The Dramatic Values in Plautus Part 5

SAG. (_With a superior wave of the hand._) It's the Persian fashion."

The second point in this category is own cousin to the above. We should label it persistent interruption and repet.i.tion. An excellent instance is _Trin._ 582 ff., when Stasimus, Lesbonicus and Philto have just hatched a plot. Philto departs.

"LES. (_To Stasimus._) You attend to my instructions. I'll be there presently. Tell Callicles to meet me.

ST. Now you just clear out! (_Pushes him after Philto._)

LES. (_Calls out as he is being shoved away._) Tell him to see what has to be done about the dowry.

ST. Clear out!

LES. (_Raising his voice._) For I'm determined not to marry her off without a dowry.

ST. Won't you clear out?

LES. (_Still louder._) And I won't let her suffer harm by reason.----

ST. Get out, I say!

LES. (_Shouts._)--of my carelessness.

ST. Clear out!

LES. It seems right that my own sins--

ST. Clear out!

LES.--should affect me alone.

ST. Clear out!

LES. (_Mock heroically._) Oh father, shall I ever behold you again?

ST. Out, out, out! (_With a final shove._) (_Exit Lesbonicus._) At last, I 've got him away! (_Breathes hard._)"

The fun, if fun there be, lies in the hammer-like repet.i.tion of "I modo,"

a sort of verbal buffoonery. A clever actor could din this with telling effect. The device is employed several times. In _Most._ 974 ff. the word is _aio_, in _Per._ 482 ff. _credo_, in _Poen._ 731 ff. _quippini_, in _Ps._ 484 ff. ?a? ???, in _Rud._ 1212 ff. _licet_ and 1269 ff.

_censeo_. The last two examples are the lengthiest.[123]

The third of these motives is the introduction of clearly unnatural dialogue, wholly incidental and foreign to the action, for the sake of lugging in a joke. The _As._ (38 ff.) yields the following conversation between Demaenetus _senex_ and his slave Liba.n.u.s:

"LI. By all that's holy, as a favor to me, spit out the words you have uttered.

DE. All right, I'll be glad to oblige you. (_Coughs._)

LI. Now, now, get it right up! (_Pats him on the back._)

DE. More? (_Coughs._)

LI. Gad, yes, please! Right from the bottom of your throat: more still!

(_Pats._)

DE. Well, how far down then?

LI. (_Unguardedly._) Down to Hades is my wish!

DE. I say, look out for trouble!

LI. (_Diplomatically._) For your wife, I mean, not for you.

DE. For that speech I bestow upon you freedom from punishment."[124]

The childish bandying of words in _Truc._ 858 ff. is egregiously tiresome in the reading, but in action could have been made to produce a modic.u.m of amus.e.m.e.nt if presented in the broad burlesque spirit that we believe was almost invariably employed. This gives us a clue to the next topic.

B. _Devices absurd and inexplicable unless interpreted in a broad farcical spirit._

This includes peculiarities that have usually been commented on as weaknesses or conventions, or else been given up as hopeless incongruities, but which we hope to prove also yield their quota of amus.e.m.e.nt if clownishly performed. The foremost of these is the famous

1. Running Slave or Parasite.

We all know him: rushing madly cross stage at top-speed (if we take the literal word of the text for it), with girded loins, in search of somebody right under his nose, the while unburdening himself of exhaustive periods that, however great the breadth of the Roman stage, would carry him several times across and back: as Curculio in 279 ff.:

"Make way for me, friends and strangers, while I carry out my duty here.

Run, all of you, scatter and clear the road! I'm in a hurry and I don't want to b.u.t.t into anybody with my head, or elbow, or chest, or knee....

And there's none so rich as can stand in my way, ... none so famous but down he goes off the sidewalk and stands on his head in the street," and so on for ten lines or more. After he has found his patron Phaedromus, he is apparently so exhausted that he cries: "Hold me up, please, hold me up!

(_Wobbles and falls panting into Phaedromus' arms._)

PH.... Get him a chair ... quick!"

When Leonida enters (_As._ 267 ff.) as the running slave, he is still out of breath at 326-7! Stasimus in _Trin._ 1008 ff., though his mission is also proclaimed as desperately urgent, pauses to declaim on public morals!

