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A Parleying with Aristophanes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
So much has been said, and on the whole so effectively, concerning Browning's use in Aristophanes' Apology of ancient authors and modern critics that a statement of the author's own contribution to the poem has become not the pointless task it would at first appear. The very thoroughness with which Browning's materials have been examined has tended to obscure the fact that this piece affords us some of our most interesting, and not our least valuable, evidence of what Browning himself thought and felt about poetry.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1940
References
1 For a listing of the best of these, see the bibliography in Douglas Bush, Mythology and the Romantic Tradition in English Poetry (Harvard University Press, 1937), pp. 618–620. See especially Bush's discussion of Aristophanes' Apology (ibid., pp. 373–375). In his few paragraphs he has to some extent anticipated and influenced the point of view expressed in the present study.
2 Classical Elements in Browning's “Aristophanes' Apology,” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, xx (1909), 15–73.
3 Browning's Ancient Classical Sources, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, xxxiii (1922), 79–80. This invaluable study, as the title indicates, discusses the classical sources in all of Browning's poetry.
4 Ibid.
5 Browning's “Aristophanes' Apology,” The University of Missouri Studies, ii (1927), 4.
6 Ibid., p. 7.
7 Leipzig, 1930, i, 86–369.
8 Ibid., p. 367.
9 New York, 1935, p. 334. DeVane himself apparently wishes to leave the influence of Schlegel and Symonds upon the poem in the realm of probability, though he quotes a lengthy passage from Hood, including both quotations given above, remarking that Hood's statements are “undoubtedly true.” See pp. 334, 335, 337, 339–340.
10 The evidence for Hood's statements contained in the passages quoted above from his monograph in Harvard Studies in Classical Philology is to be found, as he remarks (p. 79, note 1), in his Browning's Later Hellenic Poems (MS dissertation, 1921, in the Harvard College Library). Probably Hood would no longer hold as he did seventeen years ago in his dissertation (i, 166–167) that “Browning's Euripides is Symonds's; Symonds's is Browning's. And the same holds true for their interpretations of Aristophanes and of his functions in the Athenian democracy.” Certainly such ground is untenable, as will be apparent further along in this paper. Hood's statement of Schlegel's significance for Browning is less dogmatic and much better substantiated.
11 Nor is the whole story to be told if we consider Browning as an oracle of learning and poetic insight. For Spindler (i, 367) “die überwältigende Fülle von Gelehrsamkeit, der gewaltige Gedankenreichtum” of the poem determine the tenor of his discussion. With all recognition of the true value of Spindler's study, it is possible, I believe, to see Browning somewhat plainer in the Apology.
12 DeVane, p. 333.
13 “The Poetry of the Period: Robert Browning,” Temple Bar, xxvi (1869), 327; reprinted in Austin's The Poetry of the Period (1870). See William Lyon Phelps, “Robert Browning and Alfred Austin,” Yale Review, lxxii (1918), 580–591, and the notes to the Letters of Robert Browning, ed. Thurman L. Hood (Yale University Press, 1933), pp. 355, 358–363.
14 Letters, ed. Hood, pp 135–136.
15 Letters of Robert Browning to Miss Isa Blagden, ed. A. Joseph Armstrong (Baylor University Press, 1923), p. 189.
16 See Letters, ed. Hood, pp. 156, 175, and Pacchiarotto, Works, eds. Charlotte Porter and Helen Clarke (New York, 1898), ll. 529–534. All references to Browning's poetry will be to this edition.
17 Balaustion's Adventure, ll. 304–308. For Hood's identification of Balaustion's Critic-Friend with Schlegel, see Browning's Later Hellenic Poems, i, 23–53. Hood's astute remarks in his dissertation are almost certainly correct, but I believe that the unmaidenly vehemence with which Balaustion expresses herself in the lines quoted above may possibly have had its origin in Browning's dislike for his own severest critic rather than for the German scholar already some twenty-six years beyond the grave.
18 DeVane, pp. 322–323. See also pp. 368–369, 377–378. See Fifine at the Fair, ll. 1119–1125.
19 Letters, ed. Hood, pp. 156, 159.
20 See Pacchiarotto, ll. 456–581.
21 DeVane, p. 348.
22 Ll. 579–581.
23 See ll. 520, 529, 533, and the note on line 534.
24 Ll. 1671–1676. Of course Browning had no idea of dignifying Austin as Aristophanes! See ll. 1677 ff.
25 Austin, p. 325.
26 Ll. 2389–2390.
27 Ll. 2215–2216. Compare Aristophanes' The Frogs, tr. Benjamin Rogers, Works (Loeb Classical Library, 1924), ii, 373, ll. 826 ff. This edition will be used in further references to the plays of Aristophanes.
