PREFACE

Prior to the outbreak of the world-war in Europe it seemed that America was about to pass through a period of great popular interest in the drama. With the return of normal activities consequent upon the coming of peace it is to be hoped that this interest may be revived and may continue to grow. So far as such interest is hysterical or manifested by attempts at play-writing on the part of those without training, experience, or natural aptitude it has little to commend it. On the other hand, nothing can be more wholesome than a widespread comprehension of the origin, history, and basic principles of tragedy and comedy. Thus, we are deeply indebted to the successive scholars who have undertaken to analyze Elizabethan drama and assign to Seneca, the Latin comedians, Aristotle, the Greek playwrights, and the various mediaeval elements their respective shares of influence. But, as the ultimate source of all other dramatic art, the Greeks’ contribution, whether in precept or example, must ever occupy a unique position. Accordingly, no effort, however humble, to make the theater and drama of the Greeks more widely known ought to require an apology.

In the following pages I have tried to do three things:

First, to elaborate the theory that the peculiarities and conventions of the Greek drama are largely explicable by its environment, in the broadest sense of that term. Some aspects of this fundamental proposition have already been developed by others. But, so far as results have been sought in the field of classical drama, it has been done less comprehensively than is here attempted; and the earlier work has been, for the most part, antiquated by the momentous accession of new information during the last twenty-five years.

Secondly, to emphasize the technical aspect of ancient drama. Technique has largely escaped the attention even of our playwrights, some of whom attempt to produce plays that will havenone. Most of our classical scholars, also, study and teach and edit the ancient dramatists as if they, too, had been equally slipshod. Our handbooks on scenic antiquities and the classical drama have been written from the same point of view. Of late years the Germans have awakened to the real situation, and many of their recent monographs deal with various phases of the subject. Nevertheless, so lately as 1911 a German dissertation began with these words:

As yet not very many investigations into the technique of the Greek tragedians are available. In addition to the incidental hints that are scattered here and there, especially in the commentaries, two works in this field are above all to be mentioned and they are both very recent: Adolf Gross,Die Stichomythie in der griechischen Tragödie und Komödie(1905), and Friedrich Leo,Der Monolog im Drama(1908).[1]

In what terms, then, ought the indifference, not to say the unawareness, of American scholars with regard to these matters to be characterized? It is true that quite recently the German publications have caused some attention to be devoted, in this country, to the dramaturgy of the classical playwrights; but as yet such researches have gained only scant recognition from the generality of classical students.

Thirdly, to elucidate and freshen ancient practice by modern and mediaeval parallels. This is an old and deeply worked mine, and I am under heavy obligations to my predecessors; but the vein is inexhaustible, and I have striven to keep the point in mind more steadfastly than is sometimes the case. It is of a piece with this to add that I have endeavored to treat the ancient plays as if they were not dead and inert, belonging to a world apart, but as if their authors were men as real as Ibsen or Galsworthy, who had real problems and met them in a real way. The desirability of this point of view surely ought not to be a matter of question; yet in fact it is exemplified with surprising rareness. To many, Sophocles and Euripides seem to possess scarcely more historicity than the heroes of Greek mythology.

To a varying degree all these aims run afoul of a historic controversy among dramatic critics. In thePoeticsAristotle recognized the distinction between studying tragedy “by itself” and in reference also to the audience (or theater).[2]He included “spectacle” (ὄψις) or “the equipment of the spectacle” (ὁ τῆς ὄψεως κόσμος) among the six parts which every tragedy must have, but proceeded to declare that “this, though emotionally attractive, is least artistic of the parts and has least to do with the art of poetry, since the power of tragedy exists even apart from a public performance and actors and since, furthermore, it is the art of the costumer (or stage machinist) rather than that of the poet to secure spectacular effects.” He granted that “fear and pity may be excited by the spectacle, but they may be excited also by the inner structure of the play, which is the preferable method and is typical of a better poet,” etc. “The power of a tragedy,” he thought, “may be made manifest by merely reading it.” Finally, he pointed out that music and spectacle are just the accessories in which tragedy surpasses epic poetry and that they constitute no inconsiderable addition to its effect by rendering its pleasures most vivid. These citations suffice to show Aristotle’s attitude, which was consistently maintained: he believed the spectacle to be one of the indispensable elements of drama, but that it ought also to be a comparatively subordinate element. This was an eminently sane position to take, and it would have been well if his successors had been equally judicious.

