Browning and the Dramatic Monologue

by S. S. Curry

Possibly the fundamental element in dramatic instinct is the ability to occupy a point of view, to see a truth as another sees it. This shows why dramatic instinct is the foundation of success. It enables a teacher to know whether his student is at the right point of view to apprehend a truth, or in the proper attitude of mind towards a subject. It tells him when he has made a truth understood. It gives the speaker power to adapt and to illustrate his truth to others, and to see things from his hearers’ point of view. It gives the writer power to impress his reader. Even the business man must intuitively perceive the point of view and the mental attitude of those with whom he deals.

Dramatic instinct as applied to listening on the stage, and everywhere, is apt to be overlooked. It is comparatively easy when quoting some one to stand at his point of view and to imitate his manner, or to contrast the differences between a number of speakers; but a higher type of dramatic power is exhibited in the ability to put ourselves in the place and receive the impressions of some specific type of listener.

The speeches of different characters are given formally and successively in a drama. Hence, the writer of a play, or the actor, is apt to centre attention, when speaking, upon the character, without reference to the shape his thought takes from what the other character has said, and especially from those attitudes or actions of the other character which are not revealed by words. The same is true in the novel, and even in epic poetry. True dramatic instinct in any form demands that the speaker show not only his own thought and motive by his words, but that of the character he is portraying, and the influence produced upon him at the instant by the thought and character of the listener.

While the dialogue is not the only form of dramatic art, still its study is required for the understanding of the monologue, or almost any aspect of dramatic expression. The very name “dialogue” implies a listener and a speaker who are continually changing places. The listener indicates by his face and by actions of the body his impression, his attention, the effect upon him of the words of the speaker, his objection or approval. Thus he influences the speaker in shaping his ideas and choosing his words.

In the monologue the speaker must suggest the character of both speaker and listener and interpret the relation of one human being to another. He must show, as he speaks, the impression he receives from the manner in which his listener is affected by what he is saying. A public reader, or impersonator, of all the characters of a play must perform a similar feat; he must represent each character not only as speaker, but show that he has just been a listener and received an impression or stimulus from another; otherwise he cannot suggest any true dramatic action.

In the monologue, as in all true dramatic representation, the listener as well as the speaker must be realized as continuously living and thinking. The listener, though he utters not a word, must be conceived from the effect he makes upon the speaker, in order to perceive the argument as well as the situation and point of view.

The necessity of realizing a listener is one of the most important points to be noted in the study of the monologue. Take, as an illustration, Browning’s “Incident of the French Camp.”

INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:
A mile or so away,
On a little mound, Napoleon
Stood on our storming day;
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,
Legs wide, arms locked behind,
As if to balance the prone brow
Oppressive with its mind.
Just as perhaps he mused, “My plans
That soar, to earth may fall,
Let once my army-leader Lannes
Waver at yonder wall,”—
Out ’twixt the battery smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound
Full galloping; nor bridle drew
Until he reached the mound.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,
And held himself erect
By just his horse’s mane, a boy:
You hardly could suspect—
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
Scarce any blood came through)
You looked twice ere you saw his breast
Was all but shot in two.
“Well,” cried he, “Emperor, by God’s grace
We’ve got you Ratisbon!
The Marshal’s in the market-place,
And you’ll be there anon
To see your flag-bird flap his wings
Where I, to heart’s desire,
Perched him!” The Chief’s eye flashed; his plans
Soared up again like fire.
The Chief’s eye flashed; but presently
Softened itself, as sheathes
A film the mother-eagle’s eye
When her bruised eaglet breathes:
“You’re wounded!” “Nay,” his soldier’s pride
Touched to the quick, he said:
“I’m killed, Sire!” And, his Chief beside,
Smiling the boy fell dead.

I have heard prominent public readers give this as a mere story without affording any definite conception of either speaker or listener. In the first reading over of the poem, one may find no hint of either. But the student catches the phrase “we French,” and at once sees that a Frenchman must be speaking. He soon discovers that the whole poem is colored by the feeling of some old soldier of Napoleon who was either an eye-witness of the scene or who knew Napoleon’s bearing so well that he could easily picture it to his imagination. The poem now becomes a living thing, and its interpretation by voice and action is rendered possible. But is this all? To whom does the soldier speak? The listener seems entirely in the background. This is wise, because the other in telling his story would naturally lose himself in his memories and grow more or less oblivious of his hearer. But the conception of a sympathetic auditor is needed to quicken the fervor and animation of the speaker. Does not the phrase “we French” imply that the listener is another Frenchman whose patriotic enthusiasm responds to the story? The short phrases, and suggestive hints through the poem, are thus explained. The speaker seems to imply that Napoleon’s bearing is well known to his listener. Certainly upon the conception of such a speaker and such a hearer depends the spirit, dramatic force, and even thought of the poem.