Appunti lezioni English 2 prima parte di Stelzer, Appunti di Letteratura Inglese

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THE RENAISSANCE (1485-1660) 1° lezione 25.09.23 The RENAISSANCE was a period of enormous transition in religious, political and social terms: 1485: Battle of Bosworth Field marked: - the end of the Wars of the Roses - the beginning of the Tudor dynasty 1660: The Restoration: There were a period of republic called the Commonwealth > Charles I was beheaded > all went bad so the monarchy was restored DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RENAISSANCE AND EARLYMODERN The label “Renaissance” is a problematic category: 1) There was a lack of uniformity of phenomena among European countries in terms of both history and geography 2) Applied originally to the Italian case, and after to Eurocentric > Rinascimento is an Italian (after went out in Europe) 3) Popularised by 19th century historian Jacob Burckhardt (who published a study on the Italian renaissance) as a radical rapture away from the middle ages > all of the sudden rebirth of the culture > radical break but the idea was obsolete (if you use the label you think as Jacob) It was only male members of certain political and intellectual elites who profited from a period of “cultural renewal” Instead the label EARLY MODERN is wider and more neutral to define a period between the Middle Ages and the Industrial Revolution. Still, both categories are debatable. What is ‘modernity’? Does the ‘earliness’ of ‘early modern’ imply a teleological orientation? THE BATTLE OF BOSWORTH FIELD (1485) > marked the beginning of TUDOR DYNASTY: Henry VII (1485-1509) → first Tudor monarch and the victor after the thirty-year-long War of the Roses Henry VIII (1509-1547) Edward VI (1547-1553) Mary I (1553-1558) Elizabeth I (1558-1603) The accession of Henry VII marked an end to the civil war (War of Roses) and facilitated greater cultural dialogue and exchange with European neighbours. | For 20 years there had been a civil war called the Wars of the Roses: two families: The Houses of York (white rose) vs Lancaster (red rose) → at the end Henry VII defeated Richard III. Henry VII was a distant relative of the Lancaster family (he lived in France) and he married Elizabeth of York, the last descendant of the York family >> he was a Tudor (came from Wales, Galles). Renaissance arrived when England was opening > invitations of Italian, French intellectuals and new importance given to art, culture, poetry. His government was shaped by his instinctive mistrust of anyone with political influence and his ruthless (spietato) financial control of his kingdom. | Henry VIII (son) had an older brother (Arthur) who died and so he became king and also the head of the new church of England → 1534 Henry VIII’s break from Rome: ACT OF SUPREMACY (law that puts Henry VII as the head of the church). He left much of the political work to his advisers (consiglieri) like Thomas Cromwell | He was also obsessed to have a male > he needed a son > married three times 1. Catherine of Aragon → Mary I (divorced) 2. Anne Boleyn → Elizabeth I (divorced) 3. Jane Seymour → Edward VI (very week) died young Mary I made a period of radical political and religious realignment for the kingdom. She married the Spanish king Philip II of Spain but they couldn't have any children. When she died the throne went to her half- sister Elisabeth I (1558-1603), she was an effective political leader > never married and she refused marriage because it would expose England to international forces and a potential loss of political control When she dies, her cousin became king > James I of England (already king of Scotland as James VI) and he was the first of the Stuart dynasty (until 1649). THE STUART DYNASTY: 1. James I (James VI of Scotland) (1603-1625) 2. Charles I (1625-1649): beheaded at the end of the English civil war (which had broken out in 1642) start of the Commonwealth (Republic) of England When James I died his son Charles I succeeded to the throne but he was a problematic ruler > no parliament, he wanted to impose new taxes, he try to impose a new form of protestantism, ARMINIANISM (dangerously close to catholicism) > opposition of this new form = civil war between royalists (loyal to king) and parliament + puritans (type of calvinist →thought that protestant reformation is not enough → has to be more rigid). PURITANS WON and the king was beheaded → beginning of the Commonwealth (Republic) of England 1588 Elizabeth I’s speech at Tilbury Spain tries to conquer England → English won and Elizabeth I was ready to fight with people > she knows she is a woman but she has the heart of a king. ERE DA STUDIARE E VEDI IL LIBRO: ELIZABETHAN (Elizabeth I) JACOBEAN (James I) CAROLINE (Charles I) For the exam: Literature Jacobean or Caroline LANGUAGE: North england vs Dialect around London - OLD ENGLISH (c. 450 – c. 1170) - MIDDLE ENGLISH (c. 1170 – 15th century) - EARLY MODERN ENGLISH (c. 1480 – c. 1650) >(complex linguistic phenomenon = formation of new language) It was standardise and helped by the introduction of the Press > key factor - Willian Caxton set up the first press in England in 1476 but the inventor of the press is Gutenberg - Henry VIII’s break from Rome: Act of Supremacy, 1534 | England has to prove to be on the same level of the other countries >> translations of many texts from the Continent, invitations of intellectuals Also original works like: ● Thomas More’s Utopia (1516) (close friend of Erasmus). He was the chamberlain of Henry VIII and catholic, he didn't let the king to divorce so he was executed ● Thomas Elyot’s Governor deeply influenced by “Il Cortegiano” (Baldassarre Castiglione) > similar book ● Thomas Hoby’s The Courtier (1561) is the translation of the text “Il Cortegiano” ● Roger Ascham’s The Schoolmaster (pub. posthumously, 1570)> teacher of queen Elizabeth I Culture power > Francis Bacon is the inventor of the scientific method For the Exam: What is Euphuism? The rise of POPULAR THEATRE: no longer designed for the aristocracy and there were the first permanent commercial playhouses: Red Lion: 1567, Newington Butts: 1575-77?, Theatre: 1576, First Blackfriars: 1576, Curtain: 1577, Rose: 1587-8, Swan: 1595, Second Blackfriars: 1596, Globe: 1599, Fortune: 1600). Because of the problem of the lease (affitto), they took the timber (legname) of “Theatre” and built the Globe. | Playhouses built in the so-called «liberties»: areas, suburban districts not under the jurisdiction of the City of London > immoral places THE GLOBE Built in Southwark in 1599 by the Lord Chamberlain’s Men (for not going to jail) reusing the timber of the Theatre (1576-1598). The company changed its name under James I: the King’s Men. Burnt down in 1613 due to an accident during a performance of Shakespeare and Fletcher’s Henry VIII Rebuilt in 1614, closed in 1642 (civil war) by the Puritan authorities > immoral so it closed down STRUCTURE: ● Spectators standing in the yard, or pit: groundlings ● If you pay more: galleries ● The interaction between actors and audience was prominent ● Tiring house: where actors changed costumes ● Heavens: the ceiling (soffitto) over the stage THE BLACKFRIARS From 1608, the King’s Men also owned a private and indoor theatre: it could be used in winter and for more elite audiences since entrance fees were more expensive + use of special effects; large discovery space; music. The King’s Men also regularly performed at court: the Palace of Whitehall (destroyed) > today they perform a new kind of entertainment: The Banqueting House designed