Dr. Spingarn has tried to break down the force of Aristotle’s recognition of spectacular effects by saying that he could not “help thinking of plays in connection with their theatrical representation, any more than most of us can think of men and women without clothes. They belong together by long habit and use; they help each other to be what we commonly think them. But he does not make them identical or mutuallyinclusive.”[3]In other words, Aristotle had no acquaintance with the “closet-drama,” and so did not take it into account. But there is an allowance to be made also on the other side. There is some doubt as to just what Aristotle meant by “spectacle,” whether merely “the visible appearance of the actors when got up in character by the costumier” or “scenery, dresses—the whole visible apparatus of the theater.” Even if he had the larger meaning in mind he could not have realized its full significance. He knew but a single type of theatrical building, which must therefore have seemed to him as integral a part of dramatic performances as the Greek climate. He could not look down the ages and contrast the simple arrangements of the Greek theater with the varying lighting effects and scenic splendor of modern and intervening types. He could not avoid, then, underestimating the importance of this factor. Furthermore, when he states that of the six parts the spectacle has least to do with the art of poetry and is more closely related to the art of the costumer than to that of the poet, he means what he says and no more. As its title indicates, his treatise was concerned with the art of poetry, not with that of dramaturgy. Hence he stressed the factors that dealt with the essence of tragedy rather than those which influenced only its accidental features and external form. Even so, he conceded to the latter elements no negligible value. Considered from the dramaturgical standpoint as well, he must have allowed them a much greater importance.

As it happens, Spingarn confines his examination of Aristotle’s views to thePoetics, but in theRhetoricoccurs the interesting observation that “on the stage the actors are at present of more importance than the poets.”[4]Aristotle did not state that this was the proper relationship, but as a practical man he simply recognized the facts before his eyes. And these words utterly repudiate Spingarn’s attempt to subvert the obvious implication of Aristotle’s statements in thePoetics.

I have given so much space to Aristotle’s opinions because Spingarn did. But, after all, it does not greatly matter. Times have changed since Roger Bacon placed the crown of infallibility on the Stagirite’s brow with the words: “Aristotle hath the same authority in philosophy that the apostle Paul hath in divinity.” The investigation of such questions no longer begins and ends with “the master of those that know.”

Nevertheless I conceive Aristotle’s position in the present matter to have been a sensible one, though it has oftentimes been sadly disregarded and even flouted. One school has ignored the spectacle as a factor in dramatic criticism. The other school has exalted it to the chief place. In my opinion both attitudes are erroneous. The former party is the older and more numerous. I fancy that most adherents of this view err unconsciously. It is particularly easy in dealing with the dramatic remains of bygone ages to ignore or minimize the effect which the manner of presentation must have exercised and practically to confine one’s attention to literary criticism in the narrowest sense of the term. To this tendency classical scholars have been peculiarly prone. But there are many others who are quite aware of the full meaning of the position they occupy. One of these is Spingarn, who roundly declares: “A play is a creative work of the imagination, and must be considered as such always,and as such only.”[5]

The opposing view seems to have been promulgated first by Castelvetro (1570) and enjoyed no particular popularity until recently. It was adopted by the Abbé d’Aubignac in the seventeenth century, by Diderot in the eighteenth century, by A. W. Schlegel during the first half of the nineteenth century, and by Francisque Sarcey during the latter half. There is no space here to trace the developments of the doctrine; for that the interested reader may consult Spingarn’s article. But the general position of the school is as follows: “A play is a story (a) devised to be presented (b) by actors (c) on a stage (d) before an audience.”[6]These are not merely important elements or essential elements; they are the prime elements. They outweigh all other considerations. It was Diderot’s central idea that the essential part of a play was not created by the poet at all, but by the actor. The “closet-drama” they hold up to scorn as a contradiction in terms. The “psychology of the crowd,” long before that name for it had been invented, was an integral part of this teaching. The inadequacy of this point of view is aptly expressed in Goethe’s words concerning Schlegel: “His criticism is completely one-sided, because in all theatrical pieces he merely regards the skeleton of the plot and arrangement, and only points out small points of resemblance to great predecessors, without troubling himself in the least as to what the author brings forward of graceful life and the culture of a high soul.”[7]

