Scene III A Street
Enter Cinna the Poet, and After Him the Plebeians
Cinna. I dreamt tonight that I did feast with Cæsar,
And things unluckily charge my fantasy.
I have no will to wander forth of doors.
Yet something leads me forth.
1. Plebeian. What is your name?
2. Plebeian. Whither are you going?
3. Plebeian. Where do you dwell?
4. Plebeian. Are you a married man or a bachelor?
2. Plebeian. Answer every man directly.
1. Plebeian. Ay, and briefly.
4. Plebeian. Ay, and wisely.
3. Plebeian. Ay, and truly, you were best.
Cinna. What is my name? Whither am I going? Where do I dwell? Am I a married man or a bachelor? Then, to answer every man directly and briefly, wisely and truly: wisely I say, I am a bachelor.
2. Plebeian. That’s as much as to say, they are fools that marry. You’ll bear me a bang for that, I fear. Proceed; directly.
Cinna. Directly, I am going to Cæsar’s funeral.
1. Plebeian. As a friend or an enemy?
Cinna. As a friend.
2. Plebeian. That matter is answered directly.
4. Plebeian. For your dwelling,—briefly.
Cinna. Briefly, I dwell by the Capitol.
3. Plebeian. Your name, sir, truly.
Cinna. Truly, my name is Cinna.
1. Plebeian. Tear him to pieces; he’s a conspirator.
Cinna. I am Cinna the poet, I am Cinna the poet.
4. Plebeian. Tear him for his bad verses, tear him for his bad verses.
Cinna. I am not Cinna the conspirator.
4. Plebeian. It is no matter, his name’s Cinna. Pluck but his name out of his heart and turn him going.
3. Plebeian. Tear him, tear him! Come, brands, ho! fire-brands! To Brutus’, to Cassius’; burn all! Some to Decius’ house, and some to Casca’s; some to Lingarius’. Away, go!
(Exeunt.)10
It may almost be stated as a general principle that assigning a speech is the first step in focusing the attention of an audience on that speech. The value of such focusing has been discussed earlier under “Characterization.” In exceptional cases, as the citation from The Treasure shows, there may be some justification for unassigned speeches, but in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, when any lines of the play seem not to need assigning to any particular person, they lack the characterization which belongs to them.
The thesis play or the problem play, which have been so current in the last few years, have brought into special prominence a common fault in so-called dramatic dialogue. The speeches narrate, describe, expound or argue, and well, but not in the character of the supposed speaker. Rather the author himself is speaking. Such dialogue, whether it be as clever as some in Mr. Shaw’s plays, as beautiful as certain passages by George Chapman, or as commonplace as in many modern instances, should be rewritten till the author can state the desired idea or facts as the imagined speaker would have stated them. This was the fault with the extract from the John Brown play, and whether it has its source in an intense desire of the author to present his own ideas, or to phrase his sense of beauty, in lack of characterizing power or in mere carelessness, it is reprehensible. In the following instance, the writer is so absorbed in his own ideas that he forgets characterization.
Senator Morse.... What great motive—?
Mary. One more imperious than empires or coalitions—(Mary turns to Mrs. Morse)—one that mothers know—(Mary turns to Senator Morse)—and fathers, too. It is the commonest thing in the world, and the one most completely overlooked. Woman’s love and faith and charity are the motives of that great, imperious impulse by which nature is trying to rule this world and perpetuate the human soul. Individual self-control and the governance of the world are themselves in embryo.... Creation is from God and it is divine. It is the thing and the only thing that kills wantonness and makes love pure. The higher modesty is the peculiar inheritance of our race. It is our duty to understand it, respect it, make it sacred, and have it raised out of the darkness of ignorance and mystery in its true dignity as patriotic impulse and made the true basis of society, its government, and its provision for the general welfare.
Does this sound like an individual woman or like the author using one of his characters for the sounding phrases of his own thinking?
In the next illustration, from George Barnwell, the colorlessness comes from the lack of quickening sympathy with character which marks most of Lillo’s work.
Thorowgood. Thou know’st I have no heir, no child but thee; the fruits of many years successful industry must all be thine. Now, it would give me pleasure great as my love, to see on whom you would bestow it. I am daily solicited by men of the greatest rank and merit for leave to address you; but I have hitherto declin’d it, in hopes that by observation I shou’d learn which way your inclination tends; for as I know love to be essential to happiness in the marriage state, I had rather my approbation should confirm your choice than direct it.
Maria. What can I say? How shall I answer, as I ought, this tenderness, so uncommon even in the best of parents? But you are without example; yet had you been less indulgent, I had been most wretched. That I look on the croud of courtiers that visit here with equal esteem, but equal indifference, you have observed, and I must needs confess; yet had you asserted your authority, and insisted on a parent’s right to be obey’d, I had submitted and to my duty sacrificed my peace.
Thor. From your perfect obedience in every other instance, I fear’d as much; and therefore wou’d leave you without a byass in an affair wherein your happiness is so immediately concern’d.
Ma. Whether from a want of that just ambition that wou’d become your daughter, or from some other cause, I know not; but I find high birth and titles don’t recommend the man who owns them to my affections.
