The Dramatic Values in Plautus | Page 3

p. 95): "Et Trinummum, quae ita amabilibus lepidisque personis optimisque exemplis abundat, ut quoties eam lego, non comici me poetae, sed philosophi Socratici opus legere mihi videar." I believe we may safely call the Trinummus the least Plautine of Plautine plays, except the Captivi, and it is by no means so good a work. The Trinummus is crowded with interminable padded dialogue, tiresome moral preachments, and possesses a weakly motivated plot; a veritable "Sunday-school play."
But Becker continues: "Sive enim seria agit et praecepta pleno effundit penu, ad quae componere vitarn oporteat; in sententiis quanta gravitas, orationis quanta vis, quam probe et meditate cum hominum ingenia moresque novisse omnia testantur." We feel sure that our Umbrian fun-maker would strut in public and laugh in private, could he hear such an encomium of his lofty moral aims. For it is our ultimate purpose to prove that fun-maker Plautus was primarily and well-nigh exclusively a fun-maker.
[Sidenote: Weise] K. H. Weise, in "Die Komodien des Plautus, kritisch nach Inhalt und Form beleuchtet, zur Bestimmung des Echten und Unechten in den einzelnen Dichtungen" (Quedlinburg, 1866), follows hard on Becker's heels and places Plautus on a pinnacle of poetic achievement in which we scarcely recognize our apotheosized laugh-maker. Every passage in the plays that is not artistically immaculate, that does not conform to the uttermost canons of dramatic art, is unequivocally damned as "unecht." In his Introduction (p. 4) Weise is truly eloquent in painting the times and significance of our poet. With momentary insight he says: "Man hat an ihm eine immer frische und nie versiegende Fundgrabe des ?chten Volkswitzes." But this is soon marred by utterances such as (p. 14): "F?nde sich also in der Zahl der Plautinischen Komodien eine Partie, die mit einer andern in diesen Hinsichten in bedeutendem Grade contrastirte, so konnte man sicher schliessen, dass beide nicht von demselben Verfasser sein k?nnten." He demands from Plautus, as ein wahrer Poet, "Congruenz, und richtige innere Logik harmonische Construction" (p. 12), and finally declares (p. 22): "Interesse, Character, logischer Bau in der Zusammensetzung, Naturlichkeit der Sprache und des Witzes, Rythmus und antikes Idiom des Ausdrucks werden die Kriterien sein mussen, nach dem wir uber die Vortrefflichkeit und Plautinit?t plautinischer St��cke zu entscheiden haben."
On this basis he ruthlessly carves out and discards as "unecht" every passage that fails to conform to his amazing and extravagant ideals, in the belief that "der ?chte Meister Plautus konnte nur Harmonisches, nur Vernunftiges, nur Logisches, nur relativ Richtiges dichten" (p. 79), though even Homer nods. The Mercator is banned in toto. To be sure, Weise somewhat redeems himself by the statement (p. 29 f.): "Plautus bezweckte ... lediglich nur die eigentliche und wirksamste Belustigung des Publicums." But how he reconciles this with his previously quoted convictions and with the declaration (p. 16): "Plautus ist ein sehr religioser, sehr moralischer Schriftsteller," it is impossible to grasp, until we recall that the author is a German.
[Sidenote: Langen] Such criticism stultifies itself and needs no refutation; certainly not here, as P. Langen in his Plautinische Studien (Berliner Studien, 1886; pp. 90-91) has conclusively proved that the inconsistent is a feature absolutely germane to Plautine style, and has collected an overwhelming mass of "Widerspruche, Inkonsequenzen und psychologische Unwahrscheinlichkeiten" that would question the "Plautinity" of every other line, were we to follow Weise's precepts. Langen too uses the knife, but with a certain judicious restraint.
We insist that the attempt to explain away every inconsistency as spurious is a sorry refuge.
[Sidenote: Langrehr] Langrehr in Miscellanea Philologica (Gottingen, 1876), under the caption Plautina[18] gives vent to further solemn Teutonic carpings at the plot of the Epidicus and argues the play a contaminatio on the basis of the double intrigue. He is much exercised too over the mysterious episode of 'the disappearing flute-girl.'
Langen, who is in the main remarkably sane, refutes these conclusions neatly.[19] How Weise and his confr��res argue Plautus such a super-poet, in view of the life and education of the public to whom he catered, let alone the evidence of the plays themselves, and their author's status as mere translator and adapter, must remain an insoluble mystery. The simple truth is that a playwright such as Plautus, having undertaken to feed a populace hungry for amusement, ground out plays (doubtless for a living),[20] with a wholesome disregard for niceties of composition, provided only he obtained his sine qua non--the laugh.[21]
[Sidenote: Lessing] In our citation of opinions we must not overlook that impressive mile-stone in the history of criticism, the discredited but still great Lessing. In his "Abhandlung von dem Leben und den Werken des M. Accius Plautus" Lessing deprecates the harsh judgment of Horace and later detractors of our poet in modern times. Lessing idealizes him as the matchless comic poet. That the Captivi is "das vortrefflichste St��ck, welches jemals auf