by Inigo Jones in Whitehall in 1619 ACTING CONVENTIONS OF ELIZABETHAN AND JACOBEAN DRAMA ● No professional actresses until the Restoration (1660-) >> no women ● Bare stage (palcoscenico nudo) no complex scenario ● Elaborate costumes > there was convention for the aristocrats, when they die they give their clothes to to servants, but they don’t use them and so they sent to the actors ● Use of dances, music, and special effects (indoor theatres) ● Soliloquies (one character on the stage), asides (character speaks to the audience), dumb shows… Use of prose for the ‘3 Rs’: Realism, Rank (characters of lower class generally speak in prose), Risibility Several metres, but the main one was blank verse As blank verse developed, it became more and more flexible. The prosody of Shakespeare’s late plays is known for its irregular variety: different rhythms, internal cesurae (=pauses), enjambments, short verses, shared lines, … For the exam: Who were the university wits? Who is Christopher Marlowe? What he wrote? They were poets, dramatis who had been educated in university (such as Cambridge or Oxford) THE UNIVERSITY WITS: Christopher Marlowe, Robert Greene, John Lyly, Thomas Lodge, George Peele | CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE (1564-1593) he was the star of the Elizabethan theatre and Shakespeare was influenced. Marlowe wrote examples of REVENGE TRAGEDY (di vendetta): ● Tamburlaine the Great > revolutionary play, use of blank verse extremely influential ● The Jew of Malta ● Doctor Faustus > man who makes a deal with the devil in exchange of new experiences ● Edward II > history play Di ispirazione per: - Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy (c. 1587) - Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus and Hamlet (own genre, because he ask himself if he should really revenge the father) - Thomas Middleton’s Revenger’s Tragedy BEN JONSON (1572-1637) ● Satirical Comedies: Volpone (sets in Venice about this very rich man who tries to dominate society), The Alchemist, Bartholomew Fair + comedies of humours ● Tragedies ● Lyrical poetry ● Masques For the exam: 3 dramatis of the Elisabeth Period important: Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, Ben Jonson 2° lezione 27.09.23 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (Stratford upon Avon 1564-London 1616) Shakespeare born in Stratford upon Avon → Queen Elizabeth I reigned, he went to the local primary school and he didn't go to the University (Oxford) unlike many others colleagues. LOST YEARS: when he was young there are some years we don’t know what he did → no historical documents He might have been a private tutor or a teacher in some school, someone believes he went to Italy → no proves So he worked somewhere and he married quite young a woman that was older than him → already pregnant: Anne Hathaway, they had children together and after he decided to move to London and started his career as an actor, only after he started writing plays | After there was a plague (peste), theatres were closed down and he wrote two narrative poems. ● Venus and Adonis (Venere e Adone) → dedicated to the count of South Humpton, who became his patron ● The Rape of Lucretia (lo stupro/ratto di Lucrezia) After the plague he returned writing plays and he became resident dramatist of the King’s Men (until 1603 they were called the Lord Chamberlain's Men) → of king James I | He became sharer of the company → he needed this place to be successful because he could earn from tickets the company sell The fact he started his career as an actor helped him a lot, because he knew what worked on stage and what didn't. In his time he was not ‘the Bard’ but only one dramatist among many >> the company was successful and the director was the King himself | CRITICISM: «An upstart crow (cornacchia) beautified with our feathers» >>> accusing him to copy the others (Shakespeare was influenced) When he died Ben Jonson wrote a poem dedicated to him: “Sweet swan (cigno) of Avon” «Not of an age, but for all time» >> he should be immortal His friends published his unpublished works after his death not in “quarto format” (formato in quarto) (cheap editions) but in folio > more expensive | The First Folio of 1623, edited by Henry Condell andWilliam Heminges (colleagues) where Shakespeare’s comedies, histories and tragedies were collected. Divide into three genres: comedies, histories (based on national english history, he influenced the others) and tragedies > the tripartition into genres In the Jacobean period we have the greatest tragedies: - Hamlet - Romeo e Juliet - Titus Andronicus > brutal tragedy - Othello - King Lear - Anthony and Cleopather The epilogue of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (sogno d'una notte di mezza estate) > important play | Set in Athens and we found the world of Athens and of the woods, where the fairies (fate) reign > they’re in a fight but they interrupt The prologue of Shakespeare’s Henry V Henry V defeated the french and in the prologue we realise how much spectators are supposed to use their own immaginatio > no complex sceneries, they have to imagine what happens on the stage JACOBEAN LITERATURE ● Jacobean literature and drama are often dark in mood, questioning the stability of the social order ● Satire (Ben Jonson, John Donne, …) > a lots ● City comedy (Thomas Middleton, John Marston, …) > a new type of comedies perhaps none of Shakespeare’s comedies were set in London ● Heyday of tragedy ○ William Shakespeare: Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra ○ John Webster: The White Devil & The Duchess of Malfi, …) > very dark ○ John Ford: (the most interesting Caroline tragedy) ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore, 1626-33 > based on Romeo e Juliet, but the lovers are brothers and sisters (incest) ● The advent of TRAGICOMEDY and the MASQUE TRAGICOMEDY Shakespeare’s late plays (the romances: Pericles Prince of Tyre, Cymbeline very confusing play not so successful, The Winter’s Tale, The Tempest, story of the Duchy of Milan who has been banished by Milan from his brother, he sits revenge and he’s assisted from spirits > there is drama and pain but happy ending) may also be aptly labelled ‘tragicomedies’ | - A hybrid genre, imported from Italy: Torquato Tasso’s Aminta (1573) and Giovan Battista Guarini Il pastor fido (1580-3) - Philip Sidney didn't like tragicomedy and had already criticised it in his defence of Poesy > their mongrel tragicomedy. It become very fashionable - John Fletcher is the first who succeeded Shakespeare as a dramatist of the king. He wrote The Faithful Shepherdess which was staged in 1608 by the Children of Blackfriars, the first English tragicomedy > it was a flop: spectators did not understand it. Later, a very fashionable genre, written by the duo John Fletcher and Francis Beaumont MASQUES Entertainment who was in Jacobean and Caroline period very popular ● This poetry has very elaborate metaphors > apparently unconnected ideas, in reality connected es. “metaphor of the lovers as compasses” > lovers been always together and relationship between soul and God who are connected ● Sometimes violent yoking together of apparently unconnected ideas and things so that the reader is startled. Obliquity, irony, and paradox. ● Exponents: John Donne, Andrew Marvell, George Herbert (The Temple), Richard Crashaw, … ○ Hermbert wrote collection of The Temple, he was a priest, describe the shape of objects like altar THEENGLISHREVOLUTION ● The English Revolution ● Civil War (1642-1651) ● Charles I beheaded in 1649 ● Commonwealth/Interregnum 