My topic is #10: What are the main
points of dramatic literary criticism in the comedy The Frogs, by Aristophanes? And,
what are the main dramatic points of literary criticism in Aristotle's Poetics?
In preface, please note
that in the ancient and classical eras of Greece there is no word for literature, as our word that covers the various
genres of writing. They know and refer to all of their writing
as poetry. So henceforth, I replace the word literary with the word poetic. Note also that in terms of Aristotle’s Poetics, the phrase: literary criticism means poetic analysis,
which is the identification of the all poetic parts of the play. Yet in
the identification of the poetic parts, we can know much about the
validity of the play. On the other hand, the poetic criticism in The Frogs is intrinsic; it takes form in dialog as disapproving
opinions of those who want to instruct us about how we should interpret and rewrite
the poetry that is someone's play. In
The Frogs, poetic criticism is the
tearing apart of someone’s poetic work. It amounts to a slanted view often due
to a hidden agenda, and it does not matter how professional the
source of the opinion is. In terms of
the Aristophanes lampoon of the tragic poets, the agenda behind the opinion is
obvious. His lampoon of the great tragic
poets—by a mere comic poet—is aimed at the lust we have to engage in criticism,
which oft takes the form of aggressive opinion and unsolicited advice. So, he weaves that criticism that is opinion into the dialogs of his play and,
thus, in an overarching sense, The Frogs poses a critique of the ironic frenzy of vocal criticism
as opinion, which is a mockery of art and and the personal aesthetic of artists. Aristophanes roots it out of the
classical Greek culture and sheds fun light on it; yet to this day, the bane of selfish, thoughtless criticism persists
to the ruin of art. I will explain
both of these two distinct types of poetic criticism in depth, later, when I talk
about plot. Note also that of the
three major historical tragic poets whom Aristophanes shows to us in Hades, he
presents one as a sage philosopher, yet he mutes the poet: and, thus, Euripides, in his
silence speaks a truth in The Frogs, which
the attuned among us understand.
In my chat, I
will describe the practice known today as the formalist poetic analysis, which is based largely on Aristotle’s Poetics. But first I will explain the informal, yet effective overarching poetic
and broad cultural analysis that is implicit within the dialog of The Frogs, by Aristophanes. Then, we can see how the formalist
compares to the informal as the flaunting of aesthetic and technical opinion and
the comic lampoon of it. I will inform you about these topics so
that we can gain a sense of the well developed and dynamic state of poetic achievement,
theory and analysis in classical Greece.
Consider that our standard repertoire today of drama from the classical
Greek era is a small fraction of the dozens of dramatists and hundreds of comedies
and tragedies in the distinct stylistic periods of the two main genres.
First, I will
pass around my copy of the Poetics, so
that you get a sense of the information concentrated in the short work that launches
a billion plays and billions and billions of reviews of them. Also, I pass around a contemporary
textbook titled Script Analysis, which
largely expands on the formalist process in the Poetics, so that we can apply the analysis to the diverse array of
historical and contemporary forms of dramatic literature. This textbook is in common use for courses in Script Analysis, at
the college-level.
There is one broad,
overarching difference twixt the approach to the poetic criticism that the art
of Aristophanes in The Frogs dissects
and the approach that Aristotle suggests as the basis for analysis of the
tragedies and drama in general. In his
plays, Aristophanes includes data, information and
experiences that are occurring in contemporary Greek culture. He includes a vast array of historical
Greek culture. Therefore, his plays
are the type of poetry that requires us to analyze the work with our view and
consideration of the entire context of Greek culture–past and present. Whereas, Aristotle and his academic
descendants profess that all the data, information and knowledge for the
correct analysis of the tragedies as plots based on the mythos—all of it is in
the play; we need not look outside
of the thing: the play. But of course
we do look at the surrounding culture. Why? It’s because we are, all of us, social
scientists.
Since Aristophanes died two years before the
birth of Aristotle, I begin by
discussing the implied poetic criticism in his play, The Frogs. He writes The Frogs near the end of his writing career,
and it is held up as his Magnum opus.
Aristophanes
uses the presentational mode of theater. From the opening line, he makes it clear
to the audience that the fourth wall
is down. The comic play acts out the lamentations of two of the leading
historical tragic poets, albeit dead poets, dead and in Hades. These poets’ in mutual disapproval of the others art depicts a sort of over-persona,
a cultural persona, if you will, the "character" known as—Competitive Hostility.
