Phèdre. 13. Once more, in Phèdre, did the great disciple of Euripides attempt to surpass his master. In both tragedies the character of Phædra herself throws into shade all the others, but with this important difference, that in Euripides her death occurs about the middle of the piece, while she continues in Racine till the conclusion. The French poet has borrowed much from the Greek, more perhaps than in any former drama, but has surely heightened the interest, and produced a more splendid work of genius. I have never read the particular criticism in which Schlegel has endeavoured to elevate the Hippolytus above the Phèdre. Many, even among French critics, have objected to the love of Hippolytus for Aricia, by which Racine has deviated from the mythological tradition. But we are hardly tied to all the circumstance of fable; and the cold young huntsman loses nothing in the eyes of a modern reader by a virtuous attachment. This tragedy is said to be more open to verbal criticism than the Iphigenie; but in poetical beauty I do not know that Racine has ever surpassed it. The description of the death of Hippolytus is perhaps his masterpiece. It is true that, according to the practice of our own stage, long descriptions, especially in elaborate language, are out of use; but it is not, at least, for the advocates of Euripides to blame them.
Esther. 14. The Phèdre was represented in 1677; and after this its illustrious author seemed to renounce the stage. His increasing attachment to the Jansenists made it almost impossible, with any consistency, to promote an amusement they anathematised. But he was induced, after many years, in 1689, by Madame de Maintenon, to write Esther for the purpose of representation by the young ladies whose education she protected at St. Cyr. Esther, though very much praised for beauty of language, is admitted to possess little merit as a drama. Much indeed could not be expected in the circumstances. It was acted at St. Cyr; Louis applauded, and it is said that the Prince de Condé wept. The greatest praise of Esther is that it encouraged its author to write Athalie. |Athalie.| Once more restored to dramatic conceptions, his genius revived from sleep with no loss of the vigour of yesterday. He was even more in Athalie than in Iphigénie and Britannicus. This great work, published in 1691, with a royal prohibition to represent it on any theatre, stands by general consent at the head of all the tragedies of Racine, for the grandeur, simplicity, and interest of the fable, for dramatic terror, for theatrical effect, for clear and judicious management, for bold and forcible, rather than subtle, delineation of character, for sublime sentiment and imagery. It equals, if it does not, as I should incline to think, surpass, all the rest in the perfection of style, and is far more free from every defect, especially from feeble politeness and gallantry, which of course the subject could not admit. It has been said that he gave himself the preference to Phèdre; but it is more extraordinary that not only his enemies, of whom there were many, but the public itself was for some years incapable of discovering the merit of Athalie. Boileau declared it to be a masterpiece, and one can only be astonished that any could have thought differently from Boileau. It doubtless gained much in general esteem when it came to be represented by good actors; for no tragedy in the French language is more peculiarly fitted for the stage.
15. The chorus which he had previously introduced in Esther was a very bold innovation (for the revival of what is forgotten must always be classed as innovation), and it required all the skill of Racine to prevent its appearing in our eyes an impertinent excrescence. But though we do not, perhaps, wholly reconcile ourselves to some, of the songs, which too much suggest, by association, the Italian opera, the chorus of Athalie enhances the interest as well as the splendour of the tragedy. It was indeed more full of action and scenic pomp than any he had written, and probably than any other which up to that time had been represented in France. The part of Athalie predominates, but not so as to eclipse the rest. The high-priest Joad is drawn with a stern zeal admirably dramatic, and without which the idolatrous queen would have trampled down all before her during the conduct of the fable, whatever justice might have ensued at the last. We feel this want of an adequate resistance to triumphant crime in the Rodogune of Corneille. No character appears superfluous or feeble; while the plot has all the simplicity of the Greek stage, it has all the movement and continual excitation of the modern.
Racine’s female characters. 16. The female characters of Racine are of the greatest beauty; they have the ideal grace and harmony of ancient sculpture, and bear somewhat of the same analogy to those of Shakspeare which that art does to painting. Andromache, Monimia, Iphigénie, we may add Junia, have a dignity and faultlessness neither unnatural nor insipid, because they are only the ennobling and purifying of human passions. They are the forms of possible excellence, not from individual models, nor likely perhaps to delight every reader, for the same reason that more eyes are pleased by Titian than by Raphael. But it is a very narrow criticism which excludes either school from our admiration, which disparages Racine out of idolatry of Shakspeare. The latter, it is unnecessary for me to say, stands out of reach of all competition. But it is not on this account that we are to give up an author so admirable as Racine.
