’ birthplace.
It has been suggested that the apparent disproportion of satyric plays
written by Achæus is to be accounted for by his having written them for
other poets.[68] He is once copied by Euripides and parodied twice by
Aristophanes.[69] Athenæus makes an interesting comment on his style:
“Achæus of Eretria, though an elegant poet in the structure of his
plots, occasionally blackens his phrasing and produces many cryptic
expressions”.[70] The instance which he gives is significant:—
λιθάργυρος δ’
ὄλπη παρηωρεῖτο χρίσματος πλέα
τὸν Σπαρτιάτην γραπτὸν ἐν διπλῷ ξύλῳ
κύρβιν,
“the cruse of alloyed silver, filled with ointment, swung beside the
Spartan tablet, double wood inscribed”. That is, “he carried an oil-flask
and a Spartan general’s bâton”. Aiming at dignified originality of
diction Achæus has merely fallen into queerness. On the other side,
when he seeks vigorous realism he becomes quaintly prosaic. In the
_Philoctetes_, for instance, Agamemnon utters the war-cry ἐλελελεῦ in the
middle of an iambic line.
A far more noteworthy dramatist was AGATHON the Athenian, who seems to
have impressed his contemporaries, and even the exacting Aristotle, as
coming next in merit to the three masters. Born about 446 B.C., he won
his first victory in 416 and retired to the Court of the Macedonian
prince Archelaus some time before the death of Euripides (406). From
contemporary evidence we gather that he was popular as a writer and as a
social figure, handsome, and given to voluptuous living.
Three striking innovations are credited to him:—
(i) He produced at least one play of which both the plot and the
characters were invented by himself.[71] The name of this “attractive”
drama is uncertain: it may have been _The Flower_ (_Anthos_) or
_Antheus_. Agathon, here as elsewhere, shows himself a follower of
Euripides. The master had employed recognized myths as a framework for a
thoroughly “modern” treatment of ordinary human interests; his disciple
finally throws aside the convention of antiquity.
(ii) Another post-Euripidean feature is the use of musical interludes.
Aristotle tells us: “As for the later poets, their choral songs pertain
as little to the subject of the piece as to that of any other tragedy.
They are therefore sung as mere interludes—a practice first begun by
Agathon.”[72] Our poet then is once more found completing a process
which his friend had carried far. Sophocles had diminished the length
and dramatic importance of the lyrics, but with him they were still
entirely relevant. Euripides shows a strong tendency to write his odes as
separable songs, but complete irrelevance is hardly found. Plays such as
Agathon’s could obviously be performed, if necessary, without the trouble
and expense of a chorus, which in process of time altogether disappeared.
His interludes served, it seems, more as divisions between “acts” than
as an integral part of the play. In this connexion should be mentioned
his innovation in the accompaniment—the use of “chromatic” or coloured
style.[73] His florid music is laughed at by Aristophanes as “ants’
bye-paths”.[74]
(iii) Occasionally he took a great extent of legend as the topic of a
single drama, and it seems likely[75] that he composed a _Fall of Troy_,
taking the whole epic subject instead of an episode. Agathon is trying
yet another experiment—it was necessary for a writer of his powers to
vary in some way from Euripides, but this attempt was unsatisfactory.[76]
In the _Thesmophoriazusæ_ Aristophanes pays Agathon the honour of
elaborate parody. Euripides comes to beg his friend to plead for him
before an assembly of Athenian women, and the scene in which Agathon
amid much pomp explains the principles of his art, contains definite and
valuable criticism under the usual guise of burlesque; that Aristophanes
valued him is shown by the affectionate pun on his name which he
introduces into the _Frogs_ (v. 84):—
ἀγαθὸς ποιητὴς καὶ ποθεινὸς τοῖς φίλοις,
“a good poet, sorely missed by his friends”. Plato lays the scene of
his _Symposium_ in the house of Agathon, who is celebrating his first
tragic victory; the poet is depicted as a charming host, and, when the
conversation turns to a series of panegyrics upon the god of Love, offers
a contribution to which we shall return.