Thor. I wou’d not that they shou’d, unless his merit recommends him more. A noble birth and fortune, tho’ they make not a bad man good, yet they are a real advantage to a worthy one, and place his virtues in the fairest light.
Ma. I cannot answer for my inclinations, but they shall ever be submitted to your wisdom and authority; and, as you will not compel me to marry where I cannot love, so love shall never make me act contrary to my duty. Sir, I have your permission to retire?
Thor. I’ll see you to your chamber. (Exeunt.)11
Too often even somewhat skilled dramatists are led astray by the belief that to write in a style approved at the moment, or which they themselves hold beautiful, is better than to let the characters speak their own language. Examining the early plays of John Lyly—Alexander and Campaspe, Sapho and Phao, Endymion12 (1579-1590)—we find in the more serious portions both action and characterization subordinated to standards of expression supposed at the time to be best. Contrasting the lovers’ dialogue of Love’s Labor’s Lost with the scenes of Orsino and Viola in Twelfth Night, we see perfect illustration of the greater effectiveness of dialogue growing out of the characters as compared with dialogue which puts style first. The Heroic Drama of the second half of the seventeenth century rested upon theory rather than reality. Here is the way in which Almahide and Almanzor state strong feeling.
Almahide. Then, since you needs will all my weakness know,
I love you; and so well, that you must go.
I am so much oblig’d, and have withall
A heart so boundless and so prodigal
I dare not trust myself, or you, to stay,
But, like frank gamesters, must foreswear the play.
Almanzor. Fate, thou art kind to strike so hard a blow;
I am quite stunn’d, and past all feeling now.
Yet—can you tell me you have pow’r and will
To save my life, and at that instant, kill!13
All that these two worthy people are trying to say is Almahide. I love you; and so well that I dare not trust myself or you to stay.
Almanzor. Can you tell me you have power and will to save my life and at that instant kill!
Dryden makes Almahide describe her own emotional condition and, as is proper at any critical moment in Heroic Drama, drop into simile. Almanzor, too, confidently diagnoses his own condition and apostrophizes fate. All this was quite correct in its own day, not for real life, but for the people of the myth land conjured up by the dramatic theories of the litterati. Did people under such circumstances speak in this way? Surely not.
This scene from George Barnwell, 1731, illustrates the same substitution of an author’s idea of what is effective because “literary” for a phrasing that springs from the real emotion of perfectly individualized figures.
SCENE 7. Uncle. George Barnwell at a distance
Uncle. O Death, thou strange mysterious power,—seen every day, yet never understood but by the incommunicative dead—what art thou? The extensive mind of man, that with a thought circles the earth’s vast globe, sinks to the centre, or ascends above the stars; that worlds exotick finds, or thinks it finds—thy thick clouds attempts to pass in vain, lost and bewilder’d in the horrid gloom; defeated, she returns more doubtful than before; of nothing certain but of labour lost.
(During this speech, Barnwell sometimes presents the pistol and draws it back again; at last he drops it, at which his uncle starts and draws his sword.)
Barnwell. Oh, ’tis impossible!
Uncle. A man so near me, arm’d and masqu’d!
Barn. Nay, then there’s no retreat.
(Plucks a poniard from his bosom, and stabs him.)
Uncle. Oh! I am slain! All-gracious heaven regard the prayer of thy dying servant! Bless, with thy choicest blessings, my dearest nephew; forgive my murderer, and take my fleeting soul to endless mercy!
(Barnwell throws off his mask, runs to him, and, kneeling by him, raises and chafes him.)
Barn. Expiring saint! Oh, murder’d, martyr’d uncle! Lift up your dying eyes, and view your nephew in your murderer! O, do not look so tenderly upon me! Let indignation lighten from your eyes, and blast me e’re you die!—By Heaven, he weeps in pity of my woes. Tears,—tears for blood! The murder’d, in the agonies of death, weeps for his murderer.—Oh, speak your pious purpose, pronounce my pardon then—and take me with you!—He wou’d, but cannot. O why with such fond affection do you press my murdering hand!—What! will you kiss me! (Kisses him. Uncle groans and dies.) He’s gone forever—and oh! I follow. (Swoons away by his uncle’s body.) Do I still live to press the suffering bosom of the earth? Do I still breathe and taint with my infectious breath the wholesome air! Let Heaven from its high throne, in justice or in mercy, now look down on that dear murder’d saint, and me the murderer. And, if his vengeance spares, let pity strike and end my wretched being!—Murder the worst of crimes, and parricide the worst of murders, and this the worst of parricides! Cain, who stands on record from the birth of time, and must to its last final period, as accurs’d, slew a brother, favour’d above him. Detested Nero by another’s hand dispatched a mother that he fear’d and hated. But I, with my own hand, have murder’d a brother, mother, father, and a friend, most loving and belov’d. This execrable act of mine’s without a parallel. O may it ever stand alone—the last of murders, as it is the worst!
The rich man thus, in torment and despair,
Prefer’d his vain, but charitable prayer.
The fool, his own soul lost, wou’d fain be wise
For others good; but Heaven his suit denies.
By laws and means well known we stand or fall,
And one eternal rule remains for all.