Considerable light has been thrown upon this subject recently by the dissertation of Weissman, _De servi currentis persona apud comicos Romanes_ (Giessen, 1911), though his explanation of the _modus operandi_ is inconclusive. Langen has commented on it at some length,[125] but offers no solution. Weise frankly admits:[126] "Wie sie gelaufen sind, ist ein Ratsel fur uns." LeGrand[127] follows Weise's conclusion that it is an imitation from the Greek and in support of this instances Curculio's use, while running, of the presumed translations from the Greek: _agoranomus_, _demarchus_, etc. He also cites as parallels some unconvincing phrases from fragments of New Comedy, while developing an ingenious theory that the device is a heritage from the Greek orchestra, where it could have been performed with a hippodrome effect. Terence berates the practice,[128] but makes use of it himself.[129]

Weissman's conclusions are worth a summary. He notes the following as the usual essential concomitants: 1. It is mentioned in the text that the slave is on the run. 2. He is the bearer of news of the moment; 3. He fails to recognize other characters on stage; 4. He is halted by the very man he is so violently seeking. He cites as the genuine occurrences of the _servus_ or _parasitus currens_, besides the pa.s.sages mentioned above, _Cap._ 781 ff., _Ep._ 1 ff., 192 ff., _Mer._ 111 ff., _Per._ 272 ff., _St._ 274 ff. Furthermore, he argues convincingly that this was an independent Roman development without a prototype on the Greek stage and neatly refutes Weise and LeGrand by proving that there are no extant Greek fragments sufficient to furnish a ground for any but the most tenuous argument. Above all, he correctly interprets the poet's aim with the dictum: "Praeterquam quod hac persona optime ut.i.tur ad actionem bene continuandam id maxime spectat ut per eam _spectatorum risum_ captet." And this from a German youth of twenty-two!

It is in his attempt to explain the mechanism that we believe Weissman fails. He essays an exegesis of each pa.s.sage, though the separate explanations are naturally similar. It will suffice to quote one, that to _As._ 267 ff.: "Hoc nullo modo aliter mihi declarari posse videtur nisi sic: Oratio Leonidae currentis maior est quam ut arbitrari possimus currentem semper eum habuisse eam. Ex versu 290 Leonidam de celeritate sua remisisse plane apparet. Quod semel solum eum fecisse c.u.m non satis mihi esse videatur, saepius--bis vel ter--per breve tempus eum cursum suum interrup.i.s.se, circ.u.mspexisse, Libanum autem non spectavisse (hoc consilium poetae erat, licentia poetica est) et hoc modo per totam scaenam cursum suum direxisse arbitror."

It will be observed that for lack of any tangible evidence he very properly makes use of subjective reasoning. Now it has long been the opinion of the writer that the maximum of comic effect (and that this was the purpose of the _servus currens_ there can surely be no doubt) could best be obtained by the actor's making a violent and frenzied pretense of running while scarcely moving from the spot. Consider the ludicrous spectacle of the rapidly moving legs and the flailing arms, with the actor's face turned toward the audience, as he declaims sonorously of his haste to perform his vital errand, while making but a snail's progress.

Truly then his plea of exhaustion would not be without excuse! This is an explanation at once simpler, more potentially comic, more in accord with what we predicate as the spirit of Plautus, and furthermore we have seen roars of laughter created by the similar device of a low comedian in a modern extravaganza. Taking advantage of the same subjective license, we see nothing in Weissman's theory to offset our opinion. But, what is more, our subjective reconstruction is given color by a shred of tangible evidence. Suetonius (_Tib._ 38) refers to a popular quip on the emperor that compares him to an actor on the cla.s.sic Greek stage: "Biennio continuo post ademptum imperium pedem porta non extulit; ... ut vulgo iam per ioc.u.m Callip(p)ides vocaretur, quem cursitare ac ne cubiti quidem mensuram progredi proverbio Graeco notatum est." That this Callipides was the ?p????t?? mentioned by Xenophon (_Sym._ III. 11), Plutarch (_Ages._ 21 and _Apophth. Lacon._: s. v. _Ages._), Cicyero (_Ad. Att._ XIII. 12) and possibly by Aristotle (_Poet._ 26.), seems highly plausible.

Compare the _saltus fullonius_ (Sen. _Ep._ 15.4).

Most amusing of all is Plautus' introduction of a parody on the parody, when Mercury rushes in post-haste crying (_Amph._ 984 ff.):

"Make way, give way, everybody, clear the way! I tell you all: don't you get so bold as to stand in my road. For, egad! I'd like to know why I, a G.o.d, shouldn't have as much right to threaten the rabble as a mere slave in the comedies!"