登陆注册
4279800000012

第12章

Aristophanes was 'profane,' under satiric direction, unlike his rivals Cratinus, Phrynichus, Ameipsias, Eupolis, and others, if we are to believe him, who in their extraordinary Donnybrook Fair of the day of Comedy, thumped one another and everybody else with absolute heartiness, as he did, but aimed at small game, and dragged forth particular women, which he did not. He is an aggregate of many men, all of a certain greatness. We may build up a conception of his powers if we mount Rabelais upon Hudibras, lift him with the songfulness of Shelley, give him a vein of Heinrich Heine, and cover him with the mantle of the Anti-Jacobin, adding (that there may be some Irish in him) a dash of Grattan, before he is in motion.

But such efforts at conceiving one great one by incorporation of minors are vain, and cry for excuse. Supposing Wilkes for leading man in a country constantly plunging into war under some plumed Lamachus, with enemies periodically firing the land up to the gates of London, and a Samuel Foote, of prodigious genius, attacking him with ridicule, I think it gives a notion of the conflict engaged in by Aristophanes. This laughing bald-pate, as he calls himself, was a Titanic pamphleteer, using laughter for his political weapon; a laughter without scruple, the laughter of Hercules. He was primed with wit, as with the garlic he speaks of giving to the game-cocks, to make them fight the better. And he was a lyric poet of aerial delicacy, with the homely song of a jolly national poet, and a poet of such feeling that the comic mask is at times no broader than a cloth on a face to show the serious features of our common likeness.

He is not to be revived; but if his method were studied, some of the fire in him would come to us, and we might be revived.

Taking them generally, the English public are most in sympathy with this primitive Aristophanic comedy, wherein the comic is capped by the grotesque, irony tips the wit, and satire is a naked sword.

They have the basis of the Comic in them: an esteem for common-sense. They cordially dislike the reverse of it. They have a rich laugh, though it is not the gros rire of the Gaul tossing gros sel, nor the polished Frenchman's mentally digestive laugh. And if they have now, like a monarch with a troop of dwarfs, too many jesters kicking the dictionary about, to let them reflect that they are dull, occasionally, like the pensive monarch surprising himself with an idea of an idea of his own, they look so. And they are given to looking in the glass. They must see that something ails them. How much even the better order of them will endure, without a thought of the defensive, when the person afflicting them is protected from satire, we read in Memoirs of a Preceding Age, where the vulgarly tyrannous hostess of a great house of reception shuffled the guests and played them like a pack of cards, with her exact estimate of the strength of each one printed on them: and still this house continued to be the most popular in England; nor did the lady ever appear in print or on the boards as the comic type that she was.

It has been suggested that they have not yet spiritually comprehended the signification of living in society; for who are cheerfuller, brisker of wit, in the fields, and as explorers, colonisers, backwoodsmen? They are happy in rough exercise, and also in complete repose. The intermediate condition, when they are called upon to talk to one another, upon other than affairs of business or their hobbies, reveals them wearing a curious look of vacancy, as it were the socket of an eye wanting. The Comic is perpetually springing up in social life, and, it oppresses them from not being perceived.

Thus, at a dinner-party, one of the guests, who happens to have enrolled himself in a Burial Company, politely entreats the others to inscribe their names as shareholders, expatiating on the advantages accruing to them in the event of their very possible speedy death, the salubrity of the site, the aptitude of the soil for a quick consumption of their remains, etc.; and they drink sadness from the incongruous man, and conceive indigestion, not seeing him in a sharply defined light, that would bid them taste the comic of him. Or it is mentioned that a newly elected member of our Parliament celebrates his arrival at eminence by the publication of a book on cab-fares, dedicated to a beloved female relative deceased, and the comment on it is the word 'Indeed.' But, merely for a contrast, turn to a not uncommon scene of yesterday in the hunting-field, where a brilliant young rider, having broken his collar-bone, trots away very soon after, against medical interdict, half put together in splinters, to the most distant meet of his neighbourhood, sure of escaping his doctor, who is the first person he encounters. 'I came here purposely to avoid you,' says the patient. 'I came here purposely to take care of you,' says the doctor. Off they go, and come to a swollen brook. The patient clears it handsomely: the doctor tumbles in. All the field are alive with the heartiest relish of every incident and every cross-light on it; and dull would the man have been thought who had not his word to say about it when riding home.

In our prose literature we have had delightful Comic writers.

Besides Fielding and Goldsmith, there is Miss Austen, whose Emma and Mr. Elton might walk straight into a comedy, were the plot arranged for them. Galt's neglected novels have some characters and strokes of shrewd comedy. In our poetic literature the comic is delicate and graceful above the touch of Italian and French. Generally, however, the English elect excel in satire, and they are noble humourists. The national disposition is for hard-hitting, with a moral purpose to sanction it; or for a rosy, sometimes a larmoyant, geniality, not unmanly in its verging upon tenderness, and with a singular attraction for thick-headedness, to decorate it with asses'

ears and the most beautiful sylvan haloes. But the Comic is a different spirit.