To me neither of these theories is satisfactory. I conceive the truth to lie between them. Etymologically the word “drama” means “action,” and the practice of the Greek theater for centuries shows that an action carried on by living impersonators is involved. Action narrated on a printed page is not enough. I am willing to concede that by a natural extension of meaning a piece which was confessedly written for the closet and which does not and cannot succeed upon the stage may nevertheless deserve to be called a “drama.” But despite its poetic charm and other merits such a dramaquadrama is indeed avie manquée. On the other hand, against the materialistic school I maintain the self-evident proposition that it is possible for a play to observe all the technical rules arising from the conditions of performance in a theater and before an audience and yet be so lacking in poetry, in truth to life, in inherent worth, as to beundeserving of the name of “drama.” It is evident, then, that craftsmanship must be the medium of the playwright, not his sole possession. But, in truth, the issue here is more apparent than real. It does not confront us in practice. Both these extremes constitute a negligible fraction of our dramatic literature. Students of the drama in university seminars, dramatic reviewers in the theaters, and playwrights at their desks, at least those who aspire to an enduring fame, alike draw upon the same body of plays for their knowledge of dramatic lore—upon Shakespeare, Euripides, Molière, Lessing, Sophocles, Ibsen. All these masters had a close and practical knowledge of the theater for which they wrote. On the other hand, they were infinitely more than mere technicians.

But Spingarn would maintain that the aesthetic value of a play is entirely independent of theatrical conditions or the conventions arising therefrom. “For aesthetic criticism the theater simply does not exist” (cf.op. cit., p. 89). Surely, if Sophocles were writing plays for the present-day public he would find it necessary to dispense with the choral odes which have been at once the delight and the despair of Greek students from his generation to this. Would not such an omission and the consequent readjustments affect the aesthetic value of his tragedies? Or if one of our dramatists could be set down in a Greek theater of some twenty-four hundred years ago, which was incapable of representing an interior scene and had never contained a box set, certainly his dramas would have to be turned literally inside out before they could be produced at all. Would this recasting in no wise affect their aesthetic criticism? Spingarn is anxious to protect Aristotle from the imputation of believing that plays and their theatrical representation are “mutually inclusive.” But his own position makes them mutually exclusive. Both theories are extreme and unwarranted. I have already quoted Spingarn’s conception of a play. In my opinion, Mr. Galsworthy’s putting of the matter is not only broader, but far preferable, for the reason that it duly recognizes, as Spingarn’s dictum does not, the facts of existence. He writes:“For what is Art but the perfected expression of self in contact with the world?”[8]While this definition takes full cognizance of aesthetic and spiritual values, it yet does not exclude such unmentioned but implicit factors as the medium of expression chosen by the artist, the circumstances under which his work is created and is to be exhibited, the past history and inherited conventions of the genre, etc. On the contrary, it is apparent that Galsworthy would not, after the fashion of the materialistic school, elevate these indispensable, though subordinate, matters to the exclusion of all else.

It thus appears that I array myself neither with the aesthetic nor with the materialistic school of critics, but occupy middle ground. Nevertheless, my book is devoted, in the main, to a consideration of the more materialistic and external factors in the development of Greek drama. These factors are different manifestations of Environment, which is a far broader term than Aristotle’s Spectacle (ὄψις). I entertain no illusion as to the comparative importance of environment in the criticism of drama. It is distinctly of secondary importance. If it were possible to study Greek drama from but one point of view, perhaps this would not deserve to be that one. But since no such restriction obtains, it is my contention that a consideration of these factors, too, is not merely valuable, but essential to a complete survey of the field.

It will now be seen why I have no chapter on the “Influence of the Poet.” He can hardly be considered a part of his own environment. But there were also other reasons for the omission. Partly it was because every chapter shows the mastermind of the dramatist adapting himself to the situation therein outlined, and partly because an adequate treatment of this topic would involve a presentation of the poets’ ideas and teaching—a subject which is amply discussed in other treatises and which would swell this volume beyond the limits at my disposal. I am aware that to some the result will seem to give the uninitiated a lopsided view of the Greek drama. For example, a reviewerof Signor Francesco Guglielmino’sArte e Artifizio nel Dramma Greco(Catania, 1912) maintains that “for the reader who is not technically a scholar” such a study of dramatic technique presents “a subtly distorted picture.”[9]To this criticism my reply would be that the standard handbooks are guilty of much the same error in largely ignoring the phase of the subject which is here presented. But however that may be, for the language and style or for the political, moral, ethical, and religious ideas of ancient playwrights, I must recommend such invaluable works as Haigh’sTragic Drama of the Greeks(1896), Decharme’sEuripides and the Spirit of His Dramas, Croiset’sAristophanes and the Political Parties at Athens, Legrand’sThe New Greek Comedy(the last three translated by Loeb, 1906, 1909, and 1917), Sheppard’sGreek Tragedy(1911), Murray’sEuripides and His Age(1913), etc. I must add, however, that to a certain extent these books treat also of the matters discussed in this volume and have freely been consulted.

