The Essence and Origin of Tragedy Helen Adolf The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 10, No. 2. (Dec., 1951), pp. 112-125. Stable URL htp:/flinks.jstor-org/sicisici=( 121-8529% 28195112%2910%3A2%3CI12%3ATEAOOT% 3E2.0.CO%3B2-W_ ‘The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism is currently published by The American Society for Aestheties, Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at hup:/www,jstororglabout/terms.hml. ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at hutp:/www jstor.org/journals/tasfa him ch copy of any part of'a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the sereen or printed page of such transmission, ISTOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive of scholarly journals. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact support @ jstor.org. hupulwww jstor.org/ ‘Sun Aug 27 15:16:57 2006NCE AND ORIGIN OF TRAGEDY HELEN ADOL “What is tragedy?” It may not be amiss to ask this question at a time when plays are projected on the sereen, improvised in doctors’ offices; when they are replacing textbooks of psychology, or revealing, X-ray-like, the anatomy of the Self. Certainly there is no lack of definitions of tragedy, definitions that were formed to emulate or to oppose Aristotle's “imitation of an action” and “purgation of emotions.” Some of these, to be sure, fit like loose gowns (‘. .. serious drama is a serious representation by speech and action of some phase of human life. ..”).1 Others strike like hammerblows at the very center of the problem: it is the conflict (Brunetiére), the crisis (Archer), the glorious dying (J. M. Brown), the reflection of the life-process (Lewisohn), the relation to something timeless (G. R. Coffman} that matters. Far from holding rules in too great esteem,¢ our generation seems to be concerned chiefly with the dynamies of a play,* and those dynamics have been connected with the “age-old rite” from which tragedy developed. It is the special distinction of Francis Fergusson’s recent book that, it links the stage of Sophocles, the theatre of the Divine Comedy with what today should be our “idea of a theatre,” by revealing the “tragic rhythm” (purpose— passion—perception) which governs both Oedipus Tyrannus and the Purgatorio travelogue? However, the ritual basis of that rhythm can be brought into sharper focus than the Enniautos (Year Demon) theory warrants, and the differ- cence between ritual plays (librettos, as Th. H. Gaster calls them)* and tragedy proper will stand out more clearly if we adopt the following formula: “Tragedy arose out of human sacrifice; it still is a substitute for it.” Bold as this theory may appear at frst, it has long been an open secret among poets, Goethe wrote: “In der Tragidie geschieht sie [die Katharsis] durch eine ‘Art Menschenopfer, es mag nun wirklich vollbracht oder unter Einwirkung einer 1B, L, Lucas, Tragedy in Relation to Aristotle's Poetce (1928), p22 4 See Barrett H. Clark, European Theories of the Drama. With a Supplement onthe Ameri- can Drama. Rev. ed. (1047); also A. Nicoll, The Thoory of Drama (8... °G_R. Coffman, “Tragedy and « Sense of the Tragie in some of ts Ethical Img Secance Review, L (1942), pp. 26M CER, Wellek and A. Warren, Theory of Literature (1949), p. 235: "The theory of genres inciple of order.” See also W. Pabst, “Die Theorie der Novelle in Deutachland 1920- ‘Romaniatitcher Jahrbuch, Ui (1949), pp. 120 f ing to B. Fairley," Heinrich v. Kleist,” APP, XIV (1016), drama energies” (p. 240), a balance of dramatic energies” (p. 829) ‘Maxwell Anderson, The Bssence of Tragedy (1089), p. 14 2 Francis Fergusson, The Idea of « Theater. A Study of Ten Playe. The Art of Drama in Changing Peropetive (1099) "Th. H. Gaster, Phespis, Ritual, My 1950) % Tentatively put forth by thie author in a review of Mesa, I (1945) in Comparat Literature, TII/1 (Winter 1951), p.87f jeations, ‘a ystem of ‘and Drama in the Ancient Near Bast (New York, ne‘THE ESSENCE AND ORIGIN OF TRAGEDY 113 giinstigen Gottheit durch ein Surrogat geldst werden, wie im Falle Abrahams und Agamemnons.”