Racine compared with Corneille. 17. The chief faults of Racine may partly be ascribed to the influence of national taste, though we must confess that Corneille has avoided them. Though love with him is always tragic and connected with the heroic passions, never appearing singly, as in several of our own dramatists, yet it is sometimes unsuitable to the character, and still more frequently feeble and courtier-like in the expression. In this he complied too much with the times; but we must believe that he did not entirely feel that he was wrong. Corneille had, even while Racine was in his glory, a strenuous band of supporters. Fontenelle, writing in the next century, declares that time has established a decision in which most seem to concur, that the first place is due to the elder poet, the second to the younger; every one making the interval between them a little greater or less according to his taste.[1003] But Voltaire, La Harpe, and in general, I apprehend, the later French critics, have given the preference to Racine. I presume to join my suffrage to theirs. Racine appears to me the superior tragedian; and I must add that I think him next to Shakspeare among all the moderns. The comparison with Euripides is so natural that it can hardly be avoided. Certainly no tragedy of the Greek poet is so skilful or so perfect as Athalie or Britannicus. The tedious scenes during which the action is stagnant, the impertinencies of useless, often perverse morality, the extinction, by bad management, of the sympathy that had been raised in the earlier part of a play, the foolish alternation of repartees in a series of single lines, will never be found in Racine. But, when we look only at the highest excellencies of Euripides, there is, perhaps, a depth of pathos and an intensity of dramatic effect which Racine himself has not attained. The difference between the energy and sweetness of the two languages is so important in the comparison, that I shall give even this preference with some hesitation.
[1003] P. 118.
Beauty of his style. 18. The style of Racine is exquisite. Perhaps he is second only to Virgil among all poets. But I will give the praise of this in the words of a native critic. “His expression is always so happy and so natural, that it seems as if no other could have been found; and every word is placed in such a manner that we cannot fancy any other place to have suited it as well. The structure of his style is such that nothing could be displaced, nothing added, nothing retrenched; it is one unalterable whole. Even his incorrectnesses are often but sacrifices required by good taste, nor would anything be more difficult than to write over again a line of Racine. No one has enriched the language with a greater number of turns of phrase; no one is bold with more felicity and discretion, or figurative with more grace and propriety; no one has handled with more command an idiom often rebellious, or with more skill an instrument always difficult; no one has better understood that delicacy of style which must not be mistaken for feebleness, and is, in fact, but that air of ease which conceals from the reader the labour of the work and the artifices of the composition; or better managed the variety of cadences, the resources of rhythm, the association and deduction of ideas. In short, if we consider that his perfection in these respects may be opposed to that of Virgil, and that he spoke a language less flexible, less poetical, and less harmonious, we shall readily believe that Racine is, of all mankind, the one to whom nature has given the greatest talent for versification.”[1004]
[1004] La Harpe, Eloge de Racine, as quoted by himself in Cours de Littérature, vol. vi.
Thomas Corneille—his Ariane. 19. Thomas, the younger and far inferior brother of Pierre Corneille, was yet, by the fertility of his pen, by the success of some of his tragedies, and by a certain reputation which two of them have acquired, the next name, but at a vast interval, to Racine. Voltaire says he would have enjoyed a great reputation but for that of his brother—one of those pointed sayings which seem to mean something, but are devoid of meaning. Thomas Corneille is never compared with his brother; and probably his brother has been rather serviceable to his name with posterity than otherwise. He wrote with more purity, according to the French critics, than his brother, and it must be owned that, in his Ariane, he has given to love a tone more passionate and natural than the manly scenes of the older tragedian ever present. This is esteemed his best work, but it depends wholly on the principal character, whose tenderness and injuries excite our sympathy, and from whose lips many lines of great beauty flow. It may be compared with the Berenice of Racine, represented but a short time before; there is enough of resemblance in the fables to provoke comparison. That of Thomas Corneille is more tragic, less destitute of theatrical movement, and consequently better chosen; but such relative praise is of little value, where none can be given, in this respect, to the object of comparison. We feel that the prose romance is the proper sphere for the display of an affection, neither untrue to nature, nor unworthy to move the heart, but wanting the majesty of the tragic muse. An effeminacy uncongenial to tragedy belongs to this play; and the termination, where the heroine faints away instead of dying, is somewhat insipid. The only other tragedy of the younger Corneille that can be mentioned is the Earl of Essex. In this he has taken greater liberties with history than his critics approve; and though love does not so much predominate as in Ariane, it seems to engross, in a style rather too romantic, both the hero and his sovereign.
Manlius of La Fosse. 20. Neither of these tragedies, perhaps, deserves to be put on a level with the Manlius of La Fosse, to which La Harpe accords the preference above all of the seventeenth century after those of Corneille and Racine. It is just to observe what is not denied, that the author has borrowed the greater part of his story from the Venice Preserved of Otway. The French critics maintain that he has far excelled his original. It is possible that we might hesitate to own this superiority; but several blemishes have been removed, and the conduct is perhaps more noble, or at least more fitted to the French stage. But when we take from La Fosse what belongs to another—characters strongly marked, sympathies powerfully contrasted, a development of the plot probable and interesting, what will remain that is purely his own? There will remain a vigorous tone of language, a considerable power of description, and a skill in adapting, we may add with justice, in improving, what he found in a foreign language. We must pass over some other tragedies which have obtained less honour in their native land, those of Duché, Quinault, and Campistron.