The
English
Writers of Tragedy are possessed with a Notion, that
when they represent a virtuous or innocent Person in Distress, they
ought not to leave him till they have delivered him out of his Troubles,
or made him triumph over his Enemies. This Error they have been led into
by a ridiculous Doctrine in modern Criticism, that they are obliged to
an equal Distribution of Rewards and Punishments, and an impartial
Execution of poetical Justice. Who were the first that established this
Rule I know not; but I am sure it has no Foundation in Nature, in
Reason, or in the Practice of the Ancients. We find that Good and Evil
happen alike to all Men on this side the Grave; and as the principal
Design of Tragedy is to raise Commiseration and Terror in the Minds of
the Audience, we shall defeat this great End, if we always make Virtue
and Innocence happy and successful. Whatever Crosses and Disappointments
a good Man suffers in the Body of the Tragedy, they will make but small
Impression on our Minds, when we know that in the last Act he is to
arrive at the End of his Wishes and Desires. When we see him engaged in
the Depth of his Afflictions, we are apt to comfort our selves, because
we are sure he will find his Way out of them: and that his Grief, how
great soever it may be at present, will soon terminate in Gladness. For
this Reason the ancient Writers of Tragedy treated Men in their Plays,
as they are dealt with in the World, by making Virtue sometimes happy
and sometimes miserable, as they found it in the Fable which they made
choice of, or as it might affect their Audience in the most agreeable
Manner.
Aristotle
the Tragedies that were written in
either of these Kinds, and observes, That those which ended unhappily
had always pleased the People, and carried away the Prize in the publick
Disputes of the Stage, from those that ended happily
. Terror and
Commiseration leave a pleasing Anguish in the Mind; and fix the Audience
in such a serious Composure of Thought as is much more lasting and
delightful than any little transient Starts of Joy and Satisfaction.
Accordingly, we find, that more of our English Tragedies have succeeded,
in which the Favourites of the Audience sink under their Calamities,
than those in which they recover themselves out of them.
best Plays
of this Kind are
The Orphan, Venice Preserved, Alexander the Great,
Theodosius, All for Love, Œdipus, Oroonoko, Othello
, &c.
King Lear
is an admirable Tragedy of the same Kind, as
Shakespear
wrote it; but as it is reformed according to the
chymerical Notion of Poetical Justice, in my humble Opinion it has lost
half its Beauty.
the same time I must allow, that there are very
noble Tragedies which have been framed upon the other Plan, and have
ended happily; as indeed most of the good Tragedies, which have been
written since the starting of the above-mentioned Criticism, have taken
this Turn: As
The Mourning Bride, Tamerlane, Ulysses, Phædra
and
Hippolitus
, with most of Mr.
Dryden's
. I must also
allow, that many of
Shakespear's
, and several of the celebrated
Tragedies of Antiquity, are cast in the same Form. I do not therefore
dispute against this Way of writing Tragedies, but against the Criticism
that would establish this as the only Method; and by that Means would
very much cramp the
English
Tragedy, and perhaps give a wrong
Bent to the Genius of our Writers.
The Tragi-Comedy, which is the Product of the
English
Theatre, is
one of the most monstrous Inventions that ever entered into a Poet's
Thoughts. An Author might as well think of weaving the Adventures of
Æneas
and
Hudibras
into one Poem, as of writing such a
motly Piece of Mirth and Sorrow. But the Absurdity of these Performances
is so very visible, that I shall not insist upon it.
The same Objections which are made to Tragi-Comedy, may in some Measure
be applied to all Tragedies that have a double Plot in them; which are
likewise more frequent upon the
English
Stage, than upon any
other: For though the Grief of the Audience, in such Performances, be
not changed into another Passion, as in Tragi-Comedies; it is diverted
upon another Object, which weakens their Concern for the principal
Action, and breaks the Tide of Sorrow, by throwing it into different
Channels. This Inconvenience, however, may in a great Measure be cured,
if not wholly removed, by the skilful Choice of an Under-Plot, which may
bear such a near Relation to the principal Design, as to contribute
towards the Completion of it, and be concluded by the same Catastrophe.