The irony of these celebrated poets
of tragedy whose sad, nit-picky opinions masquerade as poetic criticism typifies
the greater Greek classical theater, which includes the Greek audience. Only a limited number of comedies are
included in the Greek festivals, as a sort of “junior partner” to the elevated
tragic form. Thus, the ancient
mentality denies equal appreciation
for the works of its dozens of comic poets. In fact, Aristophanes gains admission to the elite social and
intellectual circles—only in the last years of his life.
So, The Frogs is a pure lampoon by a
comic poet who bashes the irony of the highly competitive tone that the tragic
poets and their audience wrap around their art.
From the start, Aristophanes makes
his intent for a brutal lampoon highly visible and painful for the pious. He gives us Dionysus as his pseudo-protagonist,
a sad but faux tragic hero. So, he shows
his audience that their gods, goddesses and lesser deities in the pantheon are merely
other characters in the poetry of Greece. By
this bold act of showing the Greek
audience a seldom seen and unspoken fact, the brilliant comedic poet expands
the meaning, the depth and importance of the tragedies and the comedies
that keep the solemn elder, big brother in line. Furthermore, his daring provocation makes hay of the most sacred
god in the vigorous Greek theater—the “holy” one to whom the Greeks do their theater
in homage—in ritual Dithyramb: the hymn sung and danced in
honor of the immortal big-D: Dionysus. Adding critical insult
to injury, Mr. “Arisk-stuff-fun-ease”—I spell his name out in Greek fun-netics—
brings the god’s lowly slave: Xanthias onstage and gives him dialog, gives him
an evolved persona and even more intelligence, which says little, than his
master. We can clearly see the tail that
is Xanthias wag the dog big-D Dionysus. Xanthias is candid, comical and
nonchalant in his direct address to the audience. The master and slave converse as they walk to the home of Hercules.
They knock on his door. Heracles opens the door and greets the god with
a long peel of uproarious laughter, wild laughter. He is laughing at the clothing the god is wearing—because, in fact,
Dionysus is dressed in disguised as Heracles. The actual Heracles, who
is a legend of brute strength, here in The
Frogs pumps the iron of heavy cerebral knowledge, a comical stretch of the legend
of brute force.
The comedies of
Aristophanes are part of the period of old
comedy in classical Greece. But, by the time he writes The Frogs, he omits most of his chorus,
or gives it to the croaking of frogs, which further riles the ire of Big D.
Ordinarily, in the old comedies, the comedic chorus, as in tragedy, forms the opening
epilog and parados setting the tone and rhythm of the play. The classical Greek old comedic poets by-and-large use the
chorus as a convention that sets the pace, pitch and tone color. Much of comedic thought, Greek or
otherwise, takes its inspiration from and relies on the use of the wilder, irrational
parts of the human mind. Comedy is diversion,
a fun refuge from the drama and tragedy of life. Comedies that stray from its plot, themes and thinking may be more
successful than the comedy locked into say, buffoonery, or slapstick or gags
exclusively. Dramas have subplots as
relevant and supporting examples, which help us learn about the main plot. The old comedies, including some of
Aristophanes, have choral interludes asoff-the-wall non-sequitur: the parabasis a sort
of anti-choral diversion into an abyss of nonsense—such as a rock-guitarist
bashing his guitar to bits—the comedic poets destroys the rhythm and focus of
the play, yet with confidence in the audience and their respect for the comedic
play; thus, the poet takes the risk,
and the audience expects it. The point that
Aristophanes wants to show, in his well-developed lampoon, is the ironic
competitive hostility that the Dionysian and Lenaia festivals
generate. This causes the deity: the
body politic if you will, to become dissatisfied with the results: the plays as
products. Or it may be that the
deity—as this comic poet depicts him—represents the insatiable public appetite
for the culture of fine, luxurious entertainment. Dionysus shows his disappointment
and, thus, the best dead poets are in Hades due to that sad yet hilarious fact.
(By the way, Hades, with its
upper-case H, is a special place in the lower-case of hell.) Poetic criticism, as I see it, implied in the Frogs
is merely the back-and-forth fussy banter of the dead poet superstars and the
logical extension of their nit-picking hostility. Likely it is the same hostility in certain circles of the public, a
public that too oft in vain tries to bring their poets back to life in their chatter.
