No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Peripeteia and Recognition in Racine
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
The purpose of this study is to point out Racine's extensive use of peripeteia and recognition in the construction of his plots. That he relied on these two dramatic resources, which Aristotle considered “the most powerful elements of emotional interest in Tragedy,” is hinted at in Lanson's Esquisse d'une histoire de la tragédie française.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1940
References
1 The Poetics, vi.—In citing from this work, I use the translation of S. H. Butcher found in Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art with a critical text and translation of the “Poetics,” 4th ed. (London: Macmillan, 1927).
2 1st ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1920), p. 86.—Professor W. A. Nitze, in his course in Racine given at the University of Chicago (Summer, 1932), emphasized their importance in the structure of Racinian tragedy.
3 Walter Lock, “The Use of in Aristotle's Poetics” Classical Review, ix (1895), 251.
4 ii. viii.—From the translation of John Henry Freese (London: William Heinemann, 1926).
5 Dictionnaire dramatique contenant l'histoire des théâtres, les règies du genre dramatique, les observations des maîtres les plus célèbres (Paris: Lacombe, 1776), p. 404.
6 “L'Evolution d'un Genre: la Tragédie,” Etudes Critiques sur l'histoire de la littérature française, 3e éd. (Paris: Hachette et Cie, 1912), vii, 169.
7 La Formation de la doctrine classique en France (Paris: Hachette et Cie, 1927), p. 323.
8 Préface to Bérénice.
9 Racine and the “Art Poétique” of Boileau, The Johns Hopkins Studies in Romance Literatures and Languages, Extra xii (Baltimore, 1938), p. 206.
10 Poetics, x.
11 Mesnard, Œuvres de J. Racine, v, 487.
12 “Bel artifice du poëte, qui fait qu'Œdipe s'engage lui-même dans d'effroyables imprécations.”—Note on vs. 241 of Œdipus the King. (Mesnard, op. cit., vi. 234.)
13 Note on vs. 383. (Mesnard, op. cit., vi, 235.)
14 R. C. Jebb, The Tragedies of Sophocles translated into English Prose (Cambridge: University Press, 1928), p. 273.
15 Note on vss. 1474–87 of Electra. (Mesnard, op. cit., vi, 233.)
16 Notes on vss. 1168 and 1188 et sqq. (Mesnard, op. cit., vi, 230–231)—The first recognition occurs when the chorus names Electra. Orestes, in the second, makes known his identity by showing Electra the signet that belonged to their father.
17 Loc. cit.
18 Note on vs. 1353. (Mesnard, op. cit., vi, 232.)
19 Note on vs. 1360. (Loc. cit.)
20 Auguste Laverdet, Correspondance entre Boileau Despréaux et Brossette publiée sur les manuscrits originaux (Paris: J. Techener, 1858), p. 566.—The italics are Brossette's.
21 iv. iii. 1015–17 and 1022.
22 iv. i. 576–577 of Ella Isabel Harris's translation (London: Henry Frowde, 1904).
23 iii. vi. 859–862.—The italics are mine.
24 iii. vi. 869–870.
25 iii. i. 421–130.
26 v. iii. 1428–56.
27 v. iii. 1457–60.
28 v. iii. 1465–68.
29 i. i. 100.
30 iii. ii. 805–806.
31 iii. iii. 835–838.—The italics are mine.
32 v. iii. 1557–60.—The italics are mine.
33 iv. iii. 1230–31.—The italics are mine.
34 Oú vous n'osez aller mériter ma conquête.“
35 Louis Racine directs attention to Oreste's blindness at this point:
‘Il est mort!’ Oreste est si hors de lui-même, qu'il n'entend pas le sens de cette exclamation, ni de celle qui suit: ‘Qu'ont-ils fait l’ Il continue son récit; et plus il décrit les circonstances de cet événement, croyant contenter Hermione, plus il la désespère.”
(Remarques, Œuvres, v, 402)
36 v. iii. 1543.
37 v. iii. 1543–44.
38 v. iii. 1563–64.
39 v. iv. 1565–82.
40 iii. iii. 839–841.
41 iv. ii. 1251–52.
42 iv. ii. 1256–57.
43 There is mention of Britannicus in lines 1123, 1151, 1155–60, 1175–82, 1211–12, and 1217. Twenty-one of the one hundred lines are devoted to him.
44 iv. iii. 1315–18.
45 Seconde Préface.
46 v. vi. 1649–50.—The italics are mine.
47 v. vi. 1674–76.
48 ii. ii. 519–522.—The italics are mine.
49 iv. iv. 1219.
50 iv. iv. 1250.
51 iv. v. 1269–70.—The italics are mine.
52 iv. v. 1295–97.
53 Cf. supra. p. 427.
54 v. vi. 1758.—The italics are mine.
55 iii. v. 925.
56 v. vii. 1647–48.—The italics are mine.
57 iii. ix. 1206–07.—The italics are mine. The same kind of reversal is expressed in Psalm XXXVI. 15: “Let their sword enter into their own hearts, and let their bow be broken.”
58 iii. vii. 1177–78.—The italics are mine.
59 ii. vi. 609–11.
60 Perhaps the tie of blood relationship, of which she is ignorant.
61 iii. iii. 871.
62 v. vi. 1768–72.
63 v. iv. 1696.
64 IV Kings xi. 13–14; II Paralipomenon xxiii. 12–13.
65 I find only one example in Corneille's better-known plays. Sévère complains that his intention to save Polyeucte has been reversed by Fé1ix. The latter, regarding Sévère's generosity as a strategy to destroy his credit at Rome, only hastened Polyeucte's death. Sévère says:
La faveur que pour lui je vous avois offerte,
Au lieu de le sauver, précipite sa perte! (Polyeucte, v. vi. 1751–52.)
66 I am inclined to think, therefore, that this essential part of Racine's dramatic system comes directly from Aristotle rather than from the Italian or French pseudo-Aristotelian tradition. Cf. my chapter “Racine's Familiarity with Greek Tragedy and with Aristotle,” op. cit., pp. 107–124.