There is also another Particular, which may be reckoned among the
Blemishes, or rather the false Beauties, of our
English
Tragedy: I
mean those particular Speeches, which are commonly known by the Name of
Rants
. The warm and passionate Parts of a Tragedy, are always the
most taking with the Audience; for which Reason we often see the Players
pronouncing, in all the Violence of Action, several Parts of the Tragedy
which the Author writ with great Temper, and designed that they should
have been so acted. I have seen
Powell
very often raise himself a
loud Clap by this Artifice. The Poets that were acquainted with this
Secret, have given frequent Occasion for such Emotions in the Actor, by
adding Vehemence to Words where there was no Passion, or inflaming a
real Passion into Fustian. This hath filled the Mouths of our Heroes
with Bombast; and given them such Sentiments, as proceed rather from a
Swelling than a Greatness of Mind. Unnatural Exclamations, Curses, Vows,
Blasphemies, a Defiance of Mankind, and an Outraging of the Gods,
frequently pass upon the Audience for tow'ring Thoughts, and have
accordingly met with infinite Applause.
I shall here add a Remark, which I am afraid our Tragick Writers may
make an ill use of. As our Heroes are generally Lovers, their Swelling
and Blustring upon the Stage very much recommends them to the fair Part
of their Audience. The Ladies are wonderfully pleased to see a Man
insulting Kings, or affronting the Gods, in one Scene, and throwing
himself at the Feet of his Mistress in another. Let him behave himself
insolently towards the Men, and abjectly towards the Fair One, and it is
ten to one but he proves a Favourite of the Boxes.
Dryden
and
Lee
, in several of their Tragedies, have practised this Secret
with good Success.
But to shew how a Rant pleases beyond the most just and natural Thought
that is not pronounced with Vehemence, I would desire the Reader when he
sees the Tragedy of
Œdipus
, to observe how quietly the Hero is
dismissed at the End of the third Act, after having pronounced the
following Lines, in which the Thought is very natural, and apt to move
Compassion;
To you, good Gods, I make my last Appeal;
Or clear my Virtues, or my Crimes reveal.
If in the Maze of Fate I blindly run,
And backward trod those Paths I sought to shun;
Impute my Errors to your own Decree:
My Hands are guilty, but my Heart is free.
us then observe with what Thunder-claps of Applause he leaves the
Stage, after the Impieties and Execrations at the End of the fourth Act
; and you will wonder to see an Audience so cursed and so pleased at
the same time;
O that as oft have at Athens seen,
[Where, by the Way, there was no Stage till many Years after
Œdipus
.]
The Stage arise, and the big Clouds descend;
So now, in very Deed, I might behold
This pond'rous Globe, and all yen marble Roof,
Meet like the Hands of Jove, and crush Mankind.
For all the Elements, &c.
Here Aristotle is not quite accurately quoted. What he says
of the tragedies which end unhappily is, that Euripides was right in
preferring them,
'and as the strongest proof of it we find that upon the stage, and in
the dramatic contests, such tragedies, if they succeed, have always
the most tragic effect.'
Poetics
, Part II. § 12.
Of the two plays in this list, besides
Othello
,
which have not been mentioned in the preceding notes,
All for
Love
, produced in 1678, was Dryden's
Antony and Cleopatra
,
Oroonoko
, first acted in, 1678, was a tragedy by Thomas
Southerne, which included comic scenes. Southerne, who held a commission
in the army, was living in the
Spectator's
time, and died in
1746, aged 86. It was in his best play,
Isabella
, or the Fatal
Marriage, that Mrs. Siddons, in 1782, made her first appearance on the
London stage.
Congreve's
Mourning Bride
was first acted in 1697;
Rowe's
Tamerlane
(with a hero planned in complement to William
III) in 1702; Rowe's
Ulysses
in 1706; Edmund Smith's
Phædra
and
Hippolitus
in 1707.
The third Act of
Œdipus
was by Dryden, the fourth
by Lee. Dryden wrote also the first Act, the rest was Lee's.
Contents
Having spoken of Mr. Powell,
as sometimes raising himself Applause from the ill Taste of an Audience;
I must do him the Justice to own,
that he is excellently formed for a Tragoedian,
and, when he pleases, deserves the Admiration of the best Judges;
as I doubt not but he will in the Conquest of Mexico,
which is acted for his own Benefit To-morrow Night.
C.
|
Tuesday, April 17, 1711 |
Steele |
Compassion for the Gentleman who writes the following Letter, should not
prevail upon me to fall upon the Fair Sex, if it were not that I find
they are frequently Fairer than they ought to be. Such Impostures are
not to be tolerated in Civil Society; and I think his Misfortune ought
to be made publick, as a Warning for other Men always to Examine into
what they Admire.