From these sources we learn as usual little about the poet’s dramatic
skill, much as to his literary style. But under the first head falls a
vital remark of Aristotle: “in his reversals of the action (_i.e._ the
_peripeteia_), however, he shows a marvellous skill in the effort to hit
the popular taste—to produce a tragic effect that satisfies the moral
sense. This effect is produced when the clever rogue, like Sisyphus, is
outwitted, or the brave villain defeated. Such an event is, moreover,
probable in Agathon’s sense of the word: ‘it is probable,’ he says,
‘that many things should happen contrary to probability’.”[77] Agathon
belongs to the class of playwrights who win popularity by bringing down
to the customary theatrical level the methods and ideas of a genius who
is himself too undiluted and strange for his contemporaries. Agathon’s
relation to Euripides resembles that of (let us say) Mr. St. John Hankin,
in his later work, to Ibsen. Of his literary style much the same may
be said. He loves to moralize on chance and probability and the queer
twists of human nature, with Euripides’ knack of neatness but without his
insight. Such things as
μόνου γὰρ αὐτοῦ καὶ θεὸς στερίσκεται,
ἀγένητα ποιεῖν ἅσσ’ ἂν ᾖ πεπραγμένα
“this alone is beyond the power even of God, to make undone that which
has been done,” and even the celebrated τέχνη τύχην ἔστερξε καὶ τύχη
τέχνην, “skill loves luck, and luck skill,” give the measure of his power
over epigram. His easy way of expressing simple ideas with admirable
neatness may remind us of a much greater dramatist—Terence, or, in later
times, of Marivaux.[78]
Plato tells us that he was a pupil both of Prodicus[79] and of
Gorgias,[80] the renowned sophists, and we may trace their teaching
in the fragments and in the remarkable speech which the greatest
stylist of all time puts into his mouth in the _Symposium_—the rhymes,
antitheses, quibbles, and verbal trickiness of argument. The parody,
both brilliant and careful, which Aristophanes presents at the opening
of his _Thesmophoriazusæ_ is directed chiefly perhaps against his music,
whereof we have no trace. The blunt auditor, Mnesilochus, describes
it as lascivious.[81] The words set to it read like a feeble copy of
Euripides—fluent, copious, nerveless, in spite of the “lathe,” the
“glue,” the “melting-pot,” and the “moulds”[82] over which his satirist
makes merry.
Agathon, then, marks unmistakably the beginning of decadence. The three
masters had exhausted the possibilities of the art open to that age.
A new impulse from without or the social emancipation of women might
have opened new paths of achievement. But no great external influence
was to come till Alexander, and then the result for Greece itself was
loss of independence and vigour. And the little that could be done with
women still in the harem or the slave-market was left to be performed by
Menander and his fellow-comedians.[83] Agathon made a valiant effort to
carry tragedy into new channels, but lacked the genius to leave more than
clever experiments.
On a lower plane of achievement stands CRITIAS, the famous leader of
the “Thirty Tyrants”. Two tragedies from his pen are known to us,
_Pirithous_[84] and _Sisyphus_, both at one time attributed to Euripides;
but he is too doctrinaire, too deficient in brilliant idiomatic ease, for
such a mistake to endure. The _Pirithous_ deals with Heracles’ descent
into Hades to rescue Theseus and to demand of Pluto Persephone’s hand
for Pirithous. Of this astounding story we find little trace in the
fragments, which are mostly quasi-philosophical dicta. For instance:—
A temper sound more stable is than law;
The one no politician’s eloquence
Can warp, but law by tricks of cunning words
Full often is corrupted and unhinged.
In strong contrast to these prosaic lines is Critias’ superb apostrophe
to the Creator, which may be paraphrased thus:—
From all time, O Lord, is thy being; neither is there any that
saith, This is my son.
All that is created, lo, thou hast woven the firmament about
it; the heavens revolve, and all that is therein spinneth like
a wheel.
Thou hast girded thyself with light; the gloom of dusk is about
thee, even as a garment of netted fire.
Stars without number dance around thee; they cease not, they
move in a measure through thy high places.
From the same hymn probably comes the majestic passage which tells of
“unwearied Time that in full flood ever begets himself, and the Great
Bear and the Less....”
In apparent contrast to this tone is the remarkable passage, of forty-two
lines, from the _Sisyphus_. It is a purely rationalistic account of
religion. First human life was utterly brutish: there were no rewards
for righteousness, no punishment of evil-doers. Then law was set up,
that justice might be sovereign; but this device only added furtiveness
to sin. Finally, “some man of shrewdness and wisdom ... introduced
religion” (or “the conception of God,” τὸ θεῖον), so that even in secret
the wicked might be restrained by fear. The contradiction between these
two plays is illusory: Critias combines with disbelief in the personal
Greek gods belief in an impersonal First Cause. It is too often forgotten
that among the “Thirty Tyrants” were men of strong religious principles.
The democratic writers of Athens loved to depict them as mercenary
butchers, but it is plain from the casual testimony of Lysias[85] that
they looked upon themselves as moral reformers. “They _said_ that it was
their business to purge the city of wicked men, and turn the rest of
the citizens to righteousness and self-restraint.” Such passages read
like quotations from men who would inaugurate a “rule of the saints,”
and if their severities surpassed those of the English Puritans, they
were themselves outdone by the cruelty which sternly moral leaders of
the French Revolution not only condoned but initiated. Critias was the
Athenian Robespierre. But the one revolution was the reverse of the
other. The _régime_ of the Thirty was a last violent effort of the
Athenian oligarchs to stem the tide of ochlocracy, to induce some
self-discipline into the freedom of Athens. They failed, and Critias was
justified on the field of Chæronea.