1649-1660 (‘Restoration’: 1660, the return of Charles II) First republic almost like a dictatorship (dittatura) >> protectorate (protettorato) ● Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell (1653-58) and Richard Cromwell (1658-59) When Oliver died the person who was selected as successor was his SON, like monarchies. he was elected but absolutely not charismatic as his father ● The Puritans/Roundheads call back the son of Charles I and the monarchy was restored JOHN MILTON The most important author of the Elizabethan period ● Republican ● Secretary of Latin and Foreign Tongues during the Commonwealth > in the republican England he had a very important role (writer for abroad > if the english government what to sent a letter to republic to Venice, they asked him to writer for them) ● He was very deeply influential at the time, he was blind (since 1652)and he dictated the poems to who visited him (daughters or friends) ● He was the first author to regard being a poet as something like a vocation > he’s a prophet/visionary and he was the most dedicated poem England has ever seen ● He know latin, greek, aramatic, italian, french and hebrew (ebraico) ● He wrote Comus (a masque), Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, Samson Agonistes ● Areopagitica > pamphlet against this new type of censorship (puritans) THEMES: political freedom and liberty he thought book should not be censured before the publication and only people should decide if the book was ok or not > > Defends the right and free of expression PARADISE LOST Milton’s Paradise lost: - First published in 1667 > after the restoration of monarchy he was in a dangerous position - The first epic poem in English written in blank verse (versi sciolti) - 12 Books - Covering the creation of the cosmos, Satan’s rebellion and punishment, the creation of Man and the Fall - Major themes: liberty, what it means to be human, the relationship between humankind and God, social and political identity, sexuality, the nature of knowledge - Hugely influential Create a poem with several different techniques: 1) flashbacks and flashforward It’s the story of Lucifer’s rebellion (rebels to God/satan) and of the war in paradise. Satan tempt the new creation/new race > expulsion of Adam and Eve | People says that Lucifer was the hero because the portrait of Lucifer, his psychology was really magnetic > Milton was horrified > the hero of the paradise lost is not Lucifer | The protagonist is the HUMANITY PARADISE REGAINED It’s not a failure, but not very popular. It’s about the temptations of Satan made to Christ in the desert (evangelical passage) > written different style SAMSON AGONISTES Drama, the story of Samson and Delila > bible 3° lezione 02.10.23 THERESTORATION When Oliver Cromwell died, his son, Richard, did not manage to preserve the English Commonwealth (1649-1660). The Parliament summoned Charles II, the son of Charles I, from exile and restored the monarchy (1660) > “merry” monarch FRESH START? It’s true there were many innovations (ex drama exchanged form, never stopped) ● New tastes, mainly imported from the Continent: Opera, Baroque triumphalism… The royalist who have to leave England move in France > neoclassicism > England was influenced by this culture and by king Louis XIV “le rois soleil” (absolute king) > Parliament had the fear that Charles I would be like the french king, instead his son did ● The reopening of the playhouses: patents to only two companies: 1) the King’s Company, managed by Thomas Killigrew, performing at the Drury Lane 2) the Duke’s Company, managed by Sir William D’Avenant, theatre at Dorset Gardens. The first professional actresses. ● Libertine and worldly mores ● The founding of the Royal Society (1660); influence of Thomas Hobbes (The Leviathan = origin of society) > Science, Cartesio (philosophical idea) ● Explosive socio-political issues: ○ RELIGION > Charles II had a wife but also many illegitimate children (no successor to the throne) > the person who should succeed would have been his brother James, a catholic ○ wars with the Netherlands > England had started having a powerful navy (Marina Militare) and the other was the Netherlands (a republic) so there were wars of trade and influence on the sea ○ the threat of absolutism vis à vis the French Roi Soleil ○ two events that marked the beginning of the reign of Charles II: ■ the 1665 Great Plague (many deaths) ■ the 1666 Fire of London (destroy many ancient buildings > new architecture Christopher Wren) Idea of human nature is violence “homo hominis lupus” but social contract understanding they can not survive with violence. State has the power to inflict punitions. CHARLES II THE “MERRYMONARCH” PROBLEMS WITH RELIGION Charles II had a wife but also many illegitimate children (no successor to the throne) > the person who should succeed him would have been his brother James, a catholic. The Parliament splits into two groups: ● in favour of James becoming the king ● refuse to have him as a king At the end he became James II so he became king LITERATURE AND DRAMA CHANGED There is the reopening of the theatres, with the first professional actresses > Nell Gwyn (one of the mistresses -amanti- of Charles II) Only two companies would be allowed to perform, the king Charles II allowed only them to perform: 1) the King’s Company (Charles II) managed by Thomas Killigrew, performing at the Drury Lane (prestigious) 2) the Duke’s Company (James I) managed by Sir William D’Avenant, theatre at Dorset Gardens. He was the godson (figlioccio) of William Shakespeare | They shared the possession of previous plays > they divided each other the plays they could perform The restoration theatre was known for this adaptation and also for the translation of French plays. There were also a lot of NEW TEXTS OF GENRE: ❖ Opera ❖ Triumphalism ❖ New atmosphere of radical libertilism >> in contrast of the rigid moralism of the puritans period during the Commonwealth >Worldly attitudes and habits (attitudini e consuetudini mondane) not metaphysical or spiritual JOHN LOCKE > new interesting in science > major philosophical approaches of the time was: EMPIRICISM (the doctrine we can know only thought our senses and experience) JOHN DRYDEN >>> major figure of the time (1631- 1700) RESTAURATION PERIOD is also called “The age of Dryden” (For the Commonwealth is Milton, for the restoration is Dryden) The three great figures of this decades are Milton, Dryden and Alexander Pope | ● He was the first official Poet Laureate of England (nominated in 1668) and the first major English theorist of translation (one of the great literary critics, he reflected of what was the meaning of translation) >> prestigious role ● He dominated the cultural literary panorama of the second half of the seventeenth century > he was deeply influenced by french drama and literature ● He practically invented a new genre: HEROIC DRAMA ○ modelled after French Neoclassical tragedy ○ characters of almost superhuman stature ○ predominant themes > exalted ideals of love, honour, and courage > we get boring really soon (Should I marry?... Should I stay in the country?...) ○ FORM > he perfected the HEROIC COUPLET > rhyming couplets of iambic pentameter (rima baciata the main metre in poetry and drama) ● Worked for Cromwell’s government, then after seeing the beginning of the protectorat smoothly gained favour under Charles II ● Mainly collaborated with the King’s Company ● Writing comedies, tragicomedies, heroic tragedies/dramas (ex The Indian Queen, 1664, and The Indian Emperor, 1665; the two-part