Sir,
Supposing you to be a Person of general Knowledge, I make my
Application to you on a very particular Occasion. I have a great Mind
to be rid of my Wife, and hope, when you consider my Case, you will be
of Opinion I have very just Pretensions to a Divorce. I am a mere Man
of the Town, and have very little Improvement, but what I have got
from Plays.
I remember in
The Silent Woman the Learned Dr.
Cutberd, or Dr.
Otter (I forget which) makes one of the
Causes of Separation to be
Error Personæ, when a Man marries
a Woman, and finds her not to be the same Woman whom he intended to
marry, but another
1. If that be Law, it is, I presume, exactly my
Case. For you are to know, Mr.
Spectator, that there are Women who do
not let their Husbands see their Faces till they are married.
Not to keep you in suspence, I mean plainly, that Part of the Sex who
paint. They are some of them so Exquisitely skilful this Way, that
give them but a Tolerable Pair of Eyes to set up with, and they will
make Bosoms, Lips, Cheeks, and Eye-brows, by their own Industry. As
for my Dear, never Man was so Enamour'd as I was of her fair Forehead,
Neck, and Arms, as well as the bright Jett of her Hair; but to my
great Astonishment, I find they were all the Effects of Art: Her Skin
is so Tarnished with this Practice, that when she first wakes in a
Morning, she scarce seems young enough to be the Mother of her whom I
carried to Bed the Night before. I shall take the Liberty to part with
her by the first Opportunity, unless her Father will make her Portion
suitable to her real, not her assumed, Countenance. This I thought fit
to let him and her know by your Means.
I am, Sir,
Your most obedient,
humble Servant.
I cannot tell what the Law, or the Parents of the Lady, will do for this
Injured Gentleman, but must allow he has very much Justice on his Side.
I have indeed very long observed this Evil, and distinguished those of
our Women who wear their own, from those in borrowed Complexions, by the
Picts
and the
British
. There does not need any great
Discernment to judge which are which. The
British
have a lively,
animated Aspect; The
Picts
, tho' never so Beautiful, have dead,
uninformed Countenances. The Muscles of a real Face sometimes swell with
soft Passion, sudden Surprize, and are flushed with agreeable
Confusions, according as the Objects before them, or the Ideas presented
to them, affect their Imagination. But the
Picts
behold all
things with the same Air, whether they are Joyful or Sad; the same fixed
Insensibility appears upon all Occasions. A
Pict
, tho' she takes
all that Pains to invite the Approach of Lovers, is obliged to keep them
at a certain Distance; a Sigh in a Languishing Lover, if fetched too
near her, would dissolve a Feature; and a Kiss snatched by a Forward
one, might transfer the Complexion of the Mistress to the Admirer. It is
hard to speak of these false Fair Ones, without saying something
uncomplaisant, but I would only recommend to them to consider how they
like coming into a Room new Painted; they may assure themselves, the
near Approach of a Lady who uses this Practice is much more offensive.
Will. Honeycomb
told us, one Day, an Adventure he once had with a
Pict
. This Lady had Wit, as well as Beauty, at Will; and made it
her Business to gain Hearts, for no other Reason, but to rally the
Torments of her Lovers. She would make great Advances to insnare Men,
but without any manner of Scruple break off when there was no
Provocation. Her Ill-Nature and Vanity made my Friend very easily Proof
against the Charms of her Wit and Conversation; but her beauteous Form,
instead of being blemished by her Falshood and Inconstancy, every Day
increased upon him, and she had new Attractions every time he saw her.
When she observed
Will
. irrevocably her Slave, she began to use him as
such, and after many Steps towards such a Cruelty, she at last utterly
banished him. The unhappy Lover strove in vain, by servile Epistles, to
revoke his Doom; till at length he was forced to the last Refuge, a
round Sum of Money to her Maid. This corrupt Attendant placed him early
in the Morning behind the Hangings in her Mistress's Dressing-Room. He
stood very conveniently to observe, without being seen. The
Pict
begins the Face she designed to wear that Day, and I have heard him
protest she had worked a full half Hour before he knew her to be the
same Woman. As soon as he saw the Dawn of that Complexion, for which he
had so long languished, he thought fit to break from his Concealment,
repeating that of
Cowley
:
Th' adorning Thee, with so much Art,
Is but a barbarous Skill;
'Tis like the Pois'ning of a Dart,
Too apt before to kill
2.
The
Pict
stood before him in the utmost Confusion, with the prettiest
Smirk imaginable on the finished side of her Face, pale as Ashes on the
other.