同类推荐
  • OLIVER TWIST

    OLIVER TWIST

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 知稼翁词

    知稼翁词

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 陕州河亭陪韦五大夫

    陕州河亭陪韦五大夫

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • Alexandria and her Schools

    Alexandria and her Schools

    I should not have presumed to choose for any lectures of mine such a subject as that which I have tried to treat in this book. The subject was chosen by the Institution where the lectures were delivered.汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 古文观止

    古文观止

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 谈诗说情

    谈诗说情

    一个是粉壁题诗,一个是破镜重圆,一个是玉枕难眠,一个是以死殉情,好像天下有情人的磨难永远走不完……世情薄,人情恶,雨送黄昏花易落;晚风干,泪痕残,欲传心事,独倚斜栏,难、难、难。人成各,今非昨,病魂常似秋千索;角声寒,夜阑珊,怕人询问,咽泪装欢,瞒、瞒、瞒。
  • 有所思在大海南

    有所思在大海南

    她是看似万千宠爱于一身的富家女,他是娱乐圈里大明星。而她从小被父亲抛弃,他在虚假浮华里挣扎。她和他相遇,继承者、爱情、强硬的第三者他们如何能在变幻的时代里相爱相守?
  • 微型小说一千零一夜(第六卷)

    微型小说一千零一夜(第六卷)

    本书中的每一篇小说都是一个贴近生活的精彩故事,反映着当代生活的广阔图景。它们不仅能教会你如何理解生活,更能教会你如何热爱生活。开阔读者的视野、启迪读者的心智、使读者得到精神享受,是编者编选此书的最大愿望。
  • 未来在磨砺中生辉(培养学生心灵成长的经典故事)

    未来在磨砺中生辉(培养学生心灵成长的经典故事)

    在这套丛书里,我们针对青少年的心理特点,专门选择了一些特殊的故事,分别对他们在这一时期将会遭遇的情感问题、生活问题、学习问题、交友问题以及各种心理健康问题,从心理学的角度进行剖析和讲解,并提出了解决问题的方法和措施,以供同学们参考借鉴。
  • 晨时晚刻

    晨时晚刻

    “如果给我个机会回到过去的机会,我想我会回到初三那年,不离开她,就算最后我会失去性命,我也想陪她度过那些年。”那是沈括在一次回到母校的一次演讲。程晨那时已怀了身孕,而演讲完的沈括陪在她身边回忆着属于他们的共同青春。幸好最终历经磨难,他们还是在一起了!
  • 九极神脉

    九极神脉

    世界知名的设计大师林谦凡穿越到了另一个的世界,重生改名为徐天云,在机缘巧合之下,徐天云利用前世超凡的设计水平再加上神秘的九极神脉,从此踏上了一条不平凡的修仙之路。平凡普通的世俗界、法元纵横的修凡界、灵力浩瀚的修仙界、美仑美奂的仙界、至高无上的神界将一一呈现,除此之外,阴邪怪异的鬼界、古怪离奇的妖界、神秘莫测的冥界还有那暴虐无比的魔界,全都会逐一登场。
  • 重生:天财大小姐

    重生:天财大小姐

    被最亲爱的“姐姐”和未婚夫害死,她坠入了地狱。老天却不让她死,让她回到了小时候。她不再像圣母一样无数的宽容伤害她的人,她要让每一个伤害过她的人生不如死!
  • 宠魔无度之步步逆神

    宠魔无度之步步逆神

    她,不过是21世纪的学霸,为了毕业论文深夜还窝在图书馆中。不料因为不经意地对着掉落在地的一本神话书册冷笑了一声,她便被命运嘲笑般地给穿越到了异世界!穿越?无关紧要。异世界?无关紧要。第一才是最重要的!这个世界神族最强,她便要成为神族!而况自己在这个世界的本体本来就是修仙界弟子中的第一!可是随着接触的人越来越多,发生的事越来越多时,她愤怒了!原来当今的神族不过是当初的弑神者,而被污蔑为魔,却比任何族都要绝世的那个男子,才是十重天上真正的主人!“今日我自行废元坠仙,成为你眼中的废人。可是来日,我南荣洛水一样能将你踩在脚下!”她在紫仙阁当着众人的面捏碎了别人可望而不可及的强大真元,废除一身修为,脸上却带着桀骜的笑颜。她无谓妖族、兽族、人族,带领着一群铮铮之士抵抗神族,建立了这世上最强大的联盟,洛水梵。只希望能为那绝世的男子正名。却不知他最想要的不是那十重天外,而是近在咫尺。可谁知洛水梵被神族的阴谋一朝覆灭,她被无意放逐十重天之中。而他却被绝望与仇恨充斥,屠尽九重天神族,却因此被灵石所铸的心反噬,成了真正的魔。当她终于从十重天出来时,却又开始走上一条为他寻心之路……
  • 仙风媚骨

    仙风媚骨

    修仙路上,别人弹指之间便能变昼为夜,撒豆成兵,挥剑成河,呼风唤雨。而叶青双,为什么这一切都只能用拳头解决?不用法术也行,反正别人也不能对她用。罢了罢了,既来之则安之,大不了咱不要优雅的姿态,做个暴力女修。于是,她扛上了一把比自身还大上两三倍的斧头,开始了崭新的修仙生活。诶诶,那边几个骚年,看什么看,没见过妩媚女子拿彪悍兵器吗?——————书友交流群:191963217,暂时空无一人,期待你加入……
  • 爱妃逃婚

    爱妃逃婚

    “呶,这本书给你,记得看完还我。”白大兔爽快地扔给白小兔一本书,语气很凶恶。她这个天然呆妹妹真是没救了,新婚之夜看这种书恶补那个有用吗?身为她的妹夫,那个男人还真悲哀。“谢谢姐,你赶紧出去吧,别来烦我。”白小兔很没良心地挥手赶白大兔,一门心思都扑在了手里的那本书上。哎,她也是没办法,明天她要结婚了,新婚之夜她不能什么都不懂呀,那简直太丢脸了。……