Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature

Such, nearly, was the state of the French theatre before the appearance of Voltaire. His knowledge of the Greeks was very limited, although he now and then spoke of them with en...

The scene of the _Choephorae of Aeschylus_ is laid in front of the royal palace; the tomb of Agamemnon appears on the stage. Orestes appears at the sepulchre, with his faithful...

If _Romeo and Juliet_ shines with the colours of the dawn of morning, but a dawn whose purple clouds already announce the thunder of a sultry day, _Othello_ is, on the other han...

Notwithstanding the severe conclusion of the first _Oedipus_ we are so far reconciled to it by the violence, suspicion, and haughtiness in the character of Oedipus, that our fee...

There are other moral defects, which are beheld by their possessor with a certain degree of satisfaction, and which he even makes it a principle not to get rid of, but to cheris...

The kind of moral which we may in general expect from Comedy I have already shown: it is an applied doctrine of ethics, the art of life. In this respect the higher comedies of M...

In the use of verse and prose Shakspeare observes very nice distinctions according to the ranks of the speakers, but still more according to their characters and disposition of...

I found occasionally, even in the action of the very best players of the present day, sudden leaps from the measured solemnity in recitation and gesticulation which the general...

I have called mythology the chief materials of tragedy. We know, indeed, of two historical tragedies by Grecian authors: the _Capture of Miletus_, of Phrynichus, and the _Persia...

In addition to Molière we have to notice but a few older or contemporary comedians. Of Corneille, who from the imitation of Spanish comedies acquired a name before he was known...

In _Britannicus_, I have already praised the historical fidelity of the picture. Nero, Agrippina, Narcissus, and Burrhus, are so accurately sketched, and finished with such ligh...

Modern philologists have dedicated voluminous treatises, to prove the spuriousness of _Rhesus_, the subject of which is taken from the eleventh book of the Iliad. Their opinion...

The invention of dramatic art, and of the theatre, seems a very obvious and natural one. Man has a great disposition to mimicry; when he enters vividly into the situation, senti...

And yet Johnson has objected to Shakspeare that his pathos is not always natural and free from affectation. There are, it is true, passages, though comparatively speaking very f...

Of the Old Comedy but one writer has come down to us, and we cannot, therefore, in forming an estimate of his merits, enforce it by a comparison with other masters. Aristophanes...

Of all Jonson's pieces there is hardly one which, as it stands, would please on the stage in the present day, even as most of them failed to please in his own time; extracts fro...

The proofs of his ignorance, on which the greatest stress is laid, are a few geographical blunders and anachronisms. Because in a comedy founded on an earlier tale, he makes shi...

A thorough critical knowledge of the antiquities of the English theatre can only he obtained in England; the old editions of the pieces which belong to the earlier period are ev...

The regular Comedy of the Romans was, for the most part, _palliata_, that is, it appeared in a Grecian costume, and represented Grecian manners. This is the case with all the co...

The pieces of Lope de Vega, numerous beyond all belief, have partly never been printed; while of those that have, a complete collection is seldom to be found, except in Spain. M...

So much for the main features of Richard's character. The play named after him embraces also the latter part of the reign of Edward IV., in the whole a period of eight years. It...

A considerable interval takes place between the period of the first and second pieces, during which Orestes grows up to manhood. The second and third are connected together imme...

The forms of the masks, [Footnote: We have obtained a knowledge of them from the imitations in stone which have come down to us. They display both beauty and variety. That great...

I then return to what may properly be called the Tragedy of the Italians. After the _Sophonisba_, and a few pieces of the same period, which Calsabigi calls the first tragic lis...

A new aera of French Tragedy begins with Voltaire, whose first appearance, in his early youth, as a writer for the theatre, followed close upon the age of Louis the Fourteenth....

These are the dramas of a higher kind, which by foreigners are called Pieces of Intrigue, but by Spaniards, from the dress in which they are acted, Comedies of Cloak and Sword (...

Continuing attached to the University of Jena, where the dignity of Professorship was associated with that of Member of the Council, he now commenced a course of lectures on Aes...

Logical coherence, the causal connexion, I hold to be equally essential to Tragedy and every serious drama, because all the mental powers act and react upon each other, and if t...