In this connection I wish to comment upon another objection. Several of my articles which are incorporated in the present volume antedate Guglielmino’s work, and my whole book was blocked out and large parts of it were written before hisArte e Artifiziocame to my attention. Nevertheless my plan of treatment bears some points of resemblance to his. In particular, he employs the chauvinistic passages in Greek tragedy to show the poets striving for “immediate effects,” i.e., deliberately exciting the patriotic sentiments of their audiences. It will be observed that I go a step farther and maintain that the winning of the prize was the ultimate object, to which the other motive was contributory (seepp. 213 ff., below). I believe that the tag at the end of Euripides’Iphigenia among the Taurians,Orestes, andPhoenician Maidsand the parallels from Greek comedy confirm my interpretation. But the reviewer just cited declares it

unfair to the dramatist and his art to forget that he and his audience were all Athenians together.... When the Athenian dramatist, sharing the Athenian pride in their country’s history or legend, makes a characterexpress a common patriotic emotion or belief, we cannot properly call that flattery of the audience, or an artifice for effect, even though the words were sure to call out rapturous applause. The bit of truth in such a view is so partial as to be false.

But, as Professor Murray says of the choral ode in theMedea, “They are not at all the conventional glories attributed by all patriots to their respective countries.”[10]Moreover, these passages usually rest upon no popular belief, for the simple reason that they frequently corresponded neither to history nor to traditional mythology, but dealt with incidents that had been newly invented by the poet’s fancy or had at least been invested by him with new details and setting.

At the beginning of the European conflagration in August, 1914, London managers hastened to bring out such plays asDrake,Henry V, andAn Englishman’s Home. Was this merely the prompting of genuinely patriotic fervor on their part, or a misdirected attempt to exploit the emotions of their countrymen? The fact that this class of plays was soon withdrawn after it became apparent that the public heard enough about the war elsewhere without being reminded of it also in the theaters favors the latter explanation. Now, that Aristophanes frankly angled for the suffrages of his audiences cannot be denied. When, then, we remember how Euripides began to write for the stage when he was only eighteen, how he had to wait for a chorus in the great contest until he was thirty and then gained only the last place, how his first victory was deferred until 441B.C.when he was forty-four years of age, how few were the victories that he won, how he courted his public by seeking out unhackneyed themes, by inventing sensational episodes, by reverting to the mannerisms of Aeschylus, by introducing sex problems—when we remember all this, can it be doubted that his chauvinistic passages were part and parcel of the same policy and were deliberately written with the same motives as are revealed in the choice of plays by Sir Herbert Tree and the other London managers of today?

But perhaps it may be said that the psychology of managers is utterly unlike that of poets. In reply it would be possibleand sufficient to cite the not infrequent concessions which Shakespeare and many another have made to the groundlings in their audiences, but I prefer to quote the words of a dramatist who has declared himself on the subject more explicitly. Mr. Henry Arthur Jones has recently written:

A dramatist is often reproached for producing plays that are obviously below the standard of his aspirations, and obviously below the level of his best work. This assumes that the dramatist is, like the novelist, always free to do his best work. There could not be a greater mistake. The dramatist is limited and curbed by a thousand conditions which are never suspected by the public. The drama will always remain a popular art.... The dramatist who writes plays too far ahead, or too far away from the taste and habits of thought of the general body of playgoers, finds the theatre empty, his manager impoverished, and his own reputation and authority diminished or lost. No sympathy should be given to dramatists, however lofty their aims, who will not study to please the general body of playgoers of their days.... The question to be asked concerning a dramatist is—“Does he desire to give the public the best they will accept from him, or does he give them the readiest filth or nonsense that most quickly pays?” He cannot always even give the public the best that they would accept from him. In sitting down to write a play, he must first ask himself, “Can I get a manager of repute to produce this, and in such a way and at such a theatre that it can be seen to advantage? Can I get some leading actor or actress to play this part for the benefit of the play as a whole? Can I get these other individual types of character played in such a way that they will appear to be something like the persons I have in my mind?” These and a hundred other questions the dramatist has to ask himself before he decides upon the play he will write. A mistake in the casting of a secondary character may ruin a play, so narrow is the margin of success.... I hope I may be forgiven for intruding this personal matter by way of excuse and explanation. In no case do I blame or arraign the public, who, in the theatre, will always remain my masters, and whose grateful and willing servant I shall always remain.[11]

It should be recognized that my book is intended for two very diverse types of readers, whose demands likewise are dissimilar:

First, for a general reading public which has little or no acquaintance with the Greek and Latin classics in the original but has a deep and abiding interest in the drama together witha desire to learn more of the prototypes and masterpieces of the genre. This situation has made necessary an amplitude of explanatory matter which, I fear, will at times prove irksome to my professional confrères. On the other hand, I have felt that intellectual honesty required me to treat the topics discussed in my Introduction and to meet the problems there raised at some length and without evasions. But to do so necessitated the interpretation of Greek texts and the presentation of much jejune material. Perhaps, therefore, some of my non-classical readers will prefer to omit the Introduction. By cross-references and slight repetitions I have endeavored to make the rest of the book intelligible without it. The English word “stage” is too convenient to be avoided in discussing theatrical matters, but those who omit the third section of the Introduction are to understand that its use in my text does not mean that I believe that the Greek theater of the fourth and fifth centuriesB.C.had a raised stage for the exclusive use of actors.

Secondly, although much that I have written is necessarily well known to classicists, still, since I have striven to incorporate the results of the latest investigations and have arranged under one co-ordinating principle phenomena which are usually regarded as unrelated, and since I have combined points of interpretation which are scattered through scores of books and monographs, I venture to hope that my discussion will not be without interest even for specialists.

Inasmuch as the comedies of Plautus and Terence are but translations and adaptations of Greek originals, and since Seneca’s tragedies are constructed upon the Greek model, I have not hesitated to cite these Latin plays whenever they seemed to afford better illustrations than purely Greek productions.

I must express my constant indebtedness to such invaluable storehouses of data as Müller’sLehrbuch der griechischen Bühnenalterthümer(1886) andDas attische Bühnenwesen(1902), Navarre’sDionysos(1895), and especially Haigh’sThe Attic Theatre,third edition by Pickard-Cambridge (1907); also to Butcher’sAristotle’s Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, fourth edition with corrections (1911), and Bywater’s edition of Aristotle’sPoetics(1909).

I desire to thank the editors for permission, graciously granted, to use material which I have already published inClassical Philology, V (1910), VII (1912), and VIII (1913), theClassical Weekly, III (1910), VIII (1915), X (1917), and XI (1918), and theClassical Journal, VII (1911) and X (1914). Needless to state, these papers have not been brought over into the present volume verbatim, but have been curtailed, expanded, revised, and rearranged according to need. Furthermore, fully two-thirds of the book are entirely new.

Permission to quote from Mr. A. S. Way’s translation of Euripides in the “Loeb Classical Library,” Dr. B. B. Rogers’ translation of Aristophanes, and Professor J. S. Blackie’s translation of Aeschylus in “Everyman’s Library” has been courteously granted by William Heinemann, London (G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York), G. Bell & Sons, and J. M. Dent & Sons, respectively.

To my friends, Professor D. M. Robinson of Johns Hopkins University and Dr. A. S. Cooley of Bethlehem, Pa., I am indebted for having placed at my disposal their collections of photographs of Greek theaters. My colleague, Professor M. R. Hammer of the Northwestern University College of Engineering, has put me under deep obligation by supervising the preparation of several of the drawings.

In conclusion, my heartiest thanks are due to Professor Edward Capps, who first introduced me to the study of scenic antiquities. Several parts of this book, when originally published as articles, have enjoyed the benefit of his invaluable suggestions and criticisms. It is unnecessary to add, however, that he must not be held responsible for any part of them in their present form.

Roy C. Flickinger

Evanston, Ill.

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