Honeycomb
seized all her Gallypots and Washes, and carried off
his Han kerchief full of Brushes, Scraps of
Spanish
Wool, and Phials
of Unguents. The Lady went into the Country, the Lover was cured.
It is certain no Faith ought to be kept with Cheats, and an Oath made to
a
Pict
is of it self void. I would therefore exhort all the
British
Ladies to single them out, nor do I know any but
Lindamira
, who should
be Exempt from Discovery; for her own Complexion is so delicate, that
she ought to be allowed the covering it with Paint, as a Punishment for
choosing to be the worst Piece of Art extant, instead of the Masterpiece
of Nature. As for my part, who have no Expectations from Women, and
consider them only as they are Part of the Species, I do not half so
much fear offending a Beauty, as a Woman of Sense; I shall therefore
produce several Faces which have been in Publick this many Years, and
never appeared. It will be a very pretty Entertainment in the Playhouse
(when I have abolished this Custom) to see so many Ladies, when they
first lay it down,
incog.
, in their own Faces.
In the mean time, as a Pattern for improving their Charms, let the Sex
study the agreeable
Statira
. Her Features are enlivened with the
Chearfulness of her Mind, and good Humour gives an Alacrity to her Eyes.
She is Graceful without affecting an Air, and Unconcerned without
appearing Careless. Her having no manner of Art in her Mind, makes her
want none in her Person.
How like is this Lady, and how unlike is a
Pict
, to that Description
Dr.
Donne
gives of his Mistress?
Her pure and eloquent Blood
Spoke in her Cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,
That one would almost say her Body thought
3.
Ben Jonson's
Epicœne
, or the Silent Woman, kept the
stage in the
Spectator's
time, and was altered by G. Colman for Drury
Lane, in 1776. Cutbeard in the play is a barber, and Thomas Otter a Land
and Sea Captain.
Tom Otter's bull, bear, and horse is known all over
England, in rerum naturâ.
In the fifth act Morose, who has
married a Silent Woman and discovered her tongue after marriage, is
played upon by the introduction of Otter, disguised as a Divine, and
Cutbeard, as a Canon Lawyer, to explain to him
for how many causes a man may have divortium legitimum, a
lawful divorce.
Cutbeard, in opening with burlesque pedantry a budget of twelve
impediments which make the bond null, is thus supported by Otter:
| Cutb. |
The first is impedimentum erroris. |
| Otter. |
Of which there are several species. |
| Cutb |
Ay, as error personæ. |
| Otter |
If you contract yourself to one person, thinking her another. |
This is fourth of five stanzas to
The Waiting-Maid,
in
the collection of poems called
The Mistress
.
Donne's
Funeral Elegies
, on occasion of the untimely death
of Mistress Elizabeth Drury.
Of the Progress of the Soul,
Second
Anniversary. It is the strain not of a mourning lover, but of a mourning
friend. Sir Robert Drury was so cordial a friend that he gave to Donne
and his wife a lodging rent free in his own large house in Drury Lane,
'and was also,' says Isaac Walton, 'a cherisher of his studies, and
such a friend as sympathized with him and his, in all their joys and
sorrows.'
The lines quoted by Steele show that the sympathy was mutual;
but the poetry in them is a flash out of the clouds of a dull context.
It is hardly worth noticing that Steele, quoting from memory, puts
'would' for 'might' in the last line. Sir Robert's daughter Elizabeth,
who, it is said, was to have been the wife of Prince Henry, eldest son
of James I, died at the age of fifteen in 1610.
Contents
A young Gentlewoman of about Nineteen Years of Age
(bred in the Family of a Person of Quality lately deceased,)
who Paints the finest Flesh-colour,
wants a Place,
and is to be heard of at the House of
Minheer Grotesque
a Dutch Painter in Barbican.
N.B.
She is also well-skilled in the Drapery-part,
and puts on Hoods and mixes Ribbons
so as to suit the Colours of the Face
with great Art and Success.
R.
|
Wednesday, April 18, 1711 |
Addison |
Garganum inugire putes nemus aut mare Thuscum,
Tanto cum strepitu ludi spectantur; et artes,
Divitiæque peregrina, quibus oblitus actor
Cum stetit in Scena, concurrit dextera lævæ.
Dixit adhuc aliquid? Nil sane. Quid placet ergo?
Lana Tarentino violas imitata veneno.
