|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 8
Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken
for realities, but because they bring realities to mind. When the
imagination is recreated by a painted landscape, the trees are not
supposed capable to give us shade, or the fountains coolness; but
we consider, how we should be pleased with such fountains playing
beside us, and such woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading
the history of "Henry the Fifth", yet no man takes his book for the
field of Agencourt. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited with
concomitants that encrease or diminish its effect. Familiar comedy
is often more powerful on the theatre, than in the page; imperial
tragedy is always less. The humour of Petruchio may be heightened
by grimace; but what voice or what gesture can hope to add dignity
or force to the soliloquy of Cato.
A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is therefore
evident, that the action is not supposed to be real, and it follows
that between the acts a longer or shorter time may be allowed to
pass, and that no more account of space or duration is to be taken
by the auditor of a drama, than by the reader of a narrative, before
whom may pass in an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of
an empire.
Whether Shakespeare knew the unities, and rejected them by design,
or deviated from them by happy ignorance, it is, I think, impossible
to decide, and useless to inquire. We may reasonably suppose, that,
when he rose to notice, he did not want the counsels and admonitions
of scholars and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted
in a practice, which he might have begun by chance. As nothing is
essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the unities
of time and place arise evidently from false assumptions, and,
by circumscribing the extent of the drama, lessen its variety, I
cannot think it much to be lamented, that they were not known by
him, or not observed: Nor, if such another poet could arise, should
I very vehemently reproach him, that his first act passed at Venice,
and his next in Cyprus. Such violations of rules merely positive,
become the comprehensive genius of Shakespeare, and such censures
are suitable to the minute and slender criticism of Voltaire:
Non usque adeo permiscuit imis
Longus summa dies, ut non, si voce Metelli
Serventur leges, malint a Caesare tolli.
Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I cannot but
recollect how much wit and learning may be produced against me;
before such authorities I am afraid to stand, not that I think
the present question one of those that are to be decided by mere
authority, but because it is to be suspected, that these precepts
have not been so easily received but for better reasons than I
have yet been able to find. The result of my enquiries, in which it
would be ludicrous to boast of impartiality, is, that the unities
of time and place are not essential to a just drama, that though
they may sometimes conduce to pleasure, they are always to be
sacrificed to the nobler beauties of variety and instruction; and
that a play, written with nice observation of critical rules, is
to be contemplated as an elaborate curiosity, as the product of
superfluous and ostentatious art, by which is shewn, rather what
is possible, than what is necessary.
He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall preserve
all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause with the
architect, who shall display all the orders of architecture in a
citadel, without any deduction from its strength; but the principal
beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy; and the greatest graces
of a play, are to copy nature and instruct life.
Perhaps, what I have here not dogmatically but deliberately written,
may recal the principles of the drama to a new examination. I am
almost frighted at my own temerity; and when I estimate the fame
and the strength of those that maintain the contrary opinion, am
ready to sink down in reverential silence; as Aeneas withdrew from
the defence of Troy, when he saw Neptune shaking the wall, and Juno
heading the besiegers.
Those whom my arguments cannot persuade to give their approbation
to the judgment of Shakespeare, will easily, if they consider the
condition of his life, make some allowance for his ignorance.
Every man's performances, to be rightly estimated, must be compared
with the state of the age in which he lived, and with his own
particular opportunities; and though to the reader a book be not
worse or better for the circumstances of the authour, yet as there
is always a silent reference of human works to human abilities, and
as the enquiry, how far man may extend his designs, or how high
he may rate his native force, is of far greater dignity than in
what rank we shall place any particular performance, curiosity is
always busy to discover the instruments, as well as to survey the
workmanship, to know how much is to be ascribed to original powers,
and how much to casual and adventitious help. The palaces of Peru
or Mexico were certainly mean and incommodious habitations, if
compared to the houses of European monarchs; yet who could forbear
to view them with astonishment, who remembered that they were built
without the use of iron?
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|