28 Austin, p. 321.
29 L. 57.
30 Frogs, l. 926. See ll. 937 ff.
31 Augustus William Schlegel, A Course of Lectures on Dramatic Art, tr. John Black (London, 1840), i, 142.
32 Ll. 2114– 2116. The italics are mine.
33 Ll. 2185–2186. The italics are mine.
34 Ll. 2176–2177.
35 Ll. 2157–2160.
36 Ll. 2166–2172.
37 Red Cotton Night-Cap Country, ll. 53–70.
38 See below, note 39.
39 As Symonds remarks in his review (“Aristophanes' Apology,” The Academy, vii, 1875, 389): “Into her mouth Mr. Browning has put the views of the most searching and most sympathetic modern analyst. … No account is taken of his [Euripides'] tiresome quibblings and long-winded repartees, his moral hair-splitting and sophistry, the shifting of his point of view about such characters as Helen.” See below, note 66.
40 iii.787 ff. Though the text of the 1888 edition is given in the Porter and Clarke edition, the 1840 reading is substantially the same.
41 Ll. 1034 ff.
42 Ll. 69 ff. The “Third Speaker” of the poem, as DeVane remarks (p. 278), “is Browning.”
43 Ll. 335 ff. See especially ll. 1503–1516, and ll. 1690–1818, a remarkable passage that has never received the attention it deserves. Compare Sordello, iii.787 ff.
44 Ll. 2114–2120. These lines are reminiscent of Aristophanes' actual gibes at Euripides (See, for example, The Frogs, ll. 1064 ff.), but the real Aristophanes by no means granted Euripides such lofty motives for presenting his characters in pitiable circumstances.
45 Ll. 2125–2128.
46 See ll. 2140–2149. Browning hardly needed the support of Symonds in forming his interpretation of Euripides as a teacher of virtue, as has been implied. (See Hood, Browning's Later Hellenic Poems, i, 217–218, and Tisdel, pp. 6–7.) He had expressed much the same conception of Euripides' teachings four years before the appearance of Symonds' Studies of the Greek Poets, in The Ring and the Book (x.1661–1785).
47 Conclusion, ll. 482–484. The italics are mine. The part of the Apology following Browning's translation of the Herakles has separate numbering of lines and will be referred to, as in the Porter Clarke edition, as the Conclusion.
48 Robert Browning and Julia Wedgwood … Letters, ed. Richard Curie (New York, 1937), p. 144.
49 xii.830.
50 Ibid., 839–840.
51 The Ring and the Book, xii.856.
52 See ll. 761–804, 2407–2415, 2987–3008.
53 L. 3399.
54 Ll. 3419–3421. See also ll. 1311, 3391–3429; Conclusion, ll. 238–253.
55 Ll. 857–861. The italics are mine.
56 Ll. 862–866. See also ll. 3245–3246. After hearing the Herakles, Aristophanes, in the language of evangelist ministers, is “almost persuaded.” He sees for the moment (Conclusion, ll. 7–8) that the highest purpose of art may be to present “Wisdom formed For love not fear.”
57 See The Ring and the Book, xii.841–852.
58 L. 2542. See also ll. 1375–1379, 2107–2109, 2491–2549, 3118–3122. For Balaustion's attitude, see ll. 1740–1752, 3130–3152, 3314.
59 Ll. 1340–1341. See also ll. 1315–1328.
60 Ll. 3430–3433.
61 Ll. 3473–3474. See also ll. 759–778, 820–829.
62 Ll. 2683–2685.
63 It is true that Aristophanes claims (ll. 1465–1500; Conclusion, ll. 32 ff.) that he defends “man's double nature,” soul and body; but Aristophanes' characteristic trust is in sensual life altogether: “Eat and drink, And drink and eat, what else is good in life?” (ll. 1089–1090.) Here “no death [concern for the soul] shall mix with life it mars” (l. 2694). See ll. 1912 ff. and Conclusion, ll. 229 ff. Browning's belief that the interests of “life” and “death,” body and soul, should be coordinated, runs as an undertone throughout the poem. But his own trust is obviously in “life” that makes one “glad, Not grinning” (ll. 1300–1301). Aristophanes is a traitor to the cause of true “life,” and it is Euripides who, as the ministrant to the Tragic Muse, teaches man to “run life's race fairly,—legs and feet, Craving no false wings to o'erfly its length!” (ll. 1403–1404).
64 Ll. 3391–3392. See also ll. 590–592, 953 ff., 2000 ff., 2649 ff. (especially, 2671–2672).
65 Ll. 3395–3399.
66 Ll. 3422–3428. These are, to be sure, the strictures of Balaustion; and Browning protested against complete identification of his own opinions with those of his heroine. (See Letters, ed. Hood, p. 193.) But if Balaustion's point of view is not Browning's it is that of a strangely virile and indecorously outspoken matron who had absorbed the Browning doctrines more successfully even than Mrs. Sutherland Orr. Balaustion's opinions have generally been accepted as those of Browning; see above, note 39.