Conquest of Granada, 1670-1; Aureng-Zebe, 1675), an adaptation of Milton’s Paradise Lost (The State of Innocence, 1674), he asked for permission, he wrote it but never performed because: a. would have been really expensive b. naked people on the stage c. Characters like god and satans on the stage > he don’t have god as a character ➢ The Protestant Dutch Stadtholder William III of Orange was invited by Parliament to take over as king of England because James II (crowned in 1685), the brother of Charles II, was Catholic. James II was replaced by Mary II (his Protestant daughter) and her husband,William III of Orange (d. 1702) The change of government without violence never happened >> JACOBITE REVOLTS > Jacobites believed the rightful ruler should be James (Giacubs) and his descendants. There were attempts of returning to the government and replace the person on the throne > all failed ➢ BILL OF RIGHTS, 1689 is one of the most important legal documents > the establishment of a CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY | ➢ WHIGS vs TORIES > consequence of this was the creation of two parties > some people were in favour of James becoming king others in favour of the protestant king ○ who agreed to have a protestant were the Tories (conservative) ○ who taught the right rulers was James were theWhigs (liberal) The two parties in the parliament are the ancestors of what is today >> the labour party and the conservative party QUEEN ANNE Queen Anne (reigned 1702-1714), she was the last Stuart ruler ➔ Constitutional monarchy > the ruler (queen/king) have only a symbolical function/role ➔ Queen Anne had no heirs, and because of the 1702 Act of Settlement, her close relatives could not succeed her on the throne because they were Catholics and the parliament decided that crown went to her German Protestant cousins (no problem because of this all the power went to parliament) ➔ Cultural shift > most important agents are the middle classes > the bourgeoisie ➔ THE HOUSE OF HANOVER: George I (1714-1727), George II (1727-1760), George III (1760-1820) the mad king who suffered from mental disease, George IV (1820-1830),William IV (1830-1837), Victoria (1837-1901) ➔ 1707 Act of Union: Scotland and England are united as one country >> the birth of the Kingdom of GREAT BRITAIN > under the same ruler WORLD'S LEADER England was the leader nation in trades, colonialism and imperialism > discovery of Australia, but it also lost of many colonies ❖ Colonisation of the Bahamas, parts of the Atlantic coast of North America, Mumbai and Calcutta + 1713 – The Treaty of Utrecht successfully concludes the War of the Spanish Succession. This treaty allows Britain to make considerable territorial gains in the Americas and Mediterranean, including Newfoundland, St Kitts, Hudson’s Bay as well as Gibraltar and Minorca. ❖ 1763: Treaty of Paris. Lower Canada, up to the Mississippi, Florida, India and Senegal ceded to Britain, while the British returned Cuba and Manila to the Spanish. ❖ 1770: James Cook discovered Australia and claimed New South Wales for Britain ❖ By the mid-18th century Britain was the world's leading commercial nation, controlling a global trading empire and with major military and political hegemony on the Indian subcontinent. ❖ 1775-1783: American War of Independence >> USA AUGUSTAN LITERATURE The great period after the Restoration period >> evocates Emperor Augustus ● Fuzzy temporal boundaries > late 17th century to the mid 18th century ● Originally referred to the reign of Charles II ● Writers consciously sought to emulate the style and elegance of the Augustan period of Roman literature, and made wide use of its characteristic literary forms ● Alexander Pope’s (ironic) Epistle to Augustus (= George II), adapting Horace’s Ad Augustum ● Historians thought we should be as glorious as romans and imitated what romans did, we have never been so powerful so we have to glorify what we do > in literature ALEXANDER POPE (1688-1744) ❖ A master of the HEROIC COUPLET ❖ Brilliant use of allusion and adaptation of the classics ❖ Catholic + disabled > he has spine problems (colonna vertebrale) ❖ An Essay on Criticism (1711) > encapsulated what augustan poetry should be like > not necessary say something true, but you should express it in the best possible way ❖ An Essay of Man (1733-4) > religion is important but we are humans and we should explore THE RAPE OF THE LOCK (il ricciolo rapito) His masterpiece is the Rape of the Lock > heroical poem (mock epic) >> a parody of a poem (la secchia rapita) The story is silly: a gallant man is courting a lady and he cuts hairs with scissors >> HUGE SCANDAL people fighting because of this >> silly society of that time, he humoristaly portrays the gallantry of the court (superficial people). Society who lives in luxury is very lazy and no longer contribute in the society > high register to speak about silly things DUNCIAD (l’idiota) (poem) ➢ Verse translation of Homer; editor of Shakespeare; … ➢ The Dunciad (1728), a mock epic on his literary rivals, seen as the favourites of the Goddess of Dullness >> target contemporaries who believes they are good poets but they’re not ➢ Horatian satires ➢ Probably the first English poet to enjoy contemporary fame in France and Italy Before here Englischer imitates anyone else > changed with this new genre ➢ Homer was a member of the ‘Scriblerus Club’, which included Jonathan Swift and John Gay (write “The Beggar's Opera” the first ballad opera, new genre > parodying Italian romantic period of MELODRAMMA, opera seria. Known tunes with ordinary characters) THE AGEOFENLIGHTENMENT The philosophical movement behind the AUGUSTAN PERIOD is the the “ENLIGHTENMENT” ❖ The celebration of REASON enabling humans to achieve knowledge, freedom, and happiness ❖ The universe as a mechanism (Sir Isaac Newton) > new interested in science and believe you can understand universe thought science ❖ Deism & scepticism/materialism/atheism >> still believe in God but not necessarily in institutions ❖ The first modern secularised theories of psychology: Thomas Hobbes (humans are moved solely by pain vs pleasure) vs John Locke (the mind as a tabula rasa, emphy to be structured by experience >> what you know is not from god but from emotions and data from the senses, something developed by David Hume – no knowledge beyond empiricism, and George Berkeley – «esse est percipi»). Society as the product of a social contract > possibility of tolerance, reform (and eventually of revolution) ❖ Republic of letters: COSMOPOLITANISM JONATHAN SWIFT (Dublin, 1667-1745) ● Anglican priest; dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin ● The foremost prose satirist ● Author of Gulliver's travel (1726) ● Pamphlets written under the pseudonym Isaac Bickerstaff ● The Tories chief pamphleteer (directing The Examiner) EMERGE OF JOURNALIST The emergence of NEWSPAPERS and the PERIODICAL ESSAY ➔ Already during the Civil War >> it started in England and then out abroad ➔ Several attempts at censorship ➔ A new readership > normal people not aristocratic ➔ Daniel Defoe’s Review (1704-1731); Richard Steele’s The Tatler (1709-11) and Steele and Joseph Addison’s The Spectator (1711-1712) THE RISE OF THE NOVEL ❖ Associated with the emerging middle classes ❖ Unlike previous romances, focus on REALISM. Protagonists are often bourgeois, ordinary people (sometimes suffering extraordinary ordeals). ❖ Objective descriptions, circumstantial details to give a sense of probability ❖ Interest in psychology and self-inspection >> long narratives enable this > quite long you can focus on