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LECTURES ON DRAMATIC LITERATURE.

vation which is requisite for comedy, but yet hale and active, and free from all symptoms of caducity; we see in them that corporeal vigour, which is at once a proof of soundness of constitution of body and mind; no inspired enthusiasm, but at the same time nothing of folly or extravagance; a sage seriousness rather dwells on the brow, which is not however wrinkled with care, but with the exercise of reflection; yet in the alert look, and the willing smile on the mouth, we cannot mistake the indications of a playful irony.

LECTURE VIII.

Roman theatre.-Native kinds: Attellanic Fables, Mimi, Comedia Togata.— Greek tragedy transplanted to Rome.-Tragic authors of a former epoch, and of the Augustan age.-Idea of a national Roman tragedy.-Causes of the want of success of the Romans in Tragedy.--Seneca.-The Italians.-Pastoral dramas of Tasso and Guarani.--Small progress in tragedy.-Metastasio and Alfieri.-Character of both.--Comedies of Ariosto, Aretin, Porta.Improvisatore masks.-Goldoni.-Gozzi.-Latest state.

In the preceding part of these Lectures, we have been occupied with an investigation into the nature of the drama in general, and its peculiar appearance among the Greeks, whose stage was not only original, but carried to the utmost degree of perfection. In entering upon a consideration of the dramatic literature of other nations, we must in general express ourselves with greater brevity; and in doing so, we are not afraid that we shall be accused of either disproportionate length or conciseness.

And first, with respect to the Romans, whose theatre immediately follows that of the Greeks, we have only, as it were, to notice one great gap, which is partly owing to their want of creative powers in this department, and partly to the loss of all their theatrical productions, with the exception of a few fragments. The only works of the good classical times, which have descended to us, are those of Plautus and Terence, whom I have already characterized as copyists of the Greeks.

The Romans could not be said to have had a poetry of their own native growth, as it was first artificially cultivated among them along with other luxuries, when the original character of Rome was nearly extinguished by an imitation of foreign manners. We have in the Latin, the example of a language modelled into poetical expression, according to foreign grammatical and metrical forms. This imitation of the Greek bore at first the marks of great violence and constraint: the Græcism was carried the length of a clumsy intermixture of the two languages. The poetical style was gradually softened down, and we still perceive in Catullus the last traces of its early harshness, which are not however without a certain stately attraction. Those constructions, and those compound words more especially, which were too much at variance with the internal structure of the Latin, and which were grating to the Roman ear, were in time thrown out, and the poets at length succeeded in the age of Augustus, in producing the most agreeable combination of the peculiarities of the

two languages. Hardly however had this equilibrium been attained, when all free developement was at a stand, and the poetical expression, notwithstanding an apparent advance to greater boldness and learning, was irrevocably confined within the circle of those modes of expression which had once received the sanction of public approbation. The Latin poetical language therefore flourished only during the short interval which elapsed between the period of its formation and its death; and with respect to the spirit of the poetry, its fate cannot be said to have been more successful.

The Romans were not led to the invention of theatrical amusements, from the want of representations to fill up the leisure of their festivals, and to enliven the mind by withdrawing it from the concerns of life; but in the despondency of a desolating pestilence, against which all remedies seemed insufficient, they had recourse to the theatre, as a means of appeasing the anger of the gods, having previously been only acquainted with gymnastic exercises, and circus races. The histriones, whom they sent for from Etruria, were however merely dancers, who probably did not attempt pantomimic movements, but endeavoured to delight their audience by a display of bodily activity. The oldest spoken plays, the Fabula Atellanæ, were borrowed by the Romans from the Osci, the indigenous inhabitants of Italy. They were satisfied with these saturæ (for so they were called, as at first they were merely improvisatory farces, without any dramatic connexion; satura, signifying a farrago, or mixture of everything), till Livius Andromicus, somewhat more than five hundred years after the foundation of Rome, began the imitation of the Greeks; and the regular compositions of tragedy and the new comedy (the old it was impossible to transplant) were then, for the first time, known in Rome.

Thus the Romans owed the first idea of a play to the Etrurians, the effusions of a sportive humour to the Oscians, and the higher class of dramatic productions to the Greeks. They displayed however more originality in the comic than in the tragic department. The Oscians, whose language soon ceased to be spoken, and of which the remains were only to be found in these farces, were a race so nearly related to the Romans, that their dialect must have been immediately understood by a Roman audience: for if this had not been the case, how could the Romans have derived any amusement from the Atellanæ? So much did they appropriate this species of drama to themselves, that Roman youths, of noble families, became enamoured of the amusement, and used to engage in the representation; on which account, even the players, who gained a livelihood by acting

the Atellanic fables, enjoyed peculiar privileges, being exempted from the ignominy which attached to other theatrical artists, the exclusion from corporations and from military service.