67 See ll. 856–861, 1310–1311, 3435–3436. Since Browning had almost certainly read Symonds' Studies, one wonders just what his attitude was toward Symonds' protest (Studies of the Greek Poets, First Series London, 1873, pp. 257–258) against the man who would “shake his head and measure him Aristophanes by the moral standards of Quarterly Reviews and British Respectability.”
68 See ll. 3435–3449.
69 Compare Sordello's plan for the improvement of humanity through the work of successive representatives of the poet-type, “earth's essential king” (Sordello, v.505–665). According to this plan the poet who presented characters obviously all bad or all good and who in his own person pointed out the moral contained in his poem was to give way gradually to the dramatic writer who would present men and women as they appeared in the world (v.588–616). Browning intimated that his own verse would in turn improve upon the method of the dramatist proper by dispensing with external action and affording a more profound insight into “man's inmost life” (v.617–620). A somewhat similar conception of the progress of poesy is evident in the Apology.
70 See ll. 1298–1309.
71 Ll. 1312–1313.
72 L. 1311. See ll. 1314–1344. Though Aristophanes is almost persuaded by Balaustion and the Herakles (Conclusion, ll. 1–16), he of course remains unregenerate, “heart-whole” (Conclusion, l. 78). Like a true Browning character, he decides (ibid., ll. 67–79) to sin the whole sin. The concluding lines of The Lost Leader offer an interesting comparison.
73 Ll. 1321–1323. For identification of the tragi-comic poet with Shakespeare, see Conclusion, l. 62.
74 Ll. 1300–1301.
75 Sordello, iii.869–871, and v.609–629. Compare Fra Lippo Lippi, ll. 208–211, Fifine, ll. 1627–1631, 1718–1721.
76 L. 160.
77 Interpretations of Poetry and Religion (New York, 1900), p. 211.
78 Ll. 2855–2857.
79 Conclusion, ll. 479–480, 496–505. The whole passage from l. 456 to l. 525 is worth study. Compare Balaustion's Adventure, ll. 2413–2461.
80 Conclusion, l. 522.
81 See Tisdel, pp. 4–5, where the pertinent passages from Plutarch are given. Tisdel, however, does not discuss the relationship of Browning's lines in the Apology to Browning's own poetic theories. He comments upon the originality displayed by Browning in making the anecdote an integral part of his poem.
82 Compare, for example, Caponsacchi's words in The Ring and the Book (vi.1855–1857) when his testimony sets a judge weeping:
Did not I say
You were good and true at bottom? You see the truth—
I am glad I helped you: she helped me just so.
See also The Ring and the Book, vi.1173–1175, 1790–1794, 2056–2061; vii.1824–1828. Such moments of insight come characteristically under the stress of love. See, for example, Cristina, By the Fireside, and In a Balcony.
83 Ll. 1278–1283.
84 Ll. 1393–1410.
85 Santayana, p. 193.
86 Ibid. Of course Santayana would not grant the premise.
87 See Sordello, i.30–59; iii.825–829, 924–931; v.614–641, 654–656.
88 For the most striking statement of Browning's attitude in the intermediate years, see his letter to Ruskin in 1855, contained in W. G. Collingwood, The Life of John Ruskin (Boston, 1902), pp. 163–167. See Pacchiarotto, ll. 358 ff., At the “Mermaid,” ll. 99–100, and the Epilogue to Pacchiarotto, passim. It is clear in the last-named poem that poetry must always be “Sweet for the future,—strong for the nonce” (l. 108). Compare Popularity.
89 Popularity, ll. 13–14.
90 Austin, p. 332.
91 See ll. 255 ff., 523–528, 910 ff., 1651–1652, 1890–1891, 3446–3449, et passim.
92 Ll. 3466–3467.
93 See ll. 525–528, 1320 ff., 1648, 1670–1679, 3450 ff., and the citations given above, note 91.
94 Euripides and His Age (London, 1913), pp. 188 ff.
95 Symonds, pp. 198–203. See above, note 46.
96 Symonds, Studies of the Greek Poets, pp. 198–203. On the other hand, there are interesting parallels, as Hood in Browning's Later Hellenic Poems has demonstrated, between the comments of Symonds and the lines of the Apology. Symonds states, for example (p. 203), that Euripides “brought tragedy down to the level of real life,” though this, in Symonds' opinion, was to bring it to a level “where all seems confusion at least to the natural eye.” Symonds views Euripides as an entertaining poet with no great didactic message. Euripides is decidedly lower in stature than Æschylus and Sophocles as an ethical preceptor, but (p. 205) “What we lose in gravity and unity is made up for by versatility.”