the psychology of the characters ❖ Entertaining but also didactic ❖ Often in EPISTOLARY FORM >> organised in letters ❖ The novel as a journey through contemporary society Subgenres: the picaresque novel, the satirical novel, sentimental novel MOST IMPORTANT NOVELS: ● Daniel Defoe: Robinson Crusoe (1719), Moll Flanders (1722), … ● Samuel Richardson: Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded (1740), Clarissa (1748), … ● Henry Fielding: Shamela (1741) and Joseph Andrews (1742), Tom Jones (1749), … ● [Tobias Smollett: Roderick Random (1748), Peregrine Pickle (1751), Humphry Clinker (1771)] ● [Charlotte Lennox: The Female Quixote (1752) ● Laurence Sterne: Tristram Shandy (1759-67), A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy (1768), ● Oliver Goldsmith: The Vicar of Wakefield (1766) ● [Frances Burney: Evelina (1778), Cecilia (1782), Camilla (1796)] > related to jane austen For the exam: Study the plots of at least Robinson Crusoe, Pamela, Clarissa, and Tristram Shandy. The authors listed here not in square brackets are very important (no Smollett, Lennox, Berney) >> sapere riassunto senza dettagli sulle opere SAMUEL JOHNSON (1709-1784) «Dr Johnson» ❖ Best remembered as literary critic, biographer, essayist, and lexicographer ❖ He wrote “A Dictionary of the English Language” (1755) ❖ The ‘taste-maker’ of his age ❖ Association with The Gentleman’s Magazine, and director of The Rambler and The Idler ❖ Rasselas (Storia di Rasselas, principe di Abissinia) ❖ A Journal to theWestern Islands of Scotland (Viaggio alle Isole Occidentali della Scozia) ❖ Edition of Shakespeare (un’edizione settecentesca dei drammi di William Shakespeare) ❖ One of the best biographies: James Boswell’s Life of Johnson USEFUL TIMELINE 1625 - Charles I, King of England (to 1649); Charles I marries Henrietta Maria (catholic) , sister of Louis XIII of France; dissolves Parliament which fails to vote him money > no taxation without the parliament 1628 - Petition of Rights; Charles I forced to accept Parliament’s statement of civil rights in return for finances 1629 - Charles I dissolved Parliament and rules personally until 1640 1639 - First Bishops’ War between Charles I and the Scottish Church; ends with Pacification of Dunse (he needed money) 1640 - Charles I summons the “Short” Parliament; dissolved for refusal to grant money; Second Bishops’ War; The “Long” Parliament begins 1641 - Triennial Act requires Parliament to be summoned every three years; Star Chamber and High Commission abolished by Parliament; Grand Remonstrance of Parliament to Charles I 1642 - Charles I fails in attempt to arrest five members of Parliament and rejects Parliament’s Nineteen The character may also violate this board and go directly to the audience. HE AND I Diegetic elements are still present in theatre, I, however, is superimposed on HE, whereas in narration it is HE which is superimposed on I. Theatre always happens “HERE ANDNOW” THEATRE is the discourse of hic et nunc > forever in the present. Even when events take place in the past, they present themselves in the present in the form of performative action >> this is because, in theatre, discourse is action and action is discourse. In NARRATIVE time is always in the past and refers to the time of the events and not of the enunciative situation. If one is to consider the events real, these events have to be in the past. For example the utterance “today”: - in theatre is a spatio-temporal co-reference > not need to specifies, in theatre is now - in narrative one must consider it in relation to the measurative, directive or stative conditions, that is, to the chronological time of the calendar (in rapporto alle condizioni misurative, direttive o stative, cioè al tempo cronologico del calendario) > in narrative you need to specify when Dramatic action always is in the PRESENT, the present moves on and is transformed into the past, but as such is no longer present. The passage of time within (all'interno) the drama is an absolute succession of present moments. >> the drama itself, as an absolute, guarantees and creates a time of its own. Theatre as SOCIAL INSTITUTION Georges Gurvitch has perceived an “affinité frappante entre la société et le théâtre”. This AFFINITY is reflected in the metaphor describing the world as a stage > a view that is not confined to literature alone, but which is widespread in folk and popular culture. Theatre is social, it’s born and lives is front of an audience Petronius’ classic formulation, “Totus mundus agit histrionem” (all the world’s a stage), has become an infinitely variable topos, in which the original transcendental perspective (God as dramatist and audience, humanity as actors or puppets) was eliminated in the early modern period in favour of a purely mundane perspective >> the theatre metaphor points to the role-playing component in conventional modes of behaviour, to the pretensions and hypocrisy of social life. (la metafora del teatro punta verso la componente del gioco di ruolo nei modi di comportamento convenzionali, verso le pretese e l'ipocrisia della vita sociale) | Reflection of reality > celebrates or criticised sociology and the exaggerated behaviours THE LANGUAGE OF THEATRE Theatre (and its language) always refers to a PRAGMATIC CONTEXT (the stage). Theatre is a PERFORMANCE and entails not only words but space, actors, props, audience and the complex relations among these elements. Theatre is institutionally bound to the ENUNCIATION PROCESS. It needs a pragmatic context, possesses a temporal dimension, and its space is defined by DEIXIS (deissi). Theatre communication produces meaning (communicates something) only when it is related to a pragmatic context. It incorporates, at the same time, the VERBAL CODE and a great many OTHER CODES: those of gesture, costume, space. sound, etc. TYPES OF CODES One survey of theatrical codes, by Kowzan (1975), groups them into five categories: 1) SPOKEN TEXT 2) BODY GESTURE 3) ACTOR’S EXTERNAL ASPECT > mimetic and gestural (Ex. big nose) 4) THE STAGE/SETTING > can be blank or full of things 5) UNARTICULATED SOUND THEATRE SPECIFICITY AII the discourses pronounced in the theatre would then be performative in nature in the sense that they present themselves as institutionally tied (legato) in with the dynamics of the action. At the same time, co-ordination between utterance (espressione) and stage space is brought about by a particular INTENSE USE OF DEIXIS. The specific nature of the theatre lies in the organisation of the words as movements of the characters in reciprocal relationships or with respect to objects or spaces on stage, in terms of deictic, ostensive spatial relationships > Performativity and deixis are linked It is evident that performativity is realised in deixis and constitutes the specific nature of the theatre >>> it coalesces into a verbal-scenic whole (into a constituent correlation) the presence of discourse exigency with the deictics of its own infernal scenic solution tied to the action. (essa fonde in un tutto verbale-scenico la presenza dell'esigenza del discorso con i deittici della propria soluzione scenica infernale legata alla azione) DEIXIS: what it is? DEIXIS is location and identification of persons, objects, events, processes and activities being talked about or referred to in relation to the spatio-temporal context created and sustained by the act of enunciation and the participation in it. Typically of a single speaker and at least one addressee (according to John Lyons) >>> different aspects between actors and space, space the actor occupies. (è localizzazione di persone, oggetti, eventi, processi e attività di cui si fa riferimento in relazione al contesto spazio-temporale creato e sostenuto dall'atto enunciativo e dalla partecipazione ad esso, tipicamente di un singolo parlante e a almeno un destinatario) | Demonstrative pronouns, adjectives, time, place adverbs, and personal pronouns >>> are ALL DEIXIS. DEIXIS AND THE THEATRE ➔ It is a term used in linguistics to denote those aspects of an expression that refer to and depend on the situation in which the utterance is made. ➔ Deictic words indicate the situational coordinates of PERSON (I/you, us/them), PLACE (here/there, this/that), and TIME (now/then, yesterday/today). ➔ The theatre enunciation is perhaps the most determinant aspect of the specificity of theatre. Theatre discourse is that which makes theatre very different from other discursive practices. | Central to this kind of enunciation is the fact that in the theatre to speak is to act and to act is to speak (actors speak in the situation the actors fabricated). This is so for several reasons: - performance fabricates an enunciative situation that mimes a real situation - the actors/ characters always speak in a concrete situation fabricated by themselves - they imitate the dialogical structure ➔ This situation is determined immediately and directly by the participants of the speech event > explicit and implicit participants, in connection with a specific situation. That situation shapes the utterance, dictating that it sound one way and not another DIFFERENT TYPES OF DEIXIS - Enunciative deixis (I/you) - Spatial deixis (here/there) - Temporal deixis (today/yesterday) - Social deixis (idiolect, that is individual’s unique variety and/or use of language) - Demonstrative deixis (this / that) BASIS TEXTUAL TERMS: acts and scene ACT: A major unit (or structural division) of a dramatic text. Many classical plays are divided into five acts; most modern plays have two, to allow for an intermission. Usually, an act consists of a sequence of smaller action units called scenes. Other popular formats are three-act plays and one-act plays. SCENE: An action unit within an act. Usually, transition from one scene to another involves a new stage situation and a fresh episode, marked either by a change in time and/or location, or by an empty stage, or by characters entering or going off stage. BASIS STAGE TERMS: set and props SET: The objects and the backdrop making up a stage scenery (ex. a table, a couch, three walls of a room). In a playscript the set is usually described in an initial block stage direction. PROPERTIES PROPS: Generally, the set of moveable objects needed by the actors. LAYERS OF TEXT The printed text generally distinguishes more or less clearly between two layers of text. This distinction is often expressed typographically: ● One layer comprises the SPOKEN DIALOGUE that takes place between the dramatic figures ● The other refers to the VERBAL TEXT SEGMENTS that are not reproduced on stage in spoken form. This second category would therefore include the title of the play, the inscriptions, dedications and prefaces, the dramatis personae (list of characters in a dramatic work), announcements of act (Act I) and scene, stage-directions whether applicable to scenery or action, and the identification of the speaker of a particular speech. Ingarden’s concepts of “main” or “primary” and “side” or “secondary” text have been adopted as the accepted labels for these different layers of text: ● The primary or main text of a playscript consists of the speeches of the characters, including prologues and epilogues, if any. A prologue is an introductory speech, an epilogue is a concluding speech. ● The secondary or side text of a playscript consists of all textual elements that do not belong to the primary text and fulfil (adempiere) an explanatory, descriptive and narrative function (the play’s title, subtitle, historical notes, dramatis personae, stage directions, speech prefixes etc.) THE PRIMARY TEXT AND ITS ELEMENTS The PRIMARY TEXT is the main body of the play spoken by the characters. It includes: ● SPEECH: An utterance of a single speaker, either within a dialogue, a monologue, or an aside. ● DIALOGUE: A sequence of conversational ‘turns’ exchanged between two or more speakers or ‘interlocutors’. - The importation of Irish cattle, sheep, or swine into England was totally prohibited (1660) - Scottish corn was excluded, and Scottish imports were heavily taxed. - The alliance with Portugal, the marriage of Charles II with Catherine of Braganza, the renewed war with the United Provinces, the resolute retention of Gibraltar, were actuated by the desire to expand English commerce and give it military protection. - Partly as a result of victory over the Dutch, English commerce doubled between 1660 and 1688. ❖ Charles II wasn’t only the “merry monarch” but also he was seriously involved in the growth of the nation >> interested in scientific progress ❖ Mercantile fortunes now rivalled nobles. | England started building in the Nineteenth century its commercial and colonial power THE DAWN OF COLONIAL POWER New colonies were developed: ➔ in New York (was dutch -new Amsterdam- but during the 2° dutch war was caught by english), New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Carolina, and Canada. ➔ The East India Company was given full rights over all of India > own navy, army, forts, currency, and laws; it declared war and negotiated peace ➔ Bombay was acquired by marriage in 1661, Manhattan by conquest in 1664, and in that year the English seized Dutch possessions on the west coast of Africa. RESTORATION THEATRE >> timeline In 1642 an act of parliament prescribed the closure of theatre > accusation of immorality + against God | 1660: Charles II restored to the English throne and returned to England. ROYAL PATENTS (licenza) were given to Thomas Killigrew andWilliam Davenant >> who established: - the King’s Company (Killigrew) - the Duke’s Company (Davenant) Only these two companies were licensed to perform >>> double monopoly (all series of plays) Theatres officially reopened after 18 years (with Charles II), with the King’s Company performing in an ADAPTED TENNIS COURT in Vere Street >> Public theatres were destroyed during the Commonwealth and they didn’t have a space so they adapted a tennis court. | 1661: Davenant’s Duke’s Company opens in another TENNIS COURT at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. 1663: The King’s Company moves to a new theatre in Bridge Street. 1670: Duke’s Company moves to a new playhouse in Dorset Garden. 1672: Theatre Royal in Bridge Street destroyed by fire. 1674: Thomas Killigrew opens a new theatre on Drury Lane (on the same site as the Bridge Street Theatre). ROYAL PATENTS Two Royal patents were made to formalise the rights, given to Killigrew and Davenant exclusively, to build and run theatres in London (1662). | The patents separately conferred to Killigrew and Davenant the right to build a theatre in London or Westminster and to establish and manage a company of actors to perform in it. - Killigrew’s actors were to be styled the King’s Company - Davenant's were to be known as the Duke of York’s. These two patents established the joint monopoly of the spoken drama in the London theatre which persisted until the Theatres Regulations Act of 1843. THEATRES: Dorset Garden, the Duke’s Company playhouse, built in 1671 by the troupe created by Sir William Davenant. The draw shows the south façade of the theatre, as it was pictured in the libretto of The Empress of Morocco (1673) >>> play full of music and effects In reverse the GLOBE THEATRE had no roof and they were two completely different buildings. The architecture is very different after the restoration in reference to public theatres >>> renovated the theatre and plays 1. MEDIAEVAL PAGEANT IN THE MARKETPLACE - the people were around the stage - idea of having an open air space 2. RENAISSANCE (ELIZABETHAN) THEATRE - it was circular - people surrounding the stage - no roof no curtains - in Shakespeare there weren’t sceneries > spectators would used their imagination >> THE GLOBE 3. RESTORATION STAGE - tennis court > rectangular pit (platea) - covered > no open air spaces - the proximity to the stage is like in the Elizabethan theatre - Proscenium arch > separation between areas > actions are going back progressively - movable wings and shutters > opened or closed that allowed to change the sceneries (created a specific location) Which kind of influence worked in order to produce the restoration stage? Theater of the Continent (Charles II spent time in the continent, France). It is a prospective stage with different kinds of movable scenery thanks to curtains and the “proscenium arch”. Ex. WREN’S THEATRE ROYAL, DRURY LANE (1674) 4. MODERN THEATRE DOMESTIC INFLUENCES > INIGO JONES Inigo Jones was an English architect and scenographer who designed scenery and costumes for many of the main Jacobean and Caroline court masques. He was already ‘a great traveller’ and spent an extended period on the Continent >>> double tradition: 1) Continental influence (italy > Vicenza, teatro Olimpico > influenced by continental theatre and architecture 2) Domestic influence from the masque theatre His work was heavily influenced by Italian sources, and his study of the designs of Serlio revolutionised English stage technology: - perspective scenery - use of flying machines - movable shutters > opened, closed or turned and each have a different images MASQUE ● A stylized form of drama performed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries at the English court and aristocratic country houses. ● A typical masque would feature allegorical or mythological characters, often all of the same gender ● Everything would lead up to a sequence of figure dances, after which the masquers would 'take out' members of the audience, and the dramatic fiction would dissolve into the social reality of a court revel; finally the masquers would make their departure. ● A masque’s ostensible purpose was to celebrate a special occasion such as an aristocratic wedding, a calendar festival, or a state event, an ambassador > aristocratic entertainment, direct involvement of the court ● Most fundamentally, though, the genre was political in that it existed to praise and support the ruling elite ● They were in closed spaces not in the public open air theatres. During the Commonwealth theatres were closed but they were not completely silence >> they were staged in PRIVATE MANSIONS | The production of The Siege of Rhodes (1656) was an experiment that attempted to bring the conventions of the English court masques to the English public stage, initiating the new theatrical attitudes that predominated during the Restoration . The stage was with movable shutters, the idea of a prospective stage and being in a private house so covered with no open air. TWONEW PLAYHOUSES IN A NEW LONDON In 1671 Sir Christopher Wren built: - the Duke’s Theatre, Dorset Garden, for Davenant - the first Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, for Killigrew. These theatres combined Continental innovations with some of the features of the Elizabethan stage | Designer, astronomer, geometrician, and the greatest English architect of his time, Wren designed fifty-three London churches, including St Paul’s Cathedral, as well as many secular buildings of note. THE GREAT FIRE OF LONDON The fire (originated in a bakery) destroyed part of the city including St Paul’s Cathedral (rebuilt). They have to rebuild London (a new city) > nation and the city born again from ashes (ceneri) JOHN DRYDEN ANNUSMIRABILIS - 1666 It’s a poem that celebrates the colonial and commercial power of Britain > section dedicated to the power of London > reborned and rebuild stronger than ever from this ashes 1666: it’s the year of the devil >>> Dryden annus mirabilis, he says that from this fire Englans is going to be more powerful. Also Charles II personally thought about how the fire could be stopped, he was involved in the reconceptualization of the city and how the architecture should work . In the poem he describe the fire as a monster,how was the birth of fire (progressively) and after the fire Frontispiece of The Tempest, in The Works of MrWilliam Shakespeare, edited by Nicholas Rowe in 1709. Shakespeare’s play (1611) was first adapted by Davenant and Dryden in 1667, with further revisions by Thomas Shadwell in 1674 >>> with the adaptations they added characters also female, spectacular effects, and the coverture >> scenario that is remindful of what happens in the stage. These are the opening stage direction of this play: “The Front of the Stage is open’d, and the Band of 24 Violins, with the Harpsicals and Theorbo’s which accompany the Voices, are plac’d between the Pit and the Stage. While the Overture is playing the Curtain rises, [...]... a Tempestuous Sea in perpetual Agitation. This Tempest … This is accompanied with Lightning, and several Claps of Thunder, to the end of the Storm.” | There is on the stage the music box > the intention is to give the idea of a tempest (violins on the stage). Contrast between the truth of what you see and the ingenuity (ingegnosità). Another stage directions can be how could be the changes thanks to movable shutters (also masque) Tempest is a spectacularity play Nicola Sabbatini, Pratica di fabricar scene e machine ne’ teatri, Ravenna, 1638 In his Manual for Constructing Scenes and Machines in the Theatre, Sabbatini described contemporary theatrical techniques, including those used for stage lighting. Although most of the stage machinery described by Sabbatini was probably not of his invention, the Pratica remains a comprehensive documentation of practical stagecraft of the Renaissance. Its influence was considerable during the 17th century and beyond. Many tricks were used: - Shutters that permit to characters to don’t see each other (in the play they don’t see each other) - Prospective with the clouds and you don’t see up above in the sky - Dolphins in which there was water, attached to stick and it was possible to move them in the waves - A machine to reproduce waves, they were coloured, the movement represent the see agitated - Ships on the stage - How scenery can be changed quickly: a) changing the appearance b) back scene drawn apart to reveal another scene c) second set of wings hidden within a first set d) sky divided to permit the passage of clouds or gods e) triangular periaktoi worked from under the stage - Glory machine > can host one or two characters > to ascend the sky or to go to the heaven - Thunder run or thunder box (recreate the sound of thunder) with a piece of wood, sort of steps and a rock was made run down > reminds a thunder - Clouds can be together > closed or opened - Dimmer (set of candles) to create darkness on the stage > > darkness was appreciated in Restoration THOMAS BETTERTON > Restoration actor and theatre manager. In 1668 he became co-manager of the Duke's Company and in this capacity as manager Betterton implemented in English theatre the development of spectacle already accomplished in Italy and France. He exploited