And it is a largely a chattering discourse
that lacks depth in it mockery of art, a reduction of art into an intellectual
adversarial clash. Hostility generated
from competitive obsession in art becomes
grist for the mill of absurdity perhaps even tragedy of the highest order. However, far better it is to lampoon
the contagion with artful strokes of pen in hand so as to nip it in the bud.
Then, perhaps folks will go to theater more, get up on stage and/or write their
own stories.
Aristotle came along at
the right moment for Greek theater: the golden age of the tragedy is fresh in
the minds and hearts of the Greeks. And
he seems to answer Aristophanes
call for “Decorum, please, Dignity and Harmony.” So Aristotle designs his Poetics
as lexicon, a handbook or guide for the express purpose of poetic analysis
of the tragedies. By way of his Poetics, any drama that contains the
prescribed elements in close proportion and the features of protocol therefore
is a drama worthy of seeing. In the same motion, Aristotle
acknowledges and promotes the value of the comedies for their expose of, as he
puts it, the irrationally of certain persona. Aristotle, as a son of a physician, is from his early age, all
about order and logic. But rather than
a mechanical order, Aristotle’s order and logic in the Poetics shows us the organic living logic that embraces the facts
of life. This allows for the irrational side of our behavior and the as yet
unknown phenomena in the universe. Furthermore,
he spends only a modicum of time and
effort on classifying the deities and the Doric world of the paranormal.
Aristotle holds that
each genre of the Greek poetry has a degree of the formalist structure and
order of elements inherent in them. He further
asserts that the processes of natural and social sciences reflect or reveal
the poetic form. Aristotle’s theory
would declare that the tragedies as dramatic form reflect our actual
existence, our human condition. Ergo, in
life as in the plays staged, what we do—our action in life as our plot and—at
the level of Greek tragedy—as mythos is
the central element in the script that we live—day-to-day, which we write in our
minds and/or improvise for the play we live. Plot is the sum of our generic action toward what Aristotle calls
our super-objective, our essence of purpose. Aristotle explains the qualities of plot in concise terms with well-developed
detail of each:
·
Plot is
the action that leads up to the main event in the play, as in our lives;
·
Plot, as Aristotle sees it, must have
and reveal an Agon: an argument: a conflict: internal or external—as in the
plot of Orestes;
·
Plot is unified, a whole that has an
epilog then, a logical start in the Parados: the parade of chorus as Melos:
music and the spectacle that sets the stage; then, plot reveals its body (and
you may choose to spell the word BODY here as B-A-W-D-Y) the body of development
and ends in some type of resolve or repose, if you will.
·
Plot
has logical cause and effect relationships of action and reaction; the causes
as the prolog” or pregnancy into the parade that gives birth to the plot à into the body of rising
action crisis: as Aristotle’s lusis, which is the unraveling of
the torrent tempest of rising, which then burgeons into the climactic apex of
action: the Desis of the plot in Aristotelian terms, and à the resolution or reflective afterglow: the dénouement
in modern French terms—the French, they like to sip Merlot, reflect and glow—not
me, I like yoga and meditation. Aristotle, he identifies various types of causes
and effects that form the procession of a particular plot. The types of causes
with their corresponding results are one of the main aspects of focus in his emphasis
on plot; and finally …
·
Plot
has a dynamics at play in it: a seed of a potential action that lies waiting within
the kinetic action unfolding: the Gr.
Dynamis:
in what Aristotle calls the Peripeteia: the dramatic reversal of circumstances, the
turning point, the turning back of the tide of an angry mob of passion, which
oft occurs during the rising lusis of action or at the pivotal climax, the desis,
the apogee of intensity, passion,
thought and action. Here, in his
examination of the Greek poetic form, Aristotle uses intellect to take what
once belonged to the Deus ex machina: and give it back to its rightful owner. He give the miracles of understanding,
memory and learning back the human heart, the heart that knows the ethical
path, knows the path of poetic justice. It
is the heart that can turn “on a dime” to right all wrongs, save the day
and do it so that everyone wins. The character that is the ethos of Aristotle’s
Poetics is the character as a model for the Greek actor in Greek society. And, you are imitating virtue and becoming a model of virtue for all to see and enjoy.
