“a man
More sinn’d against than sinning.”
Hardly any disaster which may befall a human being can excite such tragic pity as the crowning disaster of insanity. Whatever a man’s sins, we feel that the loss of reason more than atones for them all. If the greatest villain in drama should lose his reason, we should feel this; when Lear, the rash, impetuous King of Britain, becomes insane, we cry out, forgetting for the time his
tragic error, that his punishment is too great for him. When the brief scene is ended we consign him to the Great Silence, not with feelings of rebellion but with a sense of supreme calm:
“He hates him
That would upon the rack of this tough world
Stretch him out longer.”[45:1]
So equally with tragic fear. This emotion, which is no vulgar sense of possible or impending misfortune to ourselves, but an awed and sympathetic feeling for a character essentially of the nature of our own, is brought out to the full by means of the portrayal of madness. For what reduces men so quickly to the same level as the loss of reason by a fellow-man? In real life our hearts are stirred by compassion, yet moved by inexpressible awe, as we see or hear of one whom we have known and whose senses have deserted him. Be he of high or low station, it matters nothing. Differences of rank are forgotten—and this is less often so with physical calamity. Loss of reason has effected the belated recognition of our common humanity. Carry this into the imaginative world of drama, and you have the emotion of tragic fear.
The representation, then, of madness in tragedy would seem to be not only permissible, but of the greatest value to the drama when this madness is worked into the plot and becomes an
essential part of it. Often, however, and especially with the lesser lights of the Elizabethan stage, it held a place wholly subsidiary to the main theme of the tragedy. If tragic fear and tragic pity were to be evoked it would be by other means; madness was required for colouring effects, and to lend a peculiar atmosphere to the tragedy. It was sketched but lightly, frequently with little attempt at reality; whether this arose from the dramatists’ lack of ability, or from a desire to lessen the supposed pain, can only be a matter of conjecture. The introduction of madness, as a subsidiary element, into tragedy, appears to be justifiable only when it is regarded objectively with no relation to the pain caused to the sufferer. Let us illustrate. The Duchess of Malfi, previously to her death, is made to listen to the cries and to watch the antics of madmen. The intention of the author is evident. Whether we consider him to have been successful or not, we can hardly cavil at his device when we bear in mind the nature of the tragedy. But had a madman been introduced and presented as a new character with a definite interest of his own, either at this or at an earlier stage of the play, we should have rightly condemned the new feature as inartistic and revolting, for our centre of gravity, so to say, would at once have been shifted from the unfortunate lady to the unfortunate madman.