It is true that Elizabethan dramatic structure appears to be irregular in form and haphazard in progression. Conditions of presentation, described in the [previous chapter], indicate that any conscious artistic purpose must have been difficult to pursue. The speed of composition, the prevalence of collaboration, and the absence of formal standards contributed to what might be called pragmatic dramatization. However, pragmatic dramatization did not necessarily prevent the appearance of distinctive dramatic forms. In fact, the winnowing process of the repertory system was evolutionary, ensuring the development of drama in response not to abstract theory but to the deeply ingrained artistic practices of the age.
I. PREMISES FOR A STUDY OF SHAKESPEAREAN DRAMATIC FORM
In her constantly stimulating book Endeavors of Art Madeleine Doran introduces a new and provocative approach to the examination of Elizabethan dramatic structure. Adopting the thesis of Heinrich Wölfflin, expounded in his Principles of Art History, Doran extends it to apply to the literary artist. Wölfflin argues that “the art of one age differs from that of another because the artists have different modes of imaginative beholding ... [As a result], any change in representational content from one period to [another is] less important to the effect of difference than the change in style arising from difference in decorative principle” or way of beholding.[4] Thus, the intent of the art work is less evident in the subject treated than in the arrangement effected. In comparing the “modes of imaginative beholding” in Renaissance and Baroque art, Wölfflin differentiates the two styles in terms of five categories of visual opposites, one of which is diffusion of effect (multiplicity) versus concentration of effect (unity). This category is the one most relevant to a consideration of dramatic literature. By demonstrating that Renaissance art “achieves its unity by making the parts independent as free members [and by relating them through a] coordination of the accents,” Wölfflin reconciles the opposites of multiplicity and unity in a concept of “multiple unity.”[5]
In the Elizabethan age the recurrent and popular expression of this concept is found in the image of art as a “mirror.” Hamlet’s use of this image need not be quoted. Substantially it was anticipated by Jonson in Every Man Out of His Humour:
Asper. Well I will scourge those apes;
And to these courteous eyes [of the audience] oppose a mirrour,
As large as is the stage, whereon we act:
Where they shall see the times deformitie
Anatomiz’d in every nerve, and sinnew,
With constant courage, and contempt of feare.