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UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
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UNDERSTANDING

QUEENSLAND UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY

THEATRE
KTB101
Compiled by Caroline Heim
QUEENSLAND UNIVERSITY
OF TECHNOLOGY

A CUSTOM EDITION

[Link] 1 13/12/12 11:18 AM

UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101 CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance
A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology page 1

CHAPTER 1
❦
FROM TEXT TO PERFORMANCE

(Left to Right) Kerri Higuchi, Daniel Dae Kim, and Amy Hill in Golden Child by David Henry
Hwang, directed by Chay Yew, East West Players, Los Angeles, 2000. (Photo by Michael Lamont,
courtesy of East West Players.)

3
Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

[Link] 1 11/12/12 3:07 PM

CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
page 2 A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology

4 ❦ INTRODUCTION

The manuscript, the words on the page, was what you started with and
what you have left. The production is of great importance, has given the
play the life it will know, but it is gone, in the end, and the pages are the
only wall against which to throw the future or measure the past.
—Lillian Hellman,1 Playwright

DRAMA AND PERFORMANCE time and space, and, at the end, the completed
meaning of all that has happened.
We are bombarded daily with television, videos, Plays have been formally analyzed since the
newsprint, films, and dramatic events. Terrorists days of classical Greece. Aristotle’s Poetics
threaten our lives and the environment, soldiers (c. 330 B.C.) is our first record of a critical assess-
fight in faraway places, nations negotiate peace ment of plays presented in the ancient Greek fes-
treaties, nuclear accidents and bioterrorism tivals. Since Aristotle, there have been many
threaten lives, and a famous boxer divorces his approaches to “understanding” plays. For our
glamorous actress-wife. All are subjects for nov- purposes, we will approach the analysis of plays
els, films, miniseries, and plays. The larger sub- from the viewpoint and techniques of the play-
ject is human experience (real or imagined), but wright who creates the dramatic text. As Lillian
the means of representing experience in artistic Hellman said, the words on the page are the
forms differ with the artist and with the me- playwright’s measure, after all is said and done,
dium. A play is at once a dramatic text to be read of the future and the past: “The manuscript, the
and a script to be performed. words on the page, was what you started with
Plays are read daily by individuals as di- and what you have left.”2
verse as stage directors, designers, actors, techni- Although we call the playwright’s words on
cians, teachers, students, critics, scholars, and the the printed page “drama,” we also use the words
general public. In contrast to novels and poetry, a “drama” and “dramatic” to describe many
play is often the most difficult type of prose or events ranging from riots to parades, from sports
poetry to read because it is written not only to be events to political speeches. These current events
read, but also to be performed by actors before are life’s “dramas” but not dramatic “texts.”
audiences. Like a screenplay, a play is also given Martin Esslin wrote that “a dramatic text,
life by actors although the medium and technol- unperformed, is literature.”3 Like a novel or
ogy are significantly different. Kenneth Branagh poem, drama, as written words, is considered a
acts Shakespeare’s Hamlet or Gwyneth Paltrow literary text. The chief ingredient that distin-
appears as Rosalind in As you Like It for the time guishes drama from other types of literature is,
of the performance. In contrast, their film perfor- precisely, its potential for being performed or
mances in Shackleton and Shakespeare in Love, enacted. The very origin of the word “drama”
respectively, are contained, unchanging, on vid- implies its potential for becoming a performable
eotape for all time. script. We use the words “text” or “script” to de-
Reading plays is a unique challenge. It is a scribe this written form that becomes the basis
different experience from seeing the play enacted. for theatrical performance.
For one thing, readers do not have the benefit of Drama comes from the Greek dran, meaning
the various interpretations of text and space that “to do” or “to act.” Since the word is rooted in
derive from directors, designers, and actors as “doing” or “enacting,” we have come to under-
they shape the theatrical event. As readers, we stand drama as a special way of imitating hu-
must visualize all of the elements the playwright man behavior and human events. Drama is like
has placed on the page to convey a story to us: its narrative in that it tells a story; but unlike narra-
characters in action and conflict, its happening in tive, or storytelling, it requires enactment before

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101 CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance
A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology page 3