The most successful tragic playwright of the fourth century was
ASTYDAMAS, whose history furnishes good evidence that after the
disappearance of Euripides and Sophocles the Greek genius was incapable
of carrying tragedy into new developments. While prose could boast such
names as Plato and Demosthenes, the tragic art found no greater exponent
than this Astydamas, of whose numerous plays nothing is left save nine
odd lines. There were, moreover, two Astydamantes, father and son, whose
works (scarcely known save by name) it is difficult to distinguish. But
it seems that it was the son whose popularity was so great as to win him
fifteen first prizes and an honour before unknown. His _Parthenopæus_
won such applause in 340 B.C. that the Athenians set up a brazen statue
of the playwright in the theatre; it was not till ten years later that
the orator Lycurgus persuaded them to accord a like honour to the three
Masters. We learn from Aristotle[86] that Astydamas altered the story of
Alcmæon, causing him to slay his mother in ignorance; and Plutarch[87]
alludes to his _Hector_ as one of the greatest plays. He was nothing more
than a capable writer who caught the taste of his time, and probably owed
much of his popularity to the excellence of his actors.
Only one fact is known about POLYIDUS “the sophist,” but that is
sufficiently impressive. Aristotle twice[88] takes the Recognition-scene
in his _Iphigenia_ as an example, and in the second instance actually
compares the work of Polyidus with one of Euripides’ most wonderful
successes—the Recognition-scene in the _Iphigenia in Tauris_. It appears
that as Orestes was led away to slaughter he exclaimed: “Ah! So I was
fated, like my sister, to be sacrificed.” This catches the attention
of Iphigenia and saves his life. Polyidus here undoubtedly executed a
brilliant _coup de théâtre_.
During the fourth century many tragedians wrote not for public
performance but for readers. Of these ἀναγνωστικοί[89] the most
celebrated was CHÆREMON, of whom sufficient fragments and notices
survive to give a distinct literary portrait. Comic poets ridiculed his
preciosity: he called water “river’s body,” ivy “the year’s child,”
and loved word-play: πρὶν γὰρ φρονεῖν εὖ καταφρονεῖν ἐπίστασαι.[90]
But though a sophisticated attention to style led him into such frigid
mannerisms, he can express ideas with a brief Euripidean cogency: perhaps
nothing outside the work of the great masters was more often quoted in
antiquity than his dictum “Human life is luck, not discretion”—τύχη τὰ
θνητῶν πράγματ’, οὐκ εὐβουλία.
The only technical peculiarity attributed to him is the play _Centaur_,
if play it was. Athenæus calls it a “drama in many metres,”[91] while
Aristotle[92] uses the word “rhapsody,” implying epic quality. It may be
that the epic or narrative manner was used side by side with the dramatic
in the manner of Bunyan. Here is another proof that by the time of
Euripides tragedy had really attained its full development. Attempts at
new departures in technique are all abortive after his day.
A delightful point which emerges again and again is Chæremon’s passion
for flowers. From _Thyestes_ come two phrases—“the sheen of roses mingled
with silver lilies,” and “strewing around the children of flowering
spring”—which indicate, as do many others, Chæremon’s love of colour and
sensuous loveliness. It was his desire to express all the details of what
pleased his eye that led him into preciosity—a laboured embroidery which
recalls Keats’ less happy efforts. But he can go beyond mere mannerism. A
splendid fragment of his _Œneus_ shows Chæremon at his best: it describes
the half-nude beauty of girls sleeping in the moonlight. One can hardly
believe that Chæremon belonged to the fourth century and was studied by
Aristotle. In this passage, despite its voluptuous dilettantism, there
is a sense of physical beauty, above all of colour and sensuous detail,
which was unknown since Pindar, and is not to be found again, even in
Theocritus, till we come to the Greek novelists. In one marvellous
sentence, too, he passes beyond mere prettiness to poetry, expressing
with perfect mastery the truth that the sight of beauty is the surest
incentive to chastity: κἀξεπεσφραγίζετο ὥρας γελώσης χωρὶς ἐλπίδων ἔρως:—
Love, his passion quelled by awe,
Printed his smiling soul on all he saw.
It is the idea which Meredith has voiced so magically in _Love in the
Valley_:—
Love that so desires would fain keep her changeless,
Fain would fling the net, and fain have her free.
That Greek literature has progressed far towards the self-conscious
Alexandrian search for charm can nevertheless be observed if we
compare this passage from Chæremon with the analogous description
in Euripides’ _Bacchæ_[93] (which no doubt suggested it). There the
same general impression, and far more “atmosphere,” is given with no
voluptuous details: θαῦμ’ ἰδεῖν εὐκοσμίας—“a marvel of grace for the
eye to behold”—is his nearest approach to Chæremon’s elaboration. If,
as has been well said,[94] one may compare the three Masters to Giotto,
Raffaelle, and Correggio respectively, then Chæremon finds his parallel
among the French painters; he reminds one not so much of the handsome
sensuality of Boucher as of that more seductive _simplesse_ in which
Greuze excelled.
A curious figure in this history is DIONYSIUS the Elder, tyrant of
Syracuse from 405-367 B.C. Like Frederick the Great of Prussia, not
satisfied with political and military glory, he aspired to literary
triumphs. With a pathetic hero-worship he purchased and treasured the
desk of Æschylus, and similar objects which had belonged to Euripides,
hoping (says Lucian[95]) to gain inspiration from them. The prince
frequently tried his fortune at the dramatic contests in Athens, but for
long without success, and naturally became a butt of the Attic wits, who
particularly relished his moral aphorisms (such as “tyranny is the mother
of injustice”!); Eubulus devoted a whole comedy to his tragic _confrère_.
In 367 B.C. he heard with joy that at last the first prize had fallen to
him at the Lenæa for _Hector’s Ransom_; gossip said that his death in the
same year was due to the paroxysms of gratified vanity. Little is known
about the contents of his dramas, but we hear that one play was an attack
upon the philosopher Plato. In other works, too, he appears to have
discussed his personal interests. Lucian preserves the bald verse:—
Doris, Dionysius’ spouse, has passed away,
and the astonishing remark:—
Alas! alas! a useful wife I’ve lost.
But one may be misjudging him. Perhaps by “useful” (χρησίμην) he meant
“good” (χρηστήν); Dionysius had a curious fad for using words, not in
their accepted sense, but according to real or fancied etymology.[96]
Ancient critics set great store by CARCINUS, the most distinguished of a
family long connected with the theatre. One hundred and sixty plays are
attributed to him, and eleven victories. He spent some time at the court
of the younger Dionysius, the Syracusan tyrant, and his longest fragment
deals with the Sicilian worship of Demeter and Persephone. We possess
certain interesting facts about his plots. Aristotle[97] as an instance
of the first type of Recognition—that by signs—mentions among those which
are congenital “the stars introduced by Carcinus in his _Thyestes_”
(evidently birthmarks). More striking is a later paragraph:[98] “In
constructing the plot and working it out with the proper diction, the
poet should place the scene, as far as possible, before his eyes.... The
need of such a rule is shown by the fault found in Carcinus. Amphiaraus
was on his way from the temple. This fact escaped the observation of one
who did not see the situation. On the stage, however, the piece failed,
the audience being offended at the oversight.” This shows incidentally
how little assistance an ancient dramatist obtained from that now
vital collaborator, the rehearsal. In the _Medea_[99] of Carcinus the
heroine, unlike the Euripidean, did not slay her children but sent them
away. Their disappearance caused the Corinthians to accuse her of their
murder, and she defended herself by an ingenious piece of rhetorical
logic: “Suppose that I _had_ killed them. Then it would have been a
blunder not to slay their father Jason also. This you know I have not
done. Hence I have not murdered my children either.” Just as Carcinus
there smoothed away what was felt to be too dreadful in Euripides, so in
_Œdipus_ he appears[100] to have dealt with the improbabilities which
cling to _Œdipus Tyrannus_. He excelled, moreover, in the portrayal of
passion: Cercyon, struggling with horrified grief in Carcinus’ _Alope_,
is cited by Aristotle.[101] The _Ærope_ too had sensational success.
That bloodthirsty savage Alexander, tyrant of Pheræ, was so moved by the
emotion wherewith the actor Theodorus performed his part, that he burst
into tears.[102]
Two points in his actual fragments strike a modern reader. The first
is a curious flatness of style noticeable in the one fairly long
passage; every word seems to be a second-best. The opening lines will be
sufficient:—
λέγουσι Δήμητρός ποτ’ ἄρρητον κόρην
Πλούτωνα κρυφίοις ἁρπάσαι βουλεύμασι,
δῦναί τε γαίας εἰς μελαμφαεῖς μυχούς.
πόθῳ δὲ μητέρ’ ἠφανισμένης κόρης
μαστῆρ’ ἐπελθεῖν πᾶσαν ἐν κύκλῳ χθόνα.
To turn from this dingy verbiage to his amazing brilliance in epigram
is like passing from an auctioneer’s showroom into a lighthouse. (The
difference, we note, is between narrative and “rhetoric”.) Such a
sentence as οὐδεὶς ἔπαινον ἡδοναῖς ἐκτήσατο (“no man ever won praise by
his pleasures”) positively bewilders by its glitter. It is perhaps not
absolutely perfect: its miraculous ease might allow a careless reader to
pass it by; but that is a defect which Carcinus shares with most masters
of epigram, notably with Terence and Congreve. More substantial is the
wit of this fragment:—
χαίρω σ’ ὁρῶν φθονοῦντα, τοῦτ’ εἰδώς, ὅτι
ἓν δρᾷ μόνον δίκαιον ὧν ποιεῖ φθόνος·
λυπεῖ γὰρ αὐτόχρημα τοὺς κεκτημένους.
“I rejoice to see that you harbour spite, for I know that of all its
effects there is one that is just—it straightway stings those who cherish
it.” One notices the exquisite skill which has inserted the second line,
serving admirably to prepare for and throw into relief the vigorous third
verse.
THEODECTES of Phaselis enjoyed a brilliant career. During his forty-one
years he was a pupil of Plato, Isocrates, and Aristotle, obtained great
distinction as an orator (Cicero[103] praises him), produced fifty plays,
and obtained the first prize at eight of the thirteen contests in which
he competed. Alexander the Great decked his statue with garlands in
memory of the days when they had studied together under Aristotle. That
philosopher quotes him several times, and in particular pays Theodectes
the high honour of coupling him with Sophocles; the examples which he
gives[104] of _peripeteia_ are the _Œdipus Tyrannus_ and the _Lynceus_ of
Theodectes. The same drama is used[105] to exemplify another vital point,
the difference between Complication and _Dénouement_.
He was doubtless a brilliantly able man and a popular dramatist with
a notable talent for concocting plots. But all that we can now see in
his remains is a feeble copy of Euripides, though he was, to be sure,
audacious enough to place Philoctetes’ wound in the hand instead of
the foot—for the sake of gracefulness, one may imagine. For the rest,
we possess a curious speech made by some one ignorant of letters, who
describes[106] as a picture the name “Theseus”—this idea is taken bodily
from Euripides—and sundry sententious remarks, one of which surely
deserves immortality as reaching the limit of pompous common-place:—
Widely through Greece hath this tradition spread
O aged man, and ancient is the saw:
The hap of mortals is uncertain ever.
Mention should be made of DIOGENES and CRATES the philosophers, who wrote
plays not for production, but for the study, as propagandist pamphlets.
They may none the less have been excellent plays, like the _Justice_ of
Mr. Galsworthy. Very little remains on which an opinion can be founded.
One vigorous line of Diogenes catches the attention: “I would rather have
a drop of luck than a barrel of brains”.[107]
A more remarkable dramatist was MOSCHION, whose precise importance it
is hard to estimate, though he is deeply interesting to the historian
of tragedy. For on the one hand, he was probably not popular—nothing
is known of his life,[108] and Stobæus is practically the only writer
who quotes him. On the other hand, he is the one Greek poet known to
have practised definitely the historical type of drama. Moschion is of
course not alone in selecting actual events for his theme. Long before
his day Phrynichus had produced his _Phœnissæ_ and _The Capture of
Miletus_, Æschylus his _Persæ_; and his contemporary Theodectes composed
a tragedy _Mausolus_ in glorification of the deceased king of Caria.
But all four were _pièces d’occasion_. Moschion alone practised genuine
historical drama: he went according to custom into the past for his
material, but chose great events of real history, not legend.[109] His
_Themistocles_ dealt with the battle of Salamis; we possess one brief
remnant thereof, in which (as it seems) a messenger compares the victory
of the small Greek force to the devastation wrought by a small axe in a
great pine-forest. _The Men of Pheræ_ appears[110] to have depicted the
brutality of Alexander, prince of Pheræ, who refused burial to Polyphron.
These “burial-passages” include Moschion’s most remarkable fragment,
a fine description in thirty-three lines describing the rise of
civilization. The versification is undesirably smooth—throughout there
is not a single resolved foot. Like a circumspect rationalist, Moschion
offers three alternative reasons, favouring none, for the progress
made by man: some great teacher such as Prometheus, the Law of Nature
(ἀνάγκη), the long slow experience (τριβή) of the whole race. His style
here is vigorous but uneven; after dignified lines which somewhat recall
Æschylus we find a sudden drop to bald prose: ὁ δ’ ἀσθενὴς ἦν τῶν
ἀμεινόνων βορά:[111] “the weak were the food of the strong”.