Among the foreign authors who wrote before this school can be said to have been formed in Germany, we may mention Rousseau, who acknowledged the contrast in music, and showed th...

From what has been said, it is easy to overlook the whole round of characters; nay, they are so few, and so perpetually recur, that they may be almost all enumerated. The auster...

But what more especially characterizes the tragedy of Sophocles, is the heavenly serenity beside a subject so terrific, the fresh air of life and youth which breathes through th...

We have, besides, a particular reason for censuring without reserve the errors of this poet; the fact, namely, that our own age is infected with the same faults with those which...

In the same manner, in the _Seven before Thebes_, the king and the messenger, whose speeches occupy the greatest part of the piece, speak more in virtue of their office than as...

The great master of whom we have spoken in the preceding Lecture, forms so singular an exception to the whole history of art, that we are compelled to assign a particular place...

With pretensions far lower, the _Comic Opera_ or _Operette_ approaches much more nearly to perfection. With respect to the composition, it may and indeed ought to assume only a...

The _Ecclesiazusae_ is in like manner a picture of woman's ascendency, but one much more depraved than the former. In the dress of men the women steal into the public assembly,...

The dramas derived from the English history, ten in number, form one of the most valuable of Shakspeare's works, and partly the fruit of his maturest age. I say advisedly _one_...

The three principal kinds of poetry in general are the epic, the lyric, and the dramatic. All the other subordinate species are either derived from these, or formed by combinati...

Addison possessed an elegant mind, but he was by no means a poet. He undertook to purify the English Tragedy, by bringing it into a compliance with the supposed rules of good ta...

It is singular enough, that of all the dramatical works of Lessing, the last, _Nathan der Weise_, which he wrote when his zeal for the improvement of the German theatre had near...

Closing of the Stage by the Puritans--Revival of the Stage under Charles the Second--Depravity of Taste and Morals--Dryden, Otway, and others-- Characterization of the Comic Poe...

Platonius mentions a further characteristic of the Middle Comedy. On account, he says, of the danger of alluding to public affairs, the comic writers had turned all their satire...

Respecting the tragic dignity of historical subjects, peculiar principles have prevailed. Corneille was in the best way of the world when he brought his _Cid_ on the stage, a st...

_All's Well that Ends Well_, _Much Ado about Nothing_, _Measure for Measure_, and _The Merchant of Venice_, bear, in so far, a resemblance to each other, that, along with the ma...

_Zaire_ is considered in France as the triumph of tragic poetry in the representation of lore and jealousy. We will not assert with Lessing, that Voltaire was acquainted only wi...

From all the accounts of Shakspeare which have come down to us, it is clear that his contemporaries knew well the treasure they possessed in him; and that they felt and understo...

We have a comedy of Tasso's, _Gli Intrichi d'Amore_, which ought rather to be called a lengthy romance in the form of dialogue. So many and such wonderful events are crowded tog...

The theatres of the Greeks were quite open above, and their dramas were always acted in day, and beneath the canopy of heaven. The Romans, indeed, at an after period, may have s...

"Were I to pray for a taste which should stand me in stead under every variety of circumstances, and be a source of happiness and cheerfulness to me during life, and a shield ag...

_The Midsummer Night's Dream_ and _The Tempest_, may be in so far compared together that in both the influence of a wonderful world of spirits is interwoven with the turmoil of...

As in _Macbeth_ terror reaches its utmost height, in _King Lear_ the science of compassion is exhausted. The principal characters here are not those who act, but those who suffe...

King Henry the Fifth is manifestly Shakspeare's favourite hero in English history: he paints him as endowed with every chivalrous and kingly virtue; open, sincere, affable, yet,...

Least of all am I disposed to approve of the principles which Schiller followed in _The Bride of Messina_, and which he openly avows in his preface. The examination of them, how...

The use of intrigue is certainly well calculated to effect the all-desired short duration of an important action. For the intriguer is ever expeditious, and loses no time in att...

The expositions or statements of the preliminary situation of things are another nuisance. They generally consist of choicely turned disclosures to the confidants, delivered in...