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Mommsen (1817-1903) on Euripides
Posted by Michael Sympson on 19/12/2001, 9:46:14
"... at the same time like the Greek comedy, so did the Greek tragedy make its arrival in Rome. It was a more valuable and in a certain sense easier acquisition than the comedy. The foundation for a Greek tragedy - the Homeric epics - was not entirely alien to a Roman and indeed connected with his own etiological legends. Generally a responsive native could make himself much easier at home in an idealized world of heroic myths, than on the fish market of Athens. However, the tragedy as well, only not so blunt and without the vulgarities, advanced the anti-national and hellenizing trends, and it is of great importance, that the Greek stage of the era had been mostly dominated by Euripides (c.484-406 BC.) This is not the place to discuss in great detail this remarkable man and his rather curious effect on contemporaries and on posterity, but the spirit of the later Greek and of the Roman-Greek period was influenced by him to such extent, that it makes it necessary to sketch out at least some of his basic characteristics.
Euripides belongs to the class of poets, who bring poetry to a higher level, yet their progress reveals far more instinct for what ought to be achieved, than actual powers of poetic execution. The profound expression, which ethically as well as poetically sums up a tragedy - meaning, that decisive action is identical with suffering - has of course been accomplished in the Greek tragedy as well; it shows the heroic stature of humanity, but its actual characterization is foreign to it. The unsurpassed grandeur, in which the conflict between men and destiny are carried out in Aeschylus's dramas, depends mainly on the fact that the struggling powers are conceived as forces of nature; the human element in "Prometheus" and "Agamemnon" is only lightly touched by a poetic presentation of the individual. Sophocles shows understanding for the condition of human nature - as king, as an elderly, as a sister - but the human microcosm in its universality he fails to show in even a single person.
A great aim had been accomplished, but not the ultimate: if compared with Shakespeare, it makes Aeschylus and Sophocles merely the imperfect stepping stones in a development, which presents the human condition in its totality, and weaves together each of the rounded characters into a greater poetic picture. Just how Euripides manages to show humanity as it is, represents more a logical and in some sense historical achievement, than progress in poetry. He brought the antique tragedy to an end, but did not create the modern play. Everywhere he came halfway to a halt. The masks - which translate the expressions of the inner life from the specific into the general - are as necessary for the typical tragedy in Antiquity, as they are incompatible with a modern character play; yet Euripides kept them in use. With a marvelously discerning instinct, because it never managed to give the dramatic element free reign or to present it in its purity, the older tragedy had the sense to bind itself to the vehicle of epic stories from the superhuman world of gods and heroes and to the lyrical chorus.
One feels that Euripides jerked his chains: in his stories at least, he went as far down as to half historical times, and his choral lyrics receded into the background; so much so, that in later performances they often had been left out altogether and hardly to the plays's detriment - yet he never brought his characters entirely down to earth nor did away with the chorus altogether. In every way and everywhere he is the comprehensive expression of an era, which on one hand, accomplished the greatest motions in history and philosophy and on the other hand clouded the purity and simplicity of national poetry. If the reverent piety of the older tragic playwrights, whose plays seemed to shine with an overflow from heaven itself and the enclosure of the older Greek's narrow horizon is still holding its satisfyingly powerful sway over the audience, then Euripides' world appears in the treacherous twilight of speculation, as far removed from divinity as it is a matter of intellect, and murky passions flash like thunderbolts from a grey cloud cover.
The old, deep felt faith in destiny has vanished. Now fate is ruling in all its appearances as a despotic power, and grinding their teeth, its slaves shake the chains. The kind of scepticism which is the disguise of faith in despair, has found in this poet a voice of demonic power. By necessity, the poet never achieves a creative conception that would transcend his own capacities and he never develops a truly poetic effect from a composition as a whole. That is why in a manner of speaking, he appeared to be indifferent to the composition of his tragedies, even downright blundering, as he fails to center his plays around a plot or character. The slipshod way of introducing the plot in a prologue and resolve it by divine fiat or by similar crude means, had been Euripides' very own innovation. All his effects flow from the detail, and with great skill indeed, he has mustered every means to cover up the irreplaceable want of poetic totality. Euripides is the past master in the kind of effects which as a rule originate from the sensual and sentimental and often titillate the sensitivity with a peculiar perfume, for instance, of love stories combined with murder or incest.
In their own way, the presentation of Polyxena's dying on her free will, or of Phaedra who is secretly consumed by her pains of love, or especially of the mystically enchanted "Bacchants," are of great beauty, but they are neither morally nor artistically pure, and Aristophanes' observation that this poet would never be able to present us with a Penelope, is perfectly justified. Of a similar kind, in Euripides' tragedies, is the appeal to conventional compassion. His underdeveloped heroes appear to be disgusting or ludicrous, or both, like Menelaos in "Helena," Andromache and Electra as poor dairymaids, or the sick and ruined merchant Telephos. So plays which live more in a down to earth atmosphere make perhaps the most delightful impression of his many works and turn tragedy into a moving family saga and almost into a sentimental comedy, such as "Iphigenia in Aulis," "Ion," "Alcestis." Almost as often, but with lesser luck, the poet tries to bring intellectual interests into play.
That is what causes the complications in his plots, calculated not, as in the older tragedy, to move the mind, but instead to flex our curiosity. It gives reason for the pointed controversy of the dialogues, which is almost unbearably for the rest of us, who are not born in Athens. It explains the sententious sound-bites, which litter Euripides' plays like flowers in a display. And it especially opens the road for Euripides' psychology which is not at all based on immediate empathy, but a product of reason and rationalizing. His "Medea" is indeed cut out from real life, in as much as she had been sufficiently supplied with funds before her travel: of a conflict between motherly love and jealousy, the unsuspecting reader won't find a whole lot in Euripides. Most of all, the poetic effect in a tragedy of Euripides has been replaced by the tendentious and ideological.
Without actually commenting on immediate concerns of the day and quite resolutely focussing more on social than political matters, Euripides inner disposition in the end holds common ground with the political and philosophical radicalism of the period and makes him the first and foremost apostle of a new cosmopolitan humanitarianism, which resolves the old Athenian national values. For this reason, the irreligious and un-Athenian poet ran into the opposition of his peers, while the younger generation and foreign countries surrendered with a moving enthusiasm to the poet of sentimentality and love, of the smart sound-bite and tendency, of philosophy and humanity. With Euripides, the Greek tragedy overstepped its boundaries and finally collapsed: but the cosmopolitan poet's success profited from this even more, since simultaneously the nation too overstepped its boundaries and finally collapsed.
The criticism of Aristophanes might have been correct all the way, ethically as well as poetically; but in history the impact of poetry is rarely linked to its absolute quality, but rather to the extent it manages to anticipate the zeitgeist; and under this aspect, Euripides is without peer. So it eventually happened, that Alexander [the Great] did read him studiously, that Aristotle formed his definition of the tragic effect with Euripides in view, that in Athens the latest generation of poets and artists somehow referred to him as their model, that Athens' "New Comedy" is nothing but a transformation of Euripides into the comic genre, and that the latest decorations on Athenian ceramics no longer drew their ideas from Homer's epics but from Euripides' plays, and finally, when old Greek gave way to the new Hellenism, that the poet's fame and influence was more and more on the ascend and the Greek enclaves in foreign countries, in Egypt as well as Rome, found their new identity mainly under Euripides' influence. ... ."
© translated by Michael Sympson - 12/19/2001 - all rights reserved
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Posted by Michael Sympson on 19/12/2001, 9:50:08, in reply to "Mommsen (1817-1903) on Euripides"
Harsh words. But that doesn't mean that Mommsen got it entirely wrong: from a certain perspective his points of critique are actually a great compliment to Euripides. Mommsen just didn't share this perspective, but he had enough discerning judgement, to make the points. The latter day's strong reactions to cosmopolitanism and liberalism, and the call for "local flavors," not just as a matter of cuisine, reflect on a strong political sentiment, that had found its most volatile speakers in the nationalistic climate of the late 1800s. It let to catastrophe twice, and has all the makings to get us into trouble again. And yet Mommsen was not ignorant. He appreciated the beneficial effects of Roman rule over a unified world community. But being a child of his period, he just couldn't help it and bemoaned the loss of national identities. He was a Victorian character through and through. The simple truth is, this Nobel laureate for literature, had little understanding or appreciation for concerns of genuine imaginative literature.
Which is not entirely surprising; Mommsen lived in an era, when the great figures of literary criticism in Russia - Mikhailovsky, Belinsky, Chernyshevsky, or Pisarev - were hailed as champions of liberty, which to some extent they were, and as giants of literary criticism, which they clearly were not. The truth was, that, with the possible exception of Belinsky, neither of them understood nor even liked literature. Of Pisarev word went, that he would have liked to have this fiddle abolished altogether. Even a writer of Chekhov's caliber suffered from their preoccupations with "social relevance" and "political commitment." When over the years Chekhov's acclaim grew with the reading public, the leading literary critics continued to lament his lack of human concern and of moral principles. They never tired to warn their readers that this writer was dangerous and that by writing the way he did he would betray the humanitarian traditions of his country - which is all good and well, but has absolutely nothing to do with imaginative literature.
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