FROM TEXT TO PERFORMANCE ❦ 5

an audience. The story’s events must be repre- descriptions of scenes, characters, objects, and
sented in drama, not merely told or narrated as movement in stage directions and dialogue.
in epic poetry. However, the actor remains the playwright’s es-
The word theater has its roots in the Greek sential intermediary in that complex relationship
word, theatron, meaning “a place for seeing,” or between the drama and the performance.
that special place where actors and audiences
come together to experience a performance of
DRAMATURGY
the playwright’s raw materials—the drama. The
dramatic text is not wholly realized until the In its original Greek meaning, a dramaturg was
theater’s artists complete for audiences what simply a playwright. The word “dramaturgy”
the playwright began. As Hamlet, Kenneth defines the playwright’s craft. It involves the el-
Branaugh must breathe life into Shakespeare’s ements, conventions, and techniques the play-
character for the text to come alive in the imag- wright uses to delineate general and particular
ined world of Elsinore Castle. truths about the human condition. Those ele-
All dramatic texts are constructs. They have ments involve plot, action, character, meaning,
in common the fact that they set forth events tak- language, spectacle, space, and time. We must
ing place in an imagined or fictional world, develop tools for understanding a writer’s
whether it be ancient Thebes or contemporary dramaturgical skills, which deal with plot, char-
Manhattan. The dramatic text is the play- acter, language, and so forth, so that we can read
wright’s blueprint for setting forth physical and plays from all periods of theatrical, cultural, and
psychological experience—to give shape and social history. Styles, conventions, language,
meaning to the world as the playwright sees and and techniques differ among playwrights de-
understands it. Over the centuries, these blue- pending on the physical theater, the writing con-
prints have related a variety of stories not as nar- ventions of the historical period, and the society
rations, but as imitations of imagined actions. or universe mirrored in the writer’s work. Also
Sophocles wrote of a king confronted by a applicable are the ever-changing cultural, social,
plague-ridden kingdom (Oedipus the King), Sam and technological conditions under which plays
Shepard depicted American midwesterners have been written, produced, and performed in
confronting their lost connections with the land Western society for 2500 years.
and with one another (Buried Child), and Samuel
Beckett presented worlds in which human be-
DRAMA’S STAGES
ings “wait out” lifetimes (Footfalls).
Drama, then, is a special written way of im- Drama’s stages are as varied as the society, cul-
itating human experience. It is both a literary ture, and artists engaged in creating the scripts
and a performance text. The fictional character, and performances. In ages past, drama was
Hamlet, is played by the living actor. It is our staged in convenient outdoor places. The amphi-
purpose here to learn to read plays, to under- theaters of Greek and Roman drama, like the
stand the how and why of the dramatic text, stately Theatre at Epidaurus in Greece today,
without ignoring the fact that the playwright’s brought communities together on a hillside to
words have the potential to be performed in the watch the several actors and choruses in the cir-
theater. We must learn to analyze the pattern of cular area at the base of the hill perform the
words and scenes that have the potential for tragic stories taken from myth and legend. In the
“becoming” living words and actions. Middle Ages in Europe and England, the theater
The playwright provides us with dialogue— was again an outdoor festival staged for the pub-
words arranged in a meaningful sequence—in- lic at large. Performances of plays written and
tended to be spoken aloud and enacted by actors produced by craft guilds were staged on plat-
before audiences. Often the playwright includes forms erected in marketplaces or on wagons,

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

[Link] 3 11/12/12 3:07 PM

CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
page 4 A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology

6 ❦ INTRODUCTION

which proceeded from place to place in the me- we face a task unlike the experience of sitting in
dieval towns. During the Renaissance, some the theater where we experience the play in
plays were staged in banquet halls to elite audi- performance. As readers, we necessarily have a
ences and illuminated by candles and tinted re- different experience where we depend on the
flectors; in Italy indoor playhouses were built mind’s eye to fill in the spaces, colors, and
with the first perspective scenery to create an sounds. We must sharpen our abilities to see the
illusion of place. However, the Elizabethan environments envisioned by the playwright, the
theaters in England remained largely public the- interactions among characters, the effects of
aters open to the weather and a cross-section of color and lighting, and the use of sounds and si-
society. Shakespeare’s plays were staged in the lences that contribute meaning. Our task as
most famous theater of the day—The Globe. readers is to visualize a living world, to hear
Modeled on the new European theaters, indoor words and sounds, and to follow the story, char-
playhouses replaced the open-air ones in popu- acters, and events to their final meaning.
larity by the late seventeenth century and play-
writing reflected a larger concern for place and
DRAMATIC SPACE
interior events. With the invention of gas light
and then electricity in the nineteenth century, Drama is unique among the arts in that it imi-
even more elaborate “indoor” playhouses were tates reality through representation rather than
constructed with proscenium arches framing the narration. The playwright creates a fictional uni-
stages, front curtains, and large forestages where verse with human beings, familiar objects, and
actors could step out of the picture frame to ad- recognizable environments. Beckett’s charac-
dress the audience. ters’ feet hurt; August Wilson’s hero holds onto
In today’s theaters, audiences find a variety his baseball bat. Like Beckett and Wilson, play-
of performance spaces. Broadway’s proscenium wrights use “real” human beings in particular
playhouses with elaborate lighting and sound spaces and times to create the illusion of fic-
systems hold the audience at a formal remove tional worlds in which recognizable events take
from the stage. Arena and thrust stages seat au- place in time and space. We distinguish between
diences on four and three sides of a platform the performance space (the stage) and the dramatic
and establish a more intimate relationship with space (the playwright’s fictional locale). Dra-
the audience seated in closer proximity to the ac- matic space—or the play’s environment—is
tors. Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., and the usually described in dialogue or in stage direc-
Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis are two well- tions found in modