TH 2423 Introduction to Theater
David Lipscomb University
Dr. Larry A. Brown
3
TYPES OF DRAMA
TRAGEDY
Tragedy was the earliest form of drama created by
the ancient Greeks during the sixth century BC. The word tragedy literally
means "goat song," probably referring to the practice of giving a
goat as a sacrifice or a prize at the religious festivals in honor of the god
Dionysos, whose mythical companions were satyrs (half-man, half-goat). Soon
tragedy came to signify a dramatic presentation of high seriousness and noble
character which examines the major questions of human existence: why are we
here? what is the supreme good? how can we know the will of the gods? why must
we die? In tragedy people are tested by great suffering and must face decisions
of ultimate consequence. Some meet the challenge with deeds of despicable
cruelty, while others demonstrate their ability to confront and surpass
adversity, winning our admiration and proving the greatness of human potential.
Aristotle first defined tragedy in his Poetics
around 330 BC, and all subsequent discussions of tragic form have been
influenced by his concepts. In contrast to the Aristotelian tradition, many
critics since the Romantic period have preferred to define tragedy in terms of
its unique perspective or vision of the world. Both aspects of form and vision
must be considered in a comprehensive description of tragedy.
Tragic Form
We begin with Aristotle's definition:
"Tragedy, then, is an imitation of a noble and complete action, having the
proper magnitude; it employs language that has been artistically enhanced . . .
; it is presented in dramatic, not narrative form, and achieves, through the
representation of pitiable and fearful incidents, the catharsis of such
incidents" (Golden 11). A few of these terms need clarification.
"Noble" does not mean that the characters are necessarily of high
moral standing or that they must always be kings, heroes, or gods: the title
character of Euripides' Medea is a
wicked sorceress who kills her own children. According to Hardison, the term
could be translated as larger than life, majestic, or serious (84).
"Magnitude" refers not to the greatness of the subject matter, as
some have suggested, but to the appropriate length of a production. Earlier in
the Poetics, Aristotle contrasts the shorter
action of a play with that of an epic poem such as the Iliad. Dramatic action naturally is limited to what can be
presented within two or three hours. "Enhanced language" refers to
the fact that all plays at that time were written in poetic verse rather than
the language of everyday speech. As Steiner explains, "There is nothing
democratic in the vision of tragedy. The royal and heroic characters whom the
gods honor with their vengeance are set higher than we are in the chain of
being, and their style of utterance must reflect this elevation" (241).
Endless debates have centered on the term catharsis which Aristotle unfortunately
does not define. Some critics interpret catharsis as the purging or cleansing
of pity and fear from the spectators as they observe the action on stage; in
this way tragedy relieves them of harmful emotions, leaving them better people
for their experience. According to this interpretation, Aristotle may have been
offering an alternative to Plato's charge that the dramatic poets were
dangerous to society because they incited the passions. However, it is
uncharacteristic of Aristotle to define tragedy in terms of audience
psychology; throughout the Poetics he
focuses on dramatic structure, not its effects. Therefore, commentators such as
Else and Hardison prefer to think of catharsis not as the effect of tragedy on
the spectator but as the resolution of dramatic tension within the plot. The
dramatist depicts incidents which arouse pity and fear for the protagonist,
then during the course of the action, he resolves the major conflicts, bringing
the plot to a logical and foreseeable conclusion. This explanation of catharsis
helps to explain how an audience experiences satisfaction even from an unhappy
ending: human nature may cause us to hope that things work out for Romeo and
Juliet, but, because of the insurmountable obstacles in the situation and the
ironies of fate, we come to expect the worst for these star-crossed lovers, and
would feel cheated if Juliet awoke at the last minute to provide a happy but
contrived conclusion. In tragedy things may not turn out as we wish, but we
recognize the probable or necessary relation between the hero's actions and the
results of those actions, and appreciate the playwright's honest depiction of
life's harsher realities.
Notice that Aristotle's definition does not include
an unfortunate or fatal conclusion as a necessary component of tragedy. Usually
we think of tragedy resulting in the death of the hero along with perhaps many
others. While this is true of most tragedies (especially Shakespeare), there
are some examples which conclude otherwise. Aristotle acknowledges that several
Greek tragedies end happily. In Aeschylus' trilogy the Oresteia, Orestes must avenge the death of his father by killing
his murderer, who happens to be Orestes' mother. The conflict is successfully
resolved when Athena appoints a court of law to uphold justice in such cases,
and Orestes is acquitted of any guilt. In Oedipus
the King the hero inflicts his own punishment by blinding himself, but he
goes into exile instead of dying. Sophocles wrote a sequel to this play called Oedipus at Colonus in which the hero
finds a peaceful death after years of suffering to atone for his misdeeds, but
his demise is seen as a happy ending to an unhappy life. In tragedy people must
make difficult choices and face serious consequences, but they do not always
meet with death.
The Tragic Hero
Aristotle distinguishes between tragedy which
depicts people of high or noble character, and comedy which imitates those of
low or base character. Renaissance critics read this passage to mean tragic
characters must always be kings or princes, while comedy is peopled with the
working or servant classes, but Aristotle was not talking about social or
political distinctions. For him character is determined not by birth but by
moral choice. A noble person is one who chooses to act nobly. Tragic characters
are those who take life seriously and seek worthwhile goals, while comic
characters are "good-for-nothings" who waste their lives in trivial
pursuits (Else 77). While it may be true that, as Arthur Miller argued, the
common man is a potential subject for tragedy (in the sense that one need not
be a king or a demigod to act nobly), the one thing a tragic protagonist cannot
be is common. Ordinary humanity belongs on the sidelines in tragedy,
represented by the Greek chorus. The tragic protagonist is always larger than
life, a person of action whose decisions determine the fate of others and seem
to shake the world itself.
The hero of tragedy is not perfect, however. To
witness a completely virtuous person fall from fortune to disaster would
provoke moral outrage at such an injustice. Likewise, the downfall of a
villainous person is seen as appropriate punishment and does not arouse pity or
fear. The best type of tragic hero, according to Aristotle, exists
"between these extremes . . . a person who is neither perfect in virtue
and justice, nor one who falls into misfortune through vice and depravity, but
rather, one who succumbs through some miscalculation." The Greek word hamartia,
which Golden translates as "miscalculation," literally means
"missing the mark," and in the New Testament it is translated as
"sin." Some critics have taken hamartia
to mean that the hero must have a "tragic flaw," a moral weakness in
character which inevitably leads to disaster. This interpretation comes from a
long tradition of dramatic criticism which seeks to place blame for disaster on
someone or something: "Bad things don't just happen to good people, so it
must be someone's fault." This was the "comforting" response
Job's friends gave him to explain his suffering: "God is punishing you for
your wrongdoing." For centuries tragedies were held up as moral
illustrations of the consequences of sin.
While the concept of moral flaw may apply to
certain tragic figures, it seems inappropriate for many others. There is a
definite causal connection between Macbeth's ambition to usurp the throne and
his eventual bloody fate, but can Antigone's desire to see her brother decently
buried be called a flaw in her character which leads to her death? Likewise,
does Cordelia's unwillingness to flatter her father mean that she deserves to
hang, or isn't she, like Lear, "more sinned against than sinning"?
Searching for the tragic flaw in a character often oversimplifies the complex
issues of tragedy.
For example, looking for the flaw in Oedipus'
character, a critic might point to his stubborn pride and conclude that this
trait leads directly to his downfall. However, several crucial events in the
plot are not motivated by pride at all: (1) Oedipus leaves Corinth to protect
the two people he believes to be his parents; (2) his choice of Thebes as a
destination is merely coincidental; (3) his defeat of the Sphinx demonstrates
wisdom rather than blind stubbornness. True, he kills Laius on the road,
refusing to give way on a narrow pass, but the fact that this happens to be his
father cannot be attributed to a flaw in his character. (A modern reader might
criticize him for killing anyone, but the play never indicts Oedipus for mere
murder.) Furthermore, these actions occur prior to the action of the play
itself. The central plot concerns Oedipus' desire as a responsible ruler to rid
his city of the gods' curse and his unyielding search for the truth, actions
which deserve our admiration rather than contempt as a moral flaw. Oedipus
falls because of a complex set of factors, not from any single character trait.
What Aristotle meant by hamartia might better be translated as "tragic error."
Caught in a crisis situation, the protagonist makes an error in judgment or
action, "missing the mark," and disaster results. The mistake may be
an immoral choice, such as Macbeth's decision to murder the king, or it may
occur unconsciously through ignorance or misinformation, such as in the case of
Oedipus. Gerald Else sees a close connection between the concepts of hamartia, recognition, and catharsis.
For Aristotle the most tragic situation possible was the unwitting murder of
one family member by another. Mistaken identity allows Oedipus to kill his
father Laius on the road to Thebes and subsequently to marry Jocasta, his
mother; only later does he recognize his tragic error. However, because he
commits the crime in ignorance and pays for it with remorse, self-mutilation,
and exile, the plot reaches resolution or catharsis, and we pity him as a
victim of ironic fate instead of accusing him of blood guilt.
While Aristotle's concept of tragic error fits the model
example of Oedipus quite well, there
are several tragedies in which the protagonists suffer due to circumstances
totally beyond their control. In the Oresteia
trilogy, Aeschylus does not present Orestes as a man whose nature destines him
to commit matricide, but as an unfortunate, innocent son thrown into a terrible
dilemma not of his making. In The Trojan
Women by Euripides, the title characters are helpless victims of the
conquering Greeks; ironically, Helen, the only one who deserves blame for the war,
escapes punishment by seducing her former husband Menelaus. Heracles, in
Euripides' version of the story, goes insane and slaughters his wife and
children, not for anything he has done but because Hera, queen of the gods,
wishes to punish him for being the illegitimate son of Zeus and a mortal woman.
Hamartia plays no part in these
tragedies. Given these examples, we should remember that Aristotle's theory of
tragedy, while an important place to begin, should not be used to prescribe one
definitive form which applies to all tragedies past and present.
Tragic Vision
For centuries the Poetics offered the only definition of tragedy available to
playwrights and dramatic critics. Aristotle's ideas concerning dramatic
structure established the terms of the debate and were never seriously
challenged. Based on his unquestioned authority, critics who discussed tragedy
assumed his categories to be valid for all time. A closer look, however,
reveals that Aristotle's formal definition excludes many plays which are
commonly thought of as tragedies. Not all tragic heroes suffer because of a
tragic error, nor does recognition always occur within the tragic plot.
Numerous types of drama have developed over the centuries which Aristotle never
envisioned.
Other renowned thinkers besides Aristotle have
offered alternative definitions of tragedy. The 19th century philosopher Hegel
described the tragic situation as the collision of mutually exclusive but
equally legitimate causes: both Antigone and Creon stand for principles--loyalty
to family and obedience to the state--which are morally justifiable if taken by
themselves, but when these ethical positions conflict, tragedy results for both
sides. Friedrich Nietzsche found the origins of tragedy symbolically
represented in the confrontation of Apollo and Dionysus, the Greek gods of
order, restraint, and form on the one hand and impulse, instinct, and ecstatic
frenzy on the other. By capturing the dynamic energy of life in a rational
form, tragedy coaxes order out of chaos to create art.
Both Hegel's and Nietzsche's views are helpful in
describing aspects of tragedy not addressed by Aristotle. Using terms suggested
by Robert Heilman, the tragic hero is sometimes caught between "two
imperatives, different injunctions, each with its own validity but apparently
irreconcilable." To avenge their fathers' deaths, both Orestes and Hamlet
must in turn murder another relative, placing them in a moral dilemma with no
guiltless options. In other situations, the tragic hero is divided "between
imperative and impulse, between moral ordinance and unruly passion . . .
between law and lust" (Heilman 207). Dr. Faustus rejects the limits of
science and the constraints of theology (just imperatives) to seek diabolic
knowledge and power (evil impulse), whereas the Duchess of Malfi disobeys her
brothers' command (unjust imperative) to marry a person of lower status
(innocent impulse). These two positions do not, however, exhaust all possible
tragic situations. Heilman incorrectly assigns plays whose protagonists are
innocent victims of disaster, undivided by moral dilemmas, to the category of
melodrama, but any definition of tragedy which excludes classics such as Heracles and The Trojan Women is far too narrow and restrictive.
Rather than starting from an abstract formula, we
must arrive at a comprehensive definition of tragedy from a thorough
examination of the literary works themselves in order to see what qualities
they have in common. Taking this approach, we discover a distinction between "tragedy,"
a developing and changing literary genre, and "the tragic," a
particular way of perceiving the human condition. Throughout history various
authors have shared a similar perspective of the world, asking the same
questions although coming to different conclusions. Shakespeare expressed his
view of life in a vastly different form of drama from Sophocles, but each
depicted characters struggling within the limitations of their mortality to
find meaning and purpose to human activity. Other writers have attempted to
copy the formula for tragedy, but without this tragic perspective their works
remain feeble imitations which fail to capture the majestic vision of humanity.
Contemporary critics suggest a cluster of
overlapping perspectives which collectively describe the tragic vision: we will
look at four.
First, tragedy begins by asking the ultimate
questions: why are we here? Does life have meaning or purpose? More to the
point, can life have meaning in the
face of so much suffering and evil in the world? Does death negate the
significance of the protagonist's life and the goals he/she was seeking?
Philosophers and theologians through the ages have debated the question of the
origin of suffering, but tragedy offers no singular solution. Some people suffer
because of their own actions: miscalculations which turn out to be fatal
(Lear's abdication of the throne), mistakes based on ignorance (Oedipus) or
deceit (Othello's misguided trust in Iago), or evil deeds which return to haunt
the doer (Macbeth, Dr. Faustus). Some fall victim to the malevolent will of
others (the women of Troy) or are caught in a moral dilemma not of their making
(Orestes, Hamlet). At times the tragic hero appears to suffer simply because he
or she lives in a cruel and unjust universe where the gods are unkind,
unfeeling, or nonexistent.
Whereas the causes of suffering are diverse, the
purpose of suffering in tragedy appears almost universally acknowledged: only
through suffering does a person attain wisdom. The chorus in Agamemnon by Aeschylus recites:
"Zeus, whose will has marked for man the sole way where wisdom lies,
ordered one eternal plan: Man must suffer to be wise." In Antigone, the chorus counsels Creon that
suffering is wisdom's schoolteacher. According to Francis Fergusson (adapting
an idea from Kenneth Burke), these plays follow a tragic pattern of purpose, passion, and perception:
the protagonist, seeking a goal, confronts opposition and suffers a trial by
fire, but through this painful process gains insight about himself and the
world he inhabits. From the tragic perspective, wisdom based on truth is of
supreme value, even though it must often be purchased with the hero's death.
Second, tragedy pushes the individual to the outer
limits of existence where one must live or die by one's convictions. Facing the
end of life, a person quickly recognizes life's ultimate values. All the
trivial matters which occupy our daily routine suddenly vanish. At this
decisive point there is no turning back and no room for compromise. Ibsen's Brand
lives by the motto, "All or Nothing!" This stern Norwegian minister
gives up everything--home, family, parish--in his quest for perfect obedience
to a harsh, merciless God. He finally reaches his goal, the Ice Church high in
the mountains, symbol of perfection, only to be buried alive by an avalanche of
snow. Aristotle saw the extremism of the tragic hero as a failure to find the
moderate way, leading to his downfall. In contrast, Nietzsche felt that this
extremism was the sole justification for the hero's existence, as one who possesses the courage to live
dangerously, to risk all in order to gain all. Testing the boundaries of his
finite nature, tragic man seeks to surpass his limitations and reach the unattainable.
The energy which propels him towards his goal is often so intense that it
eventually consumes him as well. We admire the daring, uncompromising spirit of
the tragic hero while recognizing that what he gains in intensity of life, he
often pays for with its brevity.
Third, tragedy depicts men and women who,
dissatisfied with the hand destiny has dealt them, challenge the rules of the
game. Sometimes they win, sometimes they lose, but always they demonstrate the
power of free will to stand against fate or the gods. Contrary to popular belief,
tragedy does not depict man as a helpless puppet dancing to the strings of
destiny. As we have seen in the case of Orestes, the end of tragedy is not
always defeat. The tragic vision does not assume man's ultimate downfall.
Instead, it explores possible ways in which free will exerts itself in the
world. For this reason Walter Kerr defines tragedy as "an investigation into the possibilities of
human freedom" (121). Human beings are creatures set loose in the
universe with the power to change it irrevocably. The will decides and then
acts on its decision, carving out its own destiny. Even when the gods appears
to have a hand in the hero's destruction, he remains his own master: despite
the tricks of fate, Oedipus never denies his responsibility in sinning against
his parents. Confronting insurmountable odds, the protagonist's determination
to act rather than submit often leads to disastrous results, but at the same
time it tests the basic substance of humanity, proving its worth.
Fourth, this tremendous strength of will to scale
the heights and accomplish the impossible sets the hero apart from ordinary
humanity, but at the same time it inspires us with a vision of human potential.
Thus, tragedy, far from being a pessimistic view of life, is ultimately optimistic
about the value of human achievement and the unconquerable strength of the
human spirit. Sophocles has the chorus of Antigone
sing, "Numberless are the world's wonders, but none more wonderful than
man." Hamlet remarks, "What a piece of work is a man! How noble in
reason, how infinite in faculty, in form and moving how express and admirable,
in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god!" Both these
sentiments echo the words of David in Psalm 8: "What is man that you are mindful
of him? . . . You have made him a little lower than divinity and crowned him
with glory and honor. You made him ruler over the works of your hands, and put
everything under his feet." The tragic vision encompasses the paradox of
human freedom, admitting the possibility of great goodness and great evil. As
Eric Bentley states, "Tragedy cannot entail extreme optimism, for that
would be to underestimate the problem; it cannot entail extreme pessimism for
that would be to lose faith in man" (33). In like fashion, the American
playwright Maxwell Anderson called theater "a religious institution
dedicated to the exaltation of the spirit of man" (32), and said,
"The theme of tragedy has always been victory in defeat, a man's conquest
of himself in the face of annihilation. . . . The message of tragedy is that
men are better than they think they are--this message needs to be said over and
over lest the race lose faith in itself entirely" (51).
This affirmation of human worth and potential, an
essential element of the tragic vision, points to one reason why the modern age
has produced so few authentic tragedies. During the last 300 years humanity's
self-esteem has been dealt several devastating blows. Copernicus removed the earth from the center of God's universe,
Darwin stripped man of his divine origin, and Freud left him the victim of his
subconscious desires. Given these premises, modern philosophy has little ground
on which to build a noble portrait of man to replace Michelangelo's fallen
David. Krutch remarks, "Tragic writers believed easily in greatness just
as we believe easily in meanness. To Shakespeare, robes and crowns and jewels
are the garments most appropriate to man because they are the fitting outward
manifestation of his inward majesty, but to us they seem absurd because the man
who bears them has, in our estimation, so pitifully shrunk. We do not write
about kings because we do not believe that any man is worthy to be one"
(233).
In The Death
of Tragedy, George Steiner argues that the triumph of rationalism and a
secular worldview has removed the metaphysical grounds for tragedy in the
modern world. The ancients saw themselves as a small but significant part of a
much larger Reality. "In Greek tragedy as in Shakespeare, mortal actions
are encompassed by forces which transcend man. The reality of Orestes entails
that of the Furies; the Weird Sisters wait for the soul of Macbeth. We cannot
conceive of Oedipus without a Sphinx, nor of Hamlet without a Ghost."
Depicting life as a great mystery beyond human understanding, these tragedies
"instruct us how little of the world belongs to man" (193-4). Modern
man will have no such overlords, and with his sciences and skeptical reason he
has conquered his superstitious belief in the unseen realm. It is ironic,
however, that by banishing divinity from the universe, humanity has diminished
rather than increased in significance.
While correct in his analysis of this crucial
point, Steiner is mistaken in his assertion that Christian hope in redemption
and the afterlife was another reason for the genre's demise: "where there
is compensation, there is justice, not tragedy" (4). This view fails to
acknowledge that Christianity's high view of man (biblically defined as a being
made in God's image) provides, when coupled with the Christian doctrine of sin,
the metaphysical grounds on which tragedy can exist. As was previously stated,
both the Christian worldview and the tragic perspective focus on the paradox of
human freedom, admitting the possibility of great goodness and great evil. In Paradise Lost John Milton portrays Adam
as the archetypal tragic hero, "sufficient to have stood, though free to
fall." Adam's predicament is the human predicament: he has enough freedom
to recognize that he is not totally free, but with what freedom he has, he
rebels against his finitude, desiring to be like God. As Reinhold Niebuhr says,
"Man is mortal; that is his fate. Man pretends not to be mortal; that is
his sin" (28). The Greeks acknowledged a similar tendency in man and shuddered
at the tragic hero's hubris (pride),
knowing that the gods' wrath would follow. Both Christian and Greek thought
agree, however, that man's dignity and value are ultimately affirmed by the
fact that his behavior attracts the attention of heaven.
Within the history of Western culture, tragedy has
been a rare phenomenon. Most serious dramas never reach the heights of tragedy;
few pretend even to make the attempt. The vast majority of plays and films
which treat serious subjects fall into another dramatic genre called melodrama.
Tragedy and melodrama may appear to depict similar stories – protagonists faced
with disaster struggling against evil forces or immeasurable odds – but the
difference lies in both the treatment of the subject matter and the purpose
behind its portrayal.
In melodrama continuous action drives the plot
through a series of adventures. Melodrama thrives on thrills, excitement,
suspense, close calls, and last-minute rescues, the more sensational the
better. Music frequently accompanies the action, creating atmosphere and
building tension; in fact, the term melodrama literally means drama with music.
Action-adventure films which depend on exotic locations and expensive special
effects are typical examples of melodrama, along with spy thrillers, westerns,
science fiction, horror, crime and murder mysteries.
All these forms focus on external conflict, in
contrast to tragedy where the primary conflict is internal. Here lies the
crucial difference between the two approaches. Tragedy sees human beings as
complex entities capable of both good and evil, thus the principle struggle
exists within the protagonist himself. Melodrama depicts a much simpler world
where everything is clearly delineated as black or white. Like Superman, the
hero stands for truth, justice, and the American way, whereas the villain is
evil incarnate, down to the core of his dark and twisted soul. Because their
motivations are readily identifiable, melodramatic characters have little
psychological depth and act in
predictable fashion.
Melodrama is essentially a form of
wish-fulfillment, presenting the world as we would like it to be. Thus, despite
the dire circumstances which threaten to defeat the hero, we can be confident
that all will end happily, with good triumphant and evil punished, a form of
resolution called poetic justice.
Melodrama appears to deal with serious subjects, but its seriousness is only
pretense, a part of the game. While tragedy explores ultimate questions of
life, melodrama exists primarily to entertain. It offers escape from everyday,
humdrum existence into a world of adventure with the guarantee that we will
return safely at the end.
Heroic and Domestic
Drama
Between the solemnity of tragedy and the pretense
of melodrama are two categories of serious drama distinguished by the type of
people each depicts. Heroic drama
falls primarily into two groups: historical dramas about famous people who
shaped the age in which they lived (Henry VIII), and romantic dramas about
swashbuckling adventurers set in past and distant places (The Three
Musketeers or The Count of Monte Cristo). In contrast to tragedy,
heroic drama does not look so deeply into the philosophical questions of evil, free
will, and man's relation to the supernatural. In contrast to melodrama, these
plays do not always abide by the rule of poetic justice (that is, the hero
sometimes dies), and they resist portraying human nature so simplistically.
Whereas the characters in heroic drama may appear
larger than life due to their extraordinary achievements, domestic drama
concerns people much like ourselves, taken from the lower and middle classes of
society, who struggle with everyday problems such as poverty, sickness, crime,
and family strife. The advent of representationalism with its goal of
reproducing "real life" on stage has made domestic drama the
predominant form of serious drama in the 20th century.
The term
"domestic" is inadequate, however, implying an exclusive interest in
matters of home and family. Other dramas of this type encompass a wider scope,
addressing current social issues such as political corruption, civil rights,
and economic injustice. Although different in style, both the problem plays of
Ibsen and the epic theater of Brecht (discussed in part 1 of the notes) are
examples of this kind of drama.
COMEDY
According to Horace Walpole, "Life is a comedy
to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel." This statement suggests
that our view of life depends on our relationship to the events observed. If we
identify closely with the plight of the characters, we put ourselves in their
place and vicariously share in their sufferings. If, however, we are
emotionally removed from the situation and experience their calamities at a
psychological distance, we may laugh at circumstances that otherwise would be
seen as tragic. For instance, violence in comedy may provoke laughter, for
people rarely suffer permanent damage from blows to the head, falling down stairs,
crashing automobiles, or explosions. How many times has Wile E. Coyote
plummeted to his doom at the bottom of a ravine only to pursue the Roadrunner
the next day? In comedy a character's problems may seem serious to him but not
to the audience; comedy is tragedy that happens to someone else. Even death may
wear a comic mask: the bodies covering the stage at the end of Hamlet create a somber atmosphere, but
in Arsenic and Old Lace the thirteen
corpses buried in the basement by two spinsters and their deranged brother add
to the hilarious mayhem of the plot. Tragedy and comedy are distinguishable not
as much by subject matter as by perspective, each viewing events from a
different angle.
Comedy represents the flip side of tragedy, a complement
to the tragic view of life. Like two sides of the same coin, both tragedy and
comedy are needed to give a complete picture of human existence. In the
dramatic contests of ancient Athens, three tragedies were followed by a ribald
satire of the myths celebrated previously in all seriousness, as if to say,
"Now the whole story has been told." If tragedy dresses man in the
robes of a mighty king, comedy causes him to trip on the hem and fall on his
royal rear. Tragedy raises the heroine onto a noble pedestal only to have
comedy look up her dress to get a peek at her tattered petticoat and polka-dot
underwear. Comedy is tragedy's private diary, recording the embarrassing side
of life, reminding us that as much as we may strive for divinity, we are still
humble, earthbound creatures who snore and belch. Both views recognize the
limitations inherent in being human, but whereas tragedy admires the hero's
efforts to overcome obstacles, comedy ridicules such pretensions, feeling
cheerful but not optimistic about his chances.
Types of Comedy
At the most fundamental level, the comic hero
struggles with limitations of a physical nature: the aches and pains of old
age, a growling stomach in church, a slippery banana peel, an urgent need to
find a restroom. Comedy which focuses on physical humor or
"slapstick" is called farce.
Like melodrama, farce has no higher agenda than to entertain its audience in
the most direct way possible. Relying on sight gags, sexual innuendo, and
frantic activity, it goes for the belly laugh rather than the sophisticated
chuckle. Farce presents human beings as helpless victims of their own bodily
urges; hungry for food, drink, and sex, the comic hero cannot see past his
immediate desires to pursue loftier goals. Characters in farce are usually
single-minded, seeking to satisfy their cravings with reckless desperation.
Without thinking they repeatedly react to stimuli in a mechanical fashion (such
as answering the door whenever the phone rings), at times performing more like
robots than living people. Featuring characters with little depth or substance,
farce places its emphasis on plot complications caused by improbable
coincidence, mistaken identities, and miscommunication. The world of farce
appears chaotic and without rules, but because it is, like melodrama, a form of
wish-fulfillment, everything works out in the end. Our wildest fantasies can be
acted out without anyone having to suffer the consequences. Because of its
reliance on physical humor, farce is more effective in performance than as
literature. The facial expressions and body gestures of an accomplished actor
are necessary to bring farce to life. Taking advantage of the purely visual
medium, the chief comedians of silent films, Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd, became
masters of farce.
Farce is described as low comedy, not as a judgment
of its quality but in contrast to other forms of humorous drama which attempt
to do more than entertain. High comedy exists as a counterpart to
tragedy, offering a relatively serious vision of the world but in humorous
terms. Avoiding slapstick physical action and cheap jokes, high comedy seeks to
amuse by uncovering the absurdity of human behavior found in society and within
the individual. Comedy of manners,
the most prominent form of high comedy, holds the customs of aristocratic
society up to ridicule. Moliere (1622-1673) loved exposing the hypocritical
posturing of the nobles in Louis XIV's court who lived exclusively for
pleasure. Comedy during the Restoration period in England (1660-1700) provides
a scandalous portrait of the sexual games played by libertines and loose women
of the day. Against a sophisticated background, comedy of manners uses verbal
wit and sarcasm to depict the charm and reveal the pretensions of its
characters. Oftentimes high comedy focuses on the quirks of individual
personality. Ben Jonson's Volpone and
Moliere's The Misanthrope are examples in which one overriding passion, in
these plays greed, consumes the protagonist, blinding him to all other goals.
One might call such a trait a "comic flaw," which often appears as a
virtue taken to extremes. Moliere's misanthropic Alceste prizes honesty above
all else, but his blunt and unsparing approach makes him an object of ridicule.
High comedy exhibits two contrasting impulses: to celebrate and to criticize.
The comic vision professes both hope and discouragement about the human
condition, looking for the best but expecting the worst.
Two other types of comedy are identified by their
exclusive focus on either celebration or criticism. Festive comedies, those
that emphasize the former view, present the comic hero as a survivor,
undefeated by obstacles thrown in his way. His victories symbolize the process
of renewal and regeneration which allows life to continue. This impulse explains
why so many comedies, including all of Shakespeare's, fall into the category of
romantic comedy which portrays love found, lost, and regained. The traditional
wedding (or at least mating) at the end of comedy represents the continuance of
life itself and looks to a brighter future. Satire, on the other hand, tends to see only the dark side of
humanity, presenting its characters in the worst possible light. Satire uses
laughter as a weapon; with its attack on foolishness and corruption in society,
it often turns people into exaggerated cartoons, making their actions appear
ridiculous and exposing the false premises on which they are based. In festive
comedies people may be ignorant or misled, but they are rarely monsters of
depravity; in satire they are seldom depicted as anything else.
Techniques of Comedy
We began this section by clarifying one major
difference between comedy and tragedy: we laugh at the hardships of comic
characters because the author sets them at a psychological distance from us.
Allardyce Nicoll describes three techniques of comedy which help to create this
comic detachment: derision, incongruity, and automatism. Derision takes aim at human frailties such as stupidity, hypocrisy,
and arrogance, knocking the victim off his self-built pedestal. Usually the
character sets himself up for the fall by pretending to be more than he
actually is (cf. alazon discussed
below). With insults and sarcasm, comedy's sharp wit seeks to pierce the
over-inflated egos of pompous politicians, bragging generals, haughty
aristocrats, and sanctimonious clergymen among other misplaced figures of
authority. Aristophanes even poked fun at the gods when they exhibited all too
human behavior. Moliere, who knew how dangerous a weapon derision can be, said
that people do not mind being portrayed as wicked, but they despise being made
to look ridiculous. Derision creates distance by placing its subjects beneath
us as contemptible and foolish, depriving them of their claims to dignity and
respect.
An irresistible urge to giggle during a funeral, a
drunken street bum elected as president, the queen of England doing "the
wave" at a baseball game: these are examples of incongruity. Incongruity provokes laughter by means of ridiculous
contrasts in situation, character, or dialogue. Appearing grossly out of place,
the unexpected element takes us by surprise. Shakespeare created an incongruous
situation in A Midsummer Night's Dream
when Titania, queen of the fairies, falls in love with Bottom the weaver,
transformed into an ass. In Gogol's The Inspector General, a common clerk is
mistaken for an important dignitary and receives royal treatment by the town.
Incongruity in character occurs in Amadeus
when a foul-mouthed Mozart does not conform to our preconception of a serious
musical genius, or when a shy little woman is revealed to be an axe murderer in
The Man Who Came to Dinner. Misplaced
words or statements are also a source of laughter. In The Rivals Mrs. Malaprop frequently misuses dialogue to humorous
effect, as when she describes her niece as "headstrong as an allegory on
the banks of the Nile."
Finally, automatism
occurs when people are depicted as acting without thinking, like machines
running on autopilot. Comic characters often have annoying habits or mannerisms
(constant hiccups or sneezing) or may exhibit repetitious, mechanical behavior,
such as the nervous suitor of Chekhov's The
Marriage Proposal drinking glass after glass of water. They lose their
ability to interact naturally with other people, and may seem oblivious to
their surroundings, as when Charlie Chaplin mindlessly strolls through rush
hour traffic. Automatism transforms people into unthinking robots, creating the
comic distance necessary for laughter.
Comic Roles
Throughout the history of theater, comedy has
tended to portray characters as recognizable stereotypes. Many types which are
still popular today find their origins in ancient Greek comedy. During the time
of the great tragic writers, Aristophanes
(448-380 BC) was the best known writer of comedy. His plays were a curious
mixture of bawdy farce, political satire, and fantasy, all composed in elegant
poetry. Menander (342-291 BC)
emerged during the next generation, changing the form of comedy into one we
recognize today, the romantic comedy where young people overcome their parents'
objections and marry to live happily ever after. The same character types made
popular by Menander flourished again during the Italian Renaissance with the
development of improvisational comedy called Commedia Dell'arte. Without the use of full scripts, Commedia
performers relied on stereotypes and familiar situations to invent dialogue and
action.
Comedies still make use of several of the
traditional roles found in the classics. One of the most popular, the crafty schemer
(Greek poneros) plots to trick others out of their money, wives, or
both. In Aristophanes' Clouds
Strepsiades attends the school of Socrates to learn just enough logic to argue
his way out of paying his debts. In Commedia, Arlecchino or Harlequin plays the
sneaky servant who helps his young master win the girl over his father's
objections. The main character in Ben Jonson's Volpone (1606) pretends to be near death so that others will bring
him luxurious presents, hoping to be put in his will. In The Country Wife (1675) Horner spreads the rumor of his impotence
so that husbands will not object to his keeping company with their wives.
Modern examples of the schemer include Groucho Marx and Hawkeye from M.A.S.H. Often working beside the schemer
is the sidekick or parasite (bolomochos), living off the
successes of the main character. Harlequin had his Scapino, Volpone his Mosca,
Groucho his Chico, Hawkeye his Trapper John. As one of the schemer's primary
targets, the straight man (spoudious) takes life too seriously.
Intent on business or study, he frowns upon those who live for pleasure and
usually provides others a good laugh at his own expense. Pantalone in Commedia
and Moliere's Miser are classic examples of this type.
In his work on ethics (Nic. 1108a.21), Aristotle describes two types of contrasting
characters. The braggart (alazon)
pretends to be more than he is, while the ironist (eiron) seems to be less than he is. The braggart appeared in Roman
comedy as Miles Gloriosus, a general always boasting of his military and sexual
conquests but whose prowess in both turns out to be imagined. In Commedia
Dell'arte he became Capitano, a swaggering, sword-wielding buffoon who saw
himself as the ladies' man, although the ladies thought otherwise. In contrast,
the ironist, a clever, resourceful character who gives the appearance of
weakness, has become a frequent character in American comedy. In a recent
example, Charlie in The Foreigner
(1983) acts as if he does not understand English, hoping that the other guests
at the lodge will leave him alone. As it turns out, they freely talk about
their secrets in front of him, and because of this knowledge the "ignorant
foreigner" becomes the only person who can save the lodge from ruin.
Because we recognize
them as theatrical types, comic characters remain just on the other side of the
line separating fiction from reality. This aesthetic distance allows us to
laugh at their troubles without feeling the pity and fear of tragedy. Corrigan
writes, "The world of comedy is characterized by the absence of real pain.
If the play is to ring true, the characters in comedy must experience the same
kinds of social pressures and restraints that we in the audience experience in
our daily lives. Yet in a comedy we always feel the characters exist in a
protected realm" (109). For all its criticism of human limitations,
hypocrisy, and foolishness, comedy views human beings essentially as survivors.
"The spirit of comedy celebrates our capacity not only to endure our tragic
fate, but to overcome it with energy and exuberance" (Corrigan 127). In
comedy we laugh at our shortcomings, learn from our failures, and leave the
theater determined to continue playing this game we call life.
Tragicomedy
Not all plays fit neatly into a single category; in
fact, most plays consist of elements from two or more genres. In his comedies
Aristophanes expressed his views through biting political satire, but he mixed
this serious criticism of his contemporaries with lowbrow farce, dirty jokes,
and slapstick humor, techniques seemingly not in keeping with the weightiness
of his subject matter. Shakespeare frequently inserted a comic scene after one
of great emotional intensity: the activity of the drunken porter offers a
momentary release following the bloody murder of Duncan by Macbeth. The
imagination of great playwrights encompasses both the tragic and comic visions
of life, and their works mirror life itself with its moments of joy and sorrow.
A play should be judged on its own merits and not on how well it conforms to
any standard of classification. Nevertheless, having some familiarity with
dramatic genres which have appeared throughout the history of theater aids in
our understanding how a play both confirms our expectations as it echoes
traditions of the past, and challenges our preconceptions of the present world.
The term "tragicomedy" is frequently used
to describe plays which combine elements from tragedy and comedy. The Roman
comic Plautus (254-184 BC) first concocted the term to explain how he could
bring gods into the comic plot of his Amphitryon.
Typically comedy depicted only servants and middleclass merchants while gods
and kings inhabited the world of tragedy. Critics during the Renaissance
applied the term to tragedies with happy endings or to a third genre also known
as pastoral. John Fletcher, a contemporary of Shakespeare, described his
pastoral The Faithful Shepherdess as
not tragedy, for it lacked a death, but not comedy, for it brought some near it
(Carlson 86). However, as we saw in our discussion of tragedy, Aristotle did
not strictly limit tragic heroes to a certain social class, nor did he say that
all tragedies end in catastrophe. Following Aristotle's lead, the German critic
Lessing (1729-1781) rejected these artificial distinctions, preferring to
define tragicomedy as "an interpenetration of emotional reactions where
tragedy and comedy are both present, yet 'one does not merely follow upon the
other, but necessarily arises from it, when seriousness stimulates laughter,
and sadness pleasure'" (Carlson 170). With this definition Lessing
provided the theoretical groundwork for our modern concept of tragicomedy.
Perhaps an analogy will help us visualize a crucial
distinction. When we combine chocolate and vanilla ice cream, each retains its
own unique flavor while complementing the other. In contrast, when we mix black
and white paint, we produce gray, a third color different from the original
pigments. When plays such as Euripides' Bacchae,
Shakespeare's Hamlet, or Shaffer's Amadeus infuse serious stories with
humor, the effect resembles the first process of combination described above,
in which both comedy and tragedy exist without losing their identities. The
comic elements provide a sharp contrast to the darker environment, but the
impact of the work as a whole remains serious. These are examples of mixed genre, as most plays are to some degree. We should reserve the term
tragicomedy for a unique class of
drama, representing an entirely new genre, one which offers its own dark vision
of the world apart from tragedy and comedy.
One of the first dramatists to explain tragicomedy
as a uniquely modern worldview, Friedrich Duerrenmatt (1921-1990) felt that the
20th century, lying in the shadow of two world wars, the Holocaust, and the
threat of nuclear armageddon, could no longer support the spirit of exaltation
which undergirds the tragic vision. Tragedy presupposes free will and personal
responsibility, but in our century, because everyone is collectively guilty, no
single individual bears guilt or responsibility. There are no more heroes, only
victims caught in the maelstrom of modern existence. Faced with a meaningless
world he cannot change, man must find ways to live without hope of transcending
his predicament. Duerrenmatt suggested that the only true reflection of modern
humanity is a paradox in which the tragic is depicted as comic. Using a
tragicomic metaphor, man becomes the circus clown with a sad face, whose
actions appear comical, but the implication of ultimate meaninglessness behind
those actions comes closer to tragic despair without the corresponding sense of
tragic affirmation.
In his most famous play The Visit (1956),
Duerrenmatt created a modern parable of greed which serves as an excellent
example of tragicomedy. Claire Zachanassian, one of the world's richest women,
pays a visit to her former hometown which lies destitute in poverty. She offers
to give the people millions in exchange for one favor: that they murder her
former lover, Alfred Ill, who jilted her years ago. At first the townspeople
refuse in moral protest, but soon everyone, including Ill's family and friends,
begins making purchases on credit, assuming that the money will be coming in
soon. Ill finally submits to the inevitable, and the townspeople fulfill the
felonious agreement.
To emphasize the bizarre, sinister quality of his
tale, Duerrenmatt combines the familiar with the fantastic, providing a view of
this serious subject through the lens of the ridiculous. Claire's entourage
includes her butler Boby, two sadistic ex-convicts, Roby and Toby, two blind
eunuchs, Koby and Loby, a succession of three husbands, Moby, Hoby, and Zoby,
plus a live panther and an empty casket. Claire herself has survived numerous car
and plane crashes, existing now as an assemblage of prosthetic spare parts. The
townspeople (who have no names but are called by their titles, Mayor, Priest,
Schoolteacher, or simply Man 1, 2, 3, 4) are dehumanized by anonymity, acting
like unthinking, amoral robots controlled by an outside force. They all
purchase yellow shoes as a sign of conspicuous prosperity, and in one scene
portray talking trees and forest animals.
By presenting evil in such ludicrous images,
Duerrenmatt creates a distorted, jarring world, a madhouse with no escape.
Tragicomedy juxtaposes comic technique with tragic circumstances, and the
effect is disturbing, for we don't know whether to laugh or cry. In another age
Alfred Ill might have been seen as a tragic hero, a man doomed by circumstances
of his own making but now out of his control, who comes to terms with the
inevitable and willingly submits to his fate. In The Visit, however,
grotesque humor belittles the protagonist, undercutting the affirmation of
tragedy, while the tragic situation darkens the celebrative mood associated
with comedy. Corrigan writes, "The vision of tragicomedy is one of almost
unrelieved despair. It lacks the heroism, the sense of accomplishment, and the
spirit of fulfillment we discover in tragedy. . . . Tragicomedy also lacks the
life-enhancing energy and the sense of triumph we associate with comedy. All
the qualities of the comic world--reconciliation, change, the restoration of
social order, and the celebration of new possibility--are either absent or not
working" (142).
With his scathing critique of greed and
materialism, Duerrenmatt at least affirms some basis for human values by which
we can determine right and wrong. Other writers of tragicomedy present an even
bleaker world in which absolute truth and meaning are impossible. The works of Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco,
and Harold Pinter are frequently classified under the title Theater of the Absurd. Their plays reflect the
terrible feeling of despair that comes from the loss of meaning humanity has
experienced during the last two centuries. If God does not exist, as much
modern thought asserts, then man was not created for any purpose, and his
search for absolute meaning is futile. The rug has been pulled out from under
us, and there is no floor underneath. The existentialist philosopher Albert
Camus compared the absurdity of the human condition to the Greek myth of
Sisyphus who was condemned in Hades to roll a boulder up a hill, knowing that
at the top it would always roll back down. From this viewpoint, life becomes a
cosmic drama with pointless activity but no plot.
Absurdist plays attempt to capture this sense of
futility in tragicomic terms. In Beckett's Waiting
for Godot (1953), two tramps entertain themselves with comic routines while
they wait in a sparse landscape adorned by a single tree for someone named
Godot, who never arrives. In Ionesco's The
Chairs (1952) an elderly couple arrange an auditorium full of chairs and
greet invisible guests who have come to hear a great speaker. When he appears,
he babbles nonsense while the couple jump out a window to their deaths. In
Pinter's The Dumbwaiter (1957) two
hit men waiting in an abandoned building receive orders from a kitchen
dumbwaiter operated by a mysterious source upstairs who is never identified. In
these plays meaningless activity and nonsensical dialogue are symbols for the
chaos and absurdity of life itself. These characters live in a state of utter
bewilderment, playing a game whose rules they do not understand and that
ultimately cannot be won. In the past tragic heroes also struggled to discover
their place in an enigmatic world, but the assumption of a rational universe
ordained by fate or God made their search meaningful and their suffering noble.
The Absurdists doubt the existence of an answer behind the question, thus
making the asking pointless. Their protagonists are anti-heroes, nobodies in an
unknowable world.
Not all playwrights associated with the Theater of
the Absurd share this depth of metaphysical despair, however. Several Eastern
European writers used Absurdist techniques of irrationality and nonsense to
symbolize the state of existence under Communist rule. Vaclav Havel spent time
in prison for his outspoken criticism of the Communist party in Czechoslovakia
but eventually became his country's president after the fall of the Iron
Curtain. One of his early works, The Memorandum (1965), exposes the insanity
of a world run by totalitarian bureaucrats. An unnamed organization creates a
new official language designed to eliminate all misunderstandings on
interoffice memos. Its unimaginable complexity makes everyone dependent on the
translation department, but the steps one must take to obtain their services
are practically impossible to fulfill. Finally, after much work, an office
manager receives a translation of his first memo which says that the new
language is harmful and should not be used. Havel adopts the style of
tragicomedy not to suggest that life itself has no meaning but that life under
an oppressive regime robs the individual of purpose and dignity. Similarly, the
British author Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz
and Guildenstern are Dead) and the American Edward Albee (The Zoo Story) have borrowed techniques
from the Absurdists to depict a confusing but not ultimately irrational
universe.
Review Terms
farce
satire
comedy of manners
festive comedy
eiron & alazon
automatism
derision
incongruity
catharsis
hamartia
melodrama
poetic justice
tragicomedy
Theater of the Absurd
Review Questions
According
to Aristotle, what kind of person is qualified to be a tragic hero?
According
to Francis Fergusson, what three elements make up the tragic pattern?
Discuss
four aspects of the tragic vision, and explain how it is ultimately an
optimistic perspective of life.
Contrast
tragedy and melodrama. What are the chief qualities of melodrama?
How
does comedy offer a balance to the perspective of tragedy?
Identify
five types of traditional comic roles.
How
is tragicomedy different from other forms of mixed genre? Describe examples
from class or the text.