It is convenient to mention here a remarkable satyric drama, produced
about 324 B.C., the _Agen_,[112] of which seventeen consecutive lines
survive. This play was produced during the Dionysiac festival in the camp
of Alexander on the banks of the Hydaspes or Jhelum, in the Punjaub. Its
subject was the escapades of Harpalus, who had revolted from Alexander
and fled to Athens. The author is said[113] to have been either Python
of Catana or Byzantium, or the Great Alexander himself. No doubt it was
an elaborate “squib” full of racy topical allusions. Were it not that
Athenæus calls it a “satyric playlet”[114] we might take the fragment
as part of a comedy. But about this time satyric drama tended to become
a form of personal attack—a dramatic “satire”. Thus one Mimnermus,
whose date is unknown, wrote a play against doctors[115]; Lycophron and
Sositheus, both members of the Alexandrian “Pleiad,” attacked individual
philosophers, the former writing a _Menedemus_ which satirized the
gluttony and drunkenness of the amiable founder of the Eretrian school,
the latter ridiculing the disciples whom the “folly of Cleanthes”
drove like cattle—an insult which the audience resented and damned the
play.[116]
The third century saw a great efflorescence of theatrical activity in
Alexandria. Under Ptolemy II (285-247 B.C.), that city became the centre
of world-culture as it already was of commerce. All artistic forms were
protected and rewarded with imperial liberality. The great library
became one of the wonders of the world, and the Dionysiac festivals
were performed with sedulous magnificence. Among the many writers of
tragedy seven were looked on as forming a class by themselves—the famous
Pleiad (“The Constellation of Seven”). Only five names of these are
certain—Philiscus, Homerus, Alexander, Lycophron, and Sositheus; for
the other two “chairs” various names are found in our authorities:
Sosiphanes, Dionysiades, Æantides, Euphronius. Nor can we be sure that
all these men worked at Alexandria.[117] That the splendour of the city
and Ptolemy’s magnificent patronage should have drawn the leading men of
art, letters, and science to the world’s centre, is a natural assumption
and indeed the fact: Theocritus the idyllist, Euclid the geometer,
Callimachus the poet and scholar, certainly lived there. Of the Pleiad,
only three are known to have worked in Alexandria: Lycophron, to whom
Ptolemy entrusted that section of the royal library which embraced
Comedy, Alexander, who superintended Tragedy, and Philiscus the priest
of Dionysus. Homerus may have passed all his career in Byzantium, which
later possessed a statue of him, and Sositheus was apparently active at
Athens.
LYCOPHRON’S _Menedemus_ has already been mentioned. His fame now rests
upon the extant poem _Alexandra_, in high repute both in ancient and in
modern times for its obscurity. But SOSITHEUS is the most interesting of
the galaxy. We may still read twenty-one lines from his satyric drama
_Daphnis_ or _Lityerses_, describing with grim vigour the ghoulish
harvester Lityerses who made his visitors reap with him, finally
beheading them and binding up the corpses in sheaves. Sositheus made his
mark, indeed, less in tragedy than in satyric writing: he turned from
the tendency of his day which made this genre a form of satire, and went
back to the antique manner. SOSIPHANES, finally, deserves mention for a
remarkable fragment:—
ὦ δυστυχεῖς μὲν πολλά, παῦρα δ’ ὄλβιοι
βροτοί, τί σεμνύνεσθε ταῖς ἐξουσίαις,
ἃς ἕν τ’ ἔδωκε φέγγος ἕν τ’ ἀφείλετο;
ἢν δ’ εὐτυχῆτε, μηδὲν ὄντες εὐθέως
ἴσ’ οὐρανῷ φρονεῖτε, τὸν δὲ κύριον
Αἵδην παρεστῶτ’ οὐχ ὁρᾶτε πλησίον.
“O mortal men, whose misery is so manifold, whose joys so few, why plume
yourselves on power which one day gives and one day destroys? If ye find
prosperity, straightway, though ye are naught, your pride rises high
as heaven, and ye see not your master death at your elbow”—a curiously
close parallel with the celebrated outburst in _Measure for Measure_. We
observe the Euripidean versification, though Sosiphanes “flourished” two
centuries[118] after the master’s birth, and though between the two, in
men like Moschion, Carcinus, and Chæremon, we find distinct flatness of
versification. The fourth-century poets, however second-rate, were still
working with originality of style: Sosiphanes belongs to an age which
has begun not so much to respect as to worship the great models. He sets
himself to copy Euripides, and his iambics are naturally “better” than
Moschion’s, as are those written by numerous able scholars of our own day.
After the era of the Pleiad, Greek tragedy for us to all intents and
purposes comes to an end. New dramas seem to have been produced down to
the time of Hadrian, who died in A.D. 138, and theatrical entertainments
were immensely popular throughout later antiquity, as vase-paintings
show, besides countless allusions in literature. But our fragments are
exceedingly meagre. One tragedy has been preserved by its subject—the
famous _Christus Patiens_ (Χριστὸς Πάσχων), which portrayed the Passion.
It is the longest and the worst of all Greek plays, and consists largely
of a repellent _cento_—snippets from Euripides pieced together and eked
out by bad iambics of the author’s own. The result is traditionally, but
wrongly, attributed to Gregory of Nazianzus (born probably in A.D. 330).
Its only value is that it is often useful in determining the text of
Euripides. It would be useless to enumerate all the poetasters of these
later centuries whose names are recorded.
* * * * *
In this chapter we have constantly referred to the _Poetic_ of Aristotle,
and it will be well at this point to summarize his view of the nature,
parts, and aim of tragedy. Before doing so, however, we must be clear
upon two points: the standpoint of his criticism and the value of his
evidence. It was long the habit to take this work as a kind of Bible of
poetical criticism, to accept with blind devotion any statements made
therein, or even alleged[119] to be made therein, as constituting rules
for all playwrights for ever. Now, as to the former point, the nature
of his criticism, it is simply to explain how good tragedies were as a
fact written. He takes the work of contemporary and earlier playwrights,
and in the light of this, together with his own strong common sense,
æsthetic sensibility, and private temperament, tells how he himself (for
example) would write a tragedy. On the one hand, could he have read
_Macbeth_ then, he would have condemned it; on the other, could he read
it now as a modern man, he would approve it. As to the second point, the
value of his evidence, we must distinguish carefully between the facts
which he reports and his comment thereon. The latter we should study with
the respect due to his vast merits; but he is not infallible. When, for
instance, he writes that “even a woman may be good, and also a slave;
though the woman may be said to be an inferior being, and the slave quite
worthless,”[120] and blames Euripides because “Iphigenia the suppliant
in no way resembles her later self,”[121] we shall regard him less as
helping us than as dating himself. But as to the objective facts which
he records he must be looked on as for us infallible.[122] He lived in
or close to the periods of which he writes; he commanded a vast array of
documents now lost to us; he was strongly desirous of ascertaining the
facts; his temperament and method were keenly scientific, his industry
prodigious. We may, and should, discuss his opinions; his facts we cannot
dispute. The reader will be able to appreciate for himself the statement
which follows.
Aristotle’s definition of tragedy runs thus: “Tragedy, then, is an
imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain
magnitude; in language embellished with each kind of artistic ornament,
the several kinds being found in separate parts of the play; in the form
of action, not of narrative; through pity and fear effecting the proper
purgation of these emotions”.[123] Adequate discussion of this celebrated
passage is here impossible; only two points can be made. Firstly, the
definition plainly applies to Greek Tragedy alone and as understood by
Aristotle: we observe the omission of what seems to us vital—the fact
that tragedy depicts the collision of opposing principles as conveyed by
the collision of personalities—and the insertion of Greek peculiarities
since, as he goes on to explain, by “language embellished” he means
language which includes song. Secondly, the famous dictum concerning
“purgation” (_catharsis_) is now generally understood as meaning, not
“purification” or “edification” of our pity and fear, but as a medical
metaphor signifying that these emotions are purged out of our spirit.
Further light on the nature of tragedy he gives by comparing it with
three other classes of literature. “Comedy aims at representing men as
worse, Tragedy as better than in actual life.”[124] In another place he
contrasts tragedy with history: “It is not the function of the poet to
relate what has happened, but what may happen—what is possible according
to the law of probability or necessity. The poet and the historian differ
not by writing in verse or in prose.... The true difference is that one
relates what has happened, the other what may happen. Poetry, therefore,
is a more philosophical and a higher thing than history: for poetry tends
to express the universal, history the particular.”[125] Our imperfect
text of the treatise ends with a more elaborate comparison between
Tragedy and Epic, wherein Aristotle combats the contemporary view[126]
that “epic poetry is addressed to a cultivated audience, who do not need
gesture; Tragedy to an inferior public. Being then unrefined, it is
evidently the lower of the two.” His own verdict is that, since tragedy
has all the epic elements, adds to these music and scenic effects, shows
vividness in reading as well as in representation, attains its end within
narrower limits, and shows greater unity of effect, it is the higher
art.[127]
In various portions of the _Poetic_ he gives us the features of Tragedy,
following three independent lines of analysis:—
§ I. On the æsthetic line he discusses the _elements_ of a tragedy: plot,
character, thought, diction, scenery, and song. Of the last three he has
little to say. But on one of them he makes an interesting remark. “Third
in order is Thought—that is, the faculty of saying what is possible
and pertinent in given circumstances.... The older poets made their
characters speak the language of civic life; the poets of our time, the
language of the rhetoricians.”[128] This prophesies from afar of Seneca
and his like. As for character, it must be good, appropriate, true to
life, and consistent.
Concerning Plot, which he rightly calls “the soul of a tragedy,”[129]
Aristotle is of course far more copious. The salient points alone can be
set down here:—
(_a_) “The proper magnitude is comprised within such limits, that the
sequence of events, according to the law of probability or necessity,
will admit of a change from bad fortune to good, or from good fortune to
bad.”[130]
(_b_) “The plot ... must imitate one action and that a whole, the
structural union of the parts being such that if anyone of them is
displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed.”[131]
A tragedy must be an organism. It therefore follows that “of all plots
and actions the episodic are the worst ... in which the episodes or acts
succeed one another without probable or necessary sequence”.[132] He is
recommending the “Unity of Action”.
