Turbidi vultu simulant quieta,
Vera dolosi (p. 19).
Classicism is even certified by pagan phrase; but there is no classical dramatic composition. In all its declamation and debate Jephthes has little dramatic movement. The long speeches of Baptistes hardly achieve even characterization. If Buchanan had learned from Euripides what made Medea a play, he was not making one himself; he was casting Latin poetry in dialogue and dividing oratory into five acts. In this he is typical of humanistic Latin tragedy. Learned, allusive, competent in style, it is not drama.
Classical tragedy in the vernacular is sufficiently exemplified by Robert Garnier (1544-1590, Œuvres, ed. Lucien Pinvert, Paris, 1923, 2 vols.). Knowing Greek tragedy as well as Seneca, appreciative, capable in style, making some dramatic advance in his seven tragedies from 1568 to 1583, he yet stopped short of the Greek type of composition, the dramaturgy that reduces a story to its crisis in order to move the play by compelling sequence of action. For his tragedies, though some of them may have been presented, were poems written to be read.
The argument of Porcie (1568) closes thus:
“Here, then, is the summary of the history on which I have planned this tragedy. You will find it in Dio’s 47th book, in Appian’s 4th and 5th, and in Plutarch’s lives of Cicero, Brutus, and Antony. I have also interwoven the fiction of the death of the Nurse, to involve it further with gloom and sorrow and make the catastrophe more bloody.”
Act I consists of (1) a monologue by the Fury Mégère, a fine piece to say, and (2) a chorus of six rhymed stanzas. It is rather a prelude than an act.
In Act II Portia’s monologue is followed by a chorus imitating Horace’s second Epode, and the Nurse’s monologue by their dialogue and another Horatian chorus. There is no action. The dialogue gives a hint of characterization when Portia in her doubt and fear regrets the death of Caesar.
Act III. Upon a Senecan monologue by Areus breaks Octavius to announce the rout and death of Brutus. The ensuing dialogue of balanced contrasts passes to Senecan speeches. After a chorus Antony vaunts the deeds of his mythical ancestors and his own prowess. The only function of Ventidius is to listen. Antony, Octavius, and Lepidus, in balanced dialogue, then in longer speeches, agree to divide the world. The chorus of soldiers rejoices in the prospect of booty.
Act IV brings the rout and death of Brutus to Portia by messenger. Her long tirades culminate in her speech on receiving the urn of ashes, and are followed by a chorus.