The Romans had, besides, their peculiar Mimi: The foreign name of these small pieces would lead us to conclude that they bore a great affinity to the Greek Mimi; they differed however considerably in form; we know also that the manners portrayed in them had a local truth, and that the subject was not derived from Grecian compositions.

It is peculiar to Italy, that from the earliest times the people have displayed a native talent for a merry, amusing, though very rude species of farce or buffoonery, in extemporary speeches and songs, with accompanying gestures; but this talent has seldom been coupled with true dramatic knowledge. In justification of this last assertion, we have only to notice what has been performed in the higher walks of the drama in that country, down to the very latest period. The former might be confirmed by a number of circumstances, which would lead us however too far from our object into the history of the Saturnalia and similar customs. In the wit, and the apposite ridicule on passing events, adapted to the capacity of the people, which prevail in the dialogues of Pasquino and Marforio, we even find many traces of the times of the Emperors, who were not however very much disposed to favour these liberties.

The conjecture that in these Mimi and Alellanæ we must perhaps seek for the first germ of the commedia del' arte, the improvisatory farce with standing masks, is more immediately connected with our present purpose. There is a striking affinity between this and the Atellanæ, in the employment of different dialects to produce a ludicrous effect. But how would Harlequin and Pulcinello be astonished, were they to be told that they descended in a direct line from the buffoons of the ancient Romans, and even from the Oscians!-With what drollery would they be disposed to requite the labours of the antiquarian, who should trace back their glorious pedigree to this root! We know from the figures on the Greek vases, that a dress very much resembling theirs was used even in the grotesque masks of the old comedy: long breeches, and a waistcoat with arms, articles of dress which the Greeks, as well as the Romans, never used except on the stage. Even in the present day Zanni is one of the names of Harlequin; and Sannio in the Latin farces was a buffoon, who, according to the accounts of ancient writers had a shaven head, and a dress patched together of all colours. The figure of Pulcinello is said to be an accurate resemblance of what has been found painted on the walls in Pompeii. If he came originally

from Atella, he may still be accounted a native of his ancient country. The objection that these traditions could not have been preserved during the cessation of all theatrical amusements, for so many centuries, will be easily got over, when we recollect the freedom enjoyed during the annual carnival, and the frolicsome festivals of the middle ages.

The Greek Mimi were dialogues in prose, and not destined for the stage; the Roman were in verse, were represented, and often delivered extempore. The most celebrated authors in this way were Laberius and Syrus, contemporaries of Julius Cæsar. The latter, when dictator, by a courtly request, compelled Laberius, a Roman knight, to appear publicly in his Mimi, although the scenic employment was stigmatized with the loss of civil rights. Laberius complained of this in a prologue, which we still have, and in which the suffering of wounded honour is expressed in a noble and affecting manner. We cannot well conceive how, in this disposition of mind, he could be capable of a display of extravagant buffoonery, nor how, with such a painful example of voluntary degradation before their eyes, the spectators could take any delight in it. Cæsar kept his word: he gave Laberius a considerable sum of money, and invested him anew with the knightly ring, which however could not reinstate him in the opinion of his fellow citizens. He took his revenge at the same time for the prologue and other allusions,* by bestowing the prize on Syrus, the slave, and afterward the freedman and scholar of Laberius in the mimetic art. We have still a number of sentences from the Mimi of Syrus, which from their internal worth and elegant conciseness of expression, are deserving of a place by the side of those of Menander. Some of them go even beyond the moral horizon of serious comedy, and exhibit something like a stoical elevation. How was the transition possible from low farce to this elevation? And how could similar maxims be possibly introduced, without such an important concatenation of human relations, as that which is exhibited in the most dignified comedy? At all events, they are calculated to give us a very favourable idea of the Mimi. Horace indeed speaks slighting of the literary merit of the Mimi of Laberius, either from the arbitrary nature of their composition, or from the negligent manner in which they were executed. However, we ought not to allow

What an inward humiliation Cæsar would have felt, could he have supposed that in a few generations, Nero, his successor in absolute sovereignty, from a mere lust for self-degradation, frequently exhibited himself in a manner which, even in a Roman of the middle rank of life, he then knew would excite a general feeling of discontent.

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