(_c_) “Plots are either Simple or Complex.... An action ... I call
Simple, when the change of fortune takes place without Reversal (or
Recoil) of the Action and without Recognition. A Complex Action is one
in which the change is accompanied by such Reversal, or by Recognition,
or by both.”[133] Reversal we shall meet again. By Recognition Aristotle
means not merely such Recognition-scenes as we find in the crisis of
the _Iphigenia in Tauris_ (though such are the best) but “a change from
ignorance to knowledge, producing love or hate between the persons
destined by the poet for good or bad fortune”.[134]
(_d_) “Two parts, then, of the plot—Reversal and Recognition—turn upon
surprises. A third part is the Tragic Incident. The Tragic Incident is a
distinctive or painful action, such as death on the stage, bodily agony,
wounds, and the like.”[135] In the words “death on the stage”—or “before
the audience” (the phrase[136] has no bearing on the stage-controversy),
Aristotle casually but completely overthrows another critical convention,
that in ancient Tragedy deaths take place only “behind the scenes”. In
the extant plays, not only do Alcestis and Hippolytus “die on the stage”
in their litters, but Ajax falls upon his sword.
(_e_) The best subject of Tragedy is the change from good fortune to
bad in the life of some eminent man not conspicuously good and just,
whose misfortune, however, is due not to wickedness but to some error or
weakness.[137]
(_f_) The poet “may not indeed destroy the framework of the received
legends—the fact, for instance, that Clytæmnestra was slain by Orestes
and Eriphyle by Alcmæon—but he ought to show invention of his own, and
skilfully handle the traditional material”.[138] This injunction was
obeyed beforehand by all the three Athenian masters; it is especially
important to remember it when studying Euripides.
(_g_) “The unravelling of the plot ... must arise out of the plot
itself; it must not be brought about by the _Deus ex Machina_, as in
the Medea.... The _Deus ex Machina_ should be employed only for events
external to the drama—for antecedent or subsequent events, which lie
beyond the range of human knowledge.”[139] This vital criticism will be
considered later, when we discuss the _Philoctetes_[140] of Sophocles and
the Euripidean drama.[141]
(_h_) “Within the action there must be nothing irrational. If the
irrational cannot be excluded, it should be outside the scope of the
tragedy. Such is the irrational element in the Œdipus of Sophocles.”[142]
Aristotle means certain strange _data_ in the _Œdipus Tyrannus_—the fact
that neither Œdipus nor Jocasta has learnt earlier about the past, and so
forth.
§ II. On the purely literary line he tells us the parts:—[143]
(_a_) “The Prologos is that entire part of a tragedy which precedes the
Parodos of the chorus” (see below for the Parodos). Thus a drama may have
no “prologos” at all, for example the _Persæ_. The implications of our
word “prologue” are derived from the practice of Euripides, who is fond
of giving in his “prologos” an account of events which have led up to the
action about to be displayed.
(_b_) “The Episode is that entire part of a tragedy which is between
complete choric songs.” “Episodes” then are what we call “acts”: the name
has already been explained.[144]
(_c_) “The Exodos is that entire part of a tragedy which has no choric
song after it.” The few anapæsts which close most tragedies are not
“choric songs”—they were performed in recitative. Thus the Exodos is
simply the last act.
(_d_) “Of the choric part the Parodos is the first undivided utterance of
the chorus: the Stasimon is a choric ode without anapæsts or trochees:
the Commos is a joint lamentation of chorus and actors.” It will be seen
later[145] that by excluding trochees he probably means the trochaic
tetrameter as seen in dialogue; lyric trochees are very common.
§ III. On the strictly dramatic line he tells us the _stages of
structural development_.
(_a_) “Every tragedy falls into two parts—Complication and Unravelling
(or _Dénouement_).... By the Complication I mean all that comes between
the beginning of the action and the part which marks the turning-point
to good or bad fortune. The Unravelling is that which comes between the
beginning of the change and the end.”[146]
(_b_) “Reversal (or Recoil, Peripeteia) is a change by which a train of
action produces the opposite of the effect intended, subject always to
our rule of probability or necessity. Thus in the Œdipus, the messenger
comes to cheer Œdipus and free him from his alarms about his mother, but,
by revealing who he is, he produces the opposite effect.”[147]
Much might be written on this analysis of dramatic structure. One remark
at least must be made. It is not plain how much importance Aristotle
allots to the Recoil or Peripeteia. We have seen that he did not regard
it as indispensable. At the most he seems to think it a striking way
of starting the _dénouement_. It is better to look upon it, and the
action which leads up to it, as a separate part of the drama—and it may
be argued that every tragedy, if not every comedy, has a Peripeteia—to
form, in fact, that middle stage which elsewhere[148] in the _Poetic_ he
mentions as necessary.