Hor.
translation
Aristotle
has
, That ordinary Writers in Tragedy endeavour
to raise Terror and Pity in their Audience, not by proper Sentiments and
Expressions, but by the Dresses and Decorations of the Stage. There is
something of this kind very ridiculous in the
English
Theatre. When
the Author has a mind to terrify us, it thunders; When he would make us
melancholy, the Stage is darkened. But among all our Tragick Artifices,
I am the most offended at those which are made use of to inspire us with
magnificent Ideas of the Persons that speak. The ordinary Method of
making an Hero, is to clap a huge Plume of Feathers upon his Head, which
rises so very high, that there is often a greater Length from his Chin
to the Top of his Head, than to the sole of his Foot. One would believe,
that we thought a great Man and a tall Man the same thing. This very
much embarrasses the Actor, who is forced to hold his Neck extremely
stiff and steady all the while he speaks; and notwithstanding any
Anxieties which he pretends for his Mistress, his Country, or his
Friends, one may see by his Action, that his greatest Care and Concern
is to keep the Plume of Feathers from falling off his Head. For my own
part, when I see a Man uttering his Complaints under such a Mountain of
Feathers, I am apt to look upon him rather as an unfortunate Lunatick,
than a distressed Hero. As these superfluous Ornaments upon the Head
make a great Man, a Princess generally receives her Grandeur from those
additional Incumbrances that fall into her Tail: I mean the broad
sweeping Train that follows her in all her Motions, and finds constant
Employment for a Boy who stands behind her to open and spread it to
Advantage. I do not know how others are affected at this Sight, but, I
must confess, my Eyes are wholly taken up with the Page's Part; and as
for the Queen, I am not so attentive to any thing she speaks, as to the
right adjusting of her Train, lest it should chance to trip up her
Heels, or incommode her, as she walks to and fro upon the Stage. It is,
in my Opinion, a very odd Spectacle, to see a Queen venting her Passion
in a disordered Motion, and a little Boy taking care all the while that
they do not ruffle the Tail of her Gown. The Parts that the two Persons
act on the Stage at the same Time, are very different: The Princess is
afraid lest she should incur the Displeasure of the King her Father, or
lose the Hero her Lover, whilst her Attendant is only concerned lest she
should entangle her Feet in her Petticoat.
We are told, That an ancient Tragick Poet, to move the Pity of his
Audience for his exiled Kings and distressed Heroes, used to make the
Actors represent them in Dresses and Cloaths that were thread-bare and
decayed. This Artifice for moving Pity, seems as ill-contrived, as that
we have been speaking of to inspire us with a great Idea of the Persons
introduced upon the Stage. In short, I would have our Conceptions raised
by the Dignity of Thought and Sublimity of Expression, rather than by a
Train of Robes or a Plume of Feathers.
Another mechanical Method of making great Men, and adding Dignity to
Kings and Queens, is to accompany them with Halberts and Battle-axes.
Two or three Shifters of Scenes, with the two Candle-snuffers, make up a
compleat Body of Guards upon the
English
Stage; and by the Addition of
a few Porters dressed in Red Coats, can represent above a Dozen Legions.
I have sometimes seen a Couple of Armies drawn up together upon the
Stage, when the Poet has been disposed to do Honour to his Generals. It
is impossible for the Reader's Imagination to multiply twenty Men into
such prodigious Multitudes, or to fancy that two or three hundred
thousand Soldiers are fighting in a Room of forty or fifty Yards in
Compass. Incidents of such a Nature should be told, not represented.
Non tamen intus
Digna geri promes in scenam: multaque tolles
Ex oculis, qua mox narret facundia prœsens.
Hor.
Yet there are things improper for a Scene,
Which Men of Judgment only will relate.
(L. Roscom.)
I should therefore, in this Particular, recommend to my Countrymen the
Example of the
French
Stage, where the Kings and Queens always appear
unattended, and leave their Guards behind the Scenes. I should likewise
be glad if we imitated the
French
in banishing from our Stage the
Noise of Drums, Trumpets, and Huzzas; which is sometimes so very great,
that when there is a Battle in the
Hay-Market
Theatre, one may hear it
as far as
Charing-Cross
.
I have here only touched upon those Particulars which are made use of to
raise and aggrandize Persons in Tragedy; and shall shew in another Paper
the several Expedients which are practised by Authors of a vulgar Genius
to move Terror, Pity, or Admiration, in their Hearers.
The Tailor and the Painter often contribute to the Success of a Tragedy
more than the Poet. Scenes affect ordinary Minds as much as Speeches;
and our Actors are very sensible, that a well-dressed Play his sometimes
brought them as full Audiences, as a well-written one. The
Italians