the potential of the new stage machinery, combined with music and dance as well as words, to offer productions of a kind not seen before by London audiences. Betterton visited Paris to study stagecraft and may have seen the famed comédies-ballets of Lully and Molière. HENRY PURCELL English composer of the middle Baroque period, most remembered for: his more than 100 songs; a tragic opera, Dido and Aeneas; and his incidental music to a version of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream called The Fairy Queen. Purcell, the most important English composer of his time, composed music covering a wide field: the church, the stage, the court, and private entertainment. In all these branches of composition he showed an obvious admiration for the past combined with a goodwill to learn from the present, particularly from his contemporaries in Italy. He’s the most original English composer of his time as well as one of the most original in Europe. | Music > often trumpets CHIEF FEATURES OF RESTORATION PLAYHOUSES AND THEATRE ● A covered stage and auditorium lit by windows above the stage, the light supplemented by candles. Chandeliers illuminating the actors and spectators generally remained alight (illuminati) but, as in the masque, rare effects of light were possible. The candles added to the special atmosphere of the Restoration theatre. Theatre wasn't an elegant place > smelling bad ● An apron stage (from Elizabethan) that encouraged the actor to work in close proximity with the audience. As in earlier times, the apron remained unlocalized until a location was identified by an actor’s lines or a scene change. ● The proscenium arch (absent before) with one or two doors on each side. One of these doors sometimes provided a ‘closet’ to an actor, but they served as entrances into the acting area. The downstage position of the stage doors is for movement across the acting area. ● Balconies over the doors were made possible by their position in the proscenium arch and provided a second level. They served as a place for the action taking place on the stage > also as a chamber window for amorous scenes. ● A music gallery was provided above the proscenium for ‘a consort of musicians’ (usually a few strings and woodwinds ARCHI E FIATI) who always played in full view of the audience. This feature indicates that music was usual in every kind of Restoration play. ● System of changeable scenery (we still have it today). At this time it was changed in full view of the audience and made NO REALISTIC ILLUSION >> THE SCENES CHANGED IN FRONT OF THE SPECTATORS THE IDEA of the TRUTH, things were realistic (ex. a wood was a wood) but at the same time they show the INGENUITY of the effects (see how clever we are obtaining this kind of scene). 6° lezione 13.10.23 RESTORATION DRAMA THE KING AND THE THEATRE Charles II’s taste and example were not always so deleterious. He exercised an encouraging influence over the drama which revived most remarkably in his reign. Unlike his father, Charles II did not foster a delicate court drama based on the theatre in Whitehall Palace but patronized the public theatre (not only elite kind of audience but also to all the people) A fresh sprightliness of language was one of the most striking features of the new comedy of manners. Dryden believed that the King was directly responsible for this improvement in the language of society, for he had acquired a French manner of witty speech during his exile: - not only in the theatrical architecture but also in the languages - never forget the celebrity of our nation, original mix of sprightliness of languages, mixed with the stability of english If any ask me whence it is that our conversation is so much refined, I must freely, and without flattery, ascribe it to the Court, and in it, particularly to the King, whose example gives a law to it ... The desire of imitating such a great pattern first awakened the dull and heavy spirits of the English from their natural reservedness, loosened them from their stiff forms of conversation, and made them easy and pliant to each other in discourse. Then, insensibly, our way of living became more free, and the fire of the English wit, which was being stifled under a constrained melancholy way of breeding, began first to display its force, by mixing the solidity of our nation with the air and gaiety of our neighbours. Three genre were common in the restoration drama 1. COMEDIES This is a generic label usually taken in contemporary usage as an indication that a text, performance, or event features humorous intent. It may also imply that a story ends happily, and to a lesser extent that it orients itself towards the everyday world of the intended audience through vernacular language. It might be ventured that comedy renders the world with a distinctive playfulness, even when its subject matter and themes are quite serious. Everything led back to a desirable situation > es. comedy ends with a marriage (institutionalised restoration of order) 2. TRAGEDIES That tragedy is «an imitation of an action» is Aristotle’s central idea, which he illustrated with reference to Sophocles’ Oedipus and other plays know to him. This action must be «serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude» and the handling of the plot is the dramatist’s primary task. Second and third in importance are the creation of «characters» and provision of the tragedy’s «thought» or argument. The action should present a change of fortune (or peripeteia) from prosperity to adversity in a way that both satisfies moral sensibility and arouses «pity and fear» in its audience. In consequence, the protagonist cannot be entirely evil or entirely good: if the hero were evil, Aristotle argued, the misfortune would call for no pity; if good, there would be no fear. = what he deserved, but it’s not villain protagonist By arousing both these feelings, a tragedy purged them from spectators (catharsis). The misfortune must derive, Aristotle concluded, not from vice or depravity, but from «some error or frailty» within a good man, later to be called the hero’s «tragic flaw» (hamartia). 3. TRAGICOMEDIES Generally speaking, it is a play which combines a serious (though happily ending) main plot with an important comic subplot. In the Renaissance, tragicomedy became a genre of play that mixed tragic elements into drama that was mainly comic. Battista Guarini defined tragicomedy as having most of tragedy’s elements (a certain gravity of diction, the depiction of important public events, and the arousal of compassion) but never carrying the action to tragedy’s conclusion, and judiciously including such comic elements as low-born characters, laughter, and jests. Central to this kind of tragicomedy were danger, reversal, and a happy ending. HEROIC DRAMA/TRAGEDY A form of serious drama which flourished briefly in England during the Restoration. Heroic tragedy, in rhymed couplets, featured a titanic protagonist, spectacular action in an exotic setting (South America, Africa, Spain), bombast (grandiloquent speech) and overwrought emotion (everything is exaggerated > emotions, languages), and themes of love and honour. A tragic denouement was not a requisite. It had affinities with Pierre Corneille’s tragedies, but its immediate progenitor, according to its most prominent advocate, John Dryden, was William Davenant’s Siege of Rhodes (1656). Dryden, with Robert Howard, inaugurated the vogue with The Indian Queen (1664), but after Aureng-Zebe (1675) he turned to blank verse tragedy and by the early 1680s heroic tragedy had run its course.