* Jean Giraudoux, discussing the theatre of Racine, affirms: “Sur cette scéne devenue une espice d’autel, Racine pouvait devenir sans difficulté le podte qui a le plus rapproché la tragédie du sacrifice humain.’"* Finally, Gerhart, Hauptmann not only called human sacrifice “‘the bloody root of tragedy,” but he went down to those very roots by reviving the horror of ‘such rites in his Atridee tetralogy." Scholars may be impressed by this consensus of geniuses; they will, however, ask for evidence. Let us begin by pointing to the South American play of Rabi- nal.* K. ‘Th, Preuss concluded his survey of Mexican fertility plays by stating: “von grésster Bedeutung ware es, ... aus den geschichtlichen Nachrichten eines Kulturvolkes die Erfillung solcher alten Kultformen mit neuem Leben und so die Entwicklung profaner dramatischer Kunst nachzuweisen.”* Rabinal does just that: it shows the transition from ritual to secular play, and it is strange that the great expert in South Américan folklore did not mention it."* For in Rabinal we have not only a ritual slaying (with sacrificial stone and the tearing out of the victim’s heart by Eagles and Jaguars), but also a moving farewell to life on the part of the victim and the granting him of four favors by hhis merciful-merciless captor. We see how he is caught and we are told why he ‘cannot be ransomed: he, the warrior of Quiché, who once had kidnapped and held the King of Rabinal in captivity, is now dependent upon that very king for his life."* In short, we find here rifual and heroic legend combined. It is precisely this combination which is the formula usually applied to Greek tragedy, and we find it leading to similar results: a fusion of dance, instrumental music, acting, ‘and solemn hieratic language. 44. W. Goethe, “Nachlese zu Aristoteles' Poetik'” (1827), Samiliche Werke (Weimarer Ausgabe), XLL, I, p. 248, WJ. Giraudoux, Litterature (1941), p. 38. I owe thia reference to Professor L. LeSage. 4G. Hauptmann, Griechitcher Frihling (1908), p. 188 f.; also quoted by Hl. Garten, German Life and Letters, N-S., LUI (1940), p. 87. Herder, too, relized the favor of archaic savagery till elinging to Greek drama; see G. Weber, Herder und das Drama (1922), p. 79. The Quiché text, along with « French translation, waa printed by Charles Brasseur de Bourbourg in his Gramdtica de la lengua Quické (Paris, 862). The only English transla. tion of “The Ancient Indian Play of Rabinal” appeared in Mesa, T (Autumn, 198), pp. 418; on pp. 44f, the editor, H. Steiner, reports on further French, Spanish, and German renderings. WK. Th. Preuss, “Der Unterbau des Dramas," Bibliothek Warburg, Vortrage 1987-8 Leipaig, 1990), pp. 87 ‘The play was given little consideration by historians of the drama. J. I. Klein, in his Geschichte des Dramas, III (1874), pp. 855 f., discussed but rejected it; A. Winterstein, Der Ureprang der Traghdie. Bin payehoanalytivcher Beitrag our Geschichte des griechitchen Theaters (1025), pp. 195 ff. dealt with it from the viewpoint of the Oedipus complex, These detail, omitted in the English translation, are found-in Brasseur de Bour bbourg, le. cit, pp- 97, 99, and 22:"L'action remonte A un temps of les ris de Is maison de Cavek n'exerpaient encore qu'une puissance tout & fait restrainte, eA. ... le milieu di 1sidme sidele.” No mention of this quarrel between Cavek and Rabinal is made in the Popol Vuh. See Popol Vuk: The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiché Maya. English version by Delia Goetz and Sylvanus G. Morley. From the Spanish translation by Adriin Recinos (1980),