Influence_of_Classical_Tragedies_on_Renaissance_Playwrights

As a Renaissance playwright, there are several aspects of classical tragedy that are imperative to your knowledge and play major roles in an effective tragedy. These elements include plot, character, rhetoric, entertainment and theme. They should be utilized in your plays, as the success of the tragedies will rely on the foundation set by playwrights such as Seneca, Sophocles, and Euripides, and many other classical dramatists. Plot is imperative to any tragedy, as it is the basis of entire story. The plot is the sequence of events that is, in essence, the structure to the drama itself. The play begins with an opening that prefaces what this story entails, has a middle that involves all of the messy situations, and an end that ties up the series of events and illustrates a message to the audience. Throughout the plot, there is often rising and falling of tension and release in the audience as the protagonist makes his or her way through each high and low point. The plot should give the audience a feeling of suspense, pity, fear, or disgust. Other factors that are often included are a secret murder, a sexual betrayal, bloody family vendettas, ghosts, and some sort of eruption of general violence at the end. There is usually a “reversal of fortune”, which has the protagonist’s initial happiness completely turned around and creates this tragic drama, due to a mistake made along the way. Seneca’s Thyestes demonstrates many of these elements of plot, as the concept of revenge is the main basis of the play. Thyestes and Atreus, brothers and enemies, are trying to outdo one another in their lifelong battle. This bloody family vendetta involves Atreus trying to outdo Thyestes for sleeping with his wife, a sexual betrayal, and ends in the murder of his brother’s three sons, which is an incredibly vicious, inhumane display of evisceration, known as the eruption of violence. Atreus is plotting throughout most of the play, as he slowly drifts between the line of sanity and insanity. Modern writing, such as The Changeling, reverberates these components as well, originally illustrated by your classical predecessor, Seneca. The concept of rising and falling, as Beatrice plots her murder of Piraquo and eventual marriage to Alsemero, is evident in much of the play. Just when Beatrice feels as though her plan will prevail, as her father expresses his respect for her potential husband, Deflores shatters all hopes entirely and blackmails her throughout the duration of the play. This tragic mistake leads her to her sexual betrayal, another secret murder, and in the end, her reversal of fortune when her sins are revealed, and she is murdered by Deflores who then takes his own life. Almost to a tee, the basic components of plot are demonstrated in Middleton’s The Changeling, with modernity due to today’s times. As mentioned before, a mistake is usually made by the “tragic hero”, which brings us to another very important component categorized as characters. The tragic hero typically has some character flaw or makes a mistake that leads the initial intentions of this character to absolute chaos. Usually, this character has a conceited attitude, and especially in the case of classical tragedy, demonstrates that they think they are above divine intervention or punishment, known as hubris. This character undergoes a change through the duration of the plot, and sometimes has a revelation about destiny, gods, or mankind. An example of a protagonist that illustrates the mistake and hubris is Pentheus, from Euripides’ The Bacchae. In his excessive pride, he blasphemes Dionysus, and ignorantly challenges the work of this powerful god. This is a terrible mistake for someone so mortal and unaware of the Bacchus’ true power. Even though the God himself comes to Pentheus and tries to convince him of the capabilities of Dionysus, this ignorant king disregards the god-in-disguise and continues to think he is above this divine intervention. He ends up truly paying for this decision as Dionysus shows what happens to someone who is blasphemous, especially toward him. The tragic hero makes a mistake, displays hubris, and then is punished by a divine being by being eviscerated by his own mother. Language is another very important part of a tragedy. Whether it is the choice of words or the actual sound that comes from those words, a playwright needs to take into consideration how the play is sounding to the audience, regardless of all the other characters, setting, and events on stage. Diction plays a large role in keeping the audience interested in the play through pleasant, sometimes poetic words. An example of a classical playwright who possessed skill in diction was Seneca. His language was very straightforward, and at the same time had a verbose nature, which kept the audience involved but not bored with the plain expression of each character. What also sets the most successful classical playwrights apart is their ability to balance diction and thought. This intellect must be balanced throughout the play, and challenge the audience to put their minds around it, but at the same time not leave anyone behind in the process. Subtle tropes, metaphors, and other forms of rhetoric are key to a thoughtful play that stimulates connections, both intellectually and between the characters in the audience. After finding the balance between diction and thought, the entertainment value is crucial to keeping the audience at attention and continuing the success of the tragedy. If there were no comic relief, love, or happiness to begin with, the tragedy would be a depressing afternoon for any audience. A sense of loss needs to be felt by both the characters and audience for them to feel emotion from the tragedy. This goes along with the rising and falling plotline, however it also involves entertaining the audience through something other than intellect and a surprising turn of events. Examples of spectacles include murder, affairs, and divine appearances. Both Thyestes by Seneca and The Bacchae by Euripides would not be complete without their infamous motif of evisceration. The scenes evict so much emotion from characters and the audience as the actual separation of a human body is being described. In The Bacchae, as Agave tears her son limb from limb, and another tears “a foot still warm in its shoe” (1134), the Maenads are “shrieking in triumph” as they dance through the murder. In a matter of two pages, the frenzied act was completed and Pentheus’ “pitiful remains lie scattered.” (1138) Similarly, in Thyestes it almost becomes humorous as the awful, obscene language of this scene depicts the actual skin being ripped from the bodies of children and it is served on a platter to be dined on by Thyestes. The carefully chosen words are so appalling it makes the audience wriggle in horror but at the same time it draws in its attention so that they cannot look away. The messenger describes, “the entrails torn from the warm bodies lay quivering, veins still throbbing, shocked hearts beating.” (IV,78) Scenes like this attract the audience in the same way they are repulsed, and also keep the audience on their toes. Lastly, as the final scene draws to an end, and the plot, characters, language, and entertainment are tied together in one last act, there should be a theme or message taken away from the play itself. There are more obvious lessons learned by the characters and plot, however what should be grasped usually has more to do with the blindness of human ignorance. In multiple classical plays, such as The Bacchae, Oedipus Rex, Electra, and Thyestes, a message is illustrated about mankind, usually even in the very last line. In Electra, the Chorus ends with, “Farewell. The mortal who can fare well, not broken by trouble met on the road, leads a most blessed life.” As a last summary to the events in Electra, the Chorus broadens the lessons learned by the characters to a lesson for mankind that those who avoid being “broken” by the obstacles in the road of life, will prevail in the end. Electra met a problem, the murder of her father and banishment of her brother, and in her own self-destruction ended her life as she knew it because of her obsession with revenge. Today, as you know, tragedies such as Tis Pity She’s a Whore, mimic this idea, as Ford ends his play with the Cardinal asking, “Who could not say, ‘Tis Pity she’s a whore'” (V, iii, 159) He is opening the question to the audience to make their own opinion about whether or not Annabella is a whore, but also their perspective of events in the play exemplified in mankind. In summary, the components from classical tragedy must be utilized in the art of playwriting in modern times, and will surely aid in the success of your tragedies. The ideas of Seneca, Euripides, and Sophocles have truly shaped the mold of tragedies, and echoing their methods of plot, character, language, entertainment, and theme will truly enhance your work. The classical times must be built upon in order to be successful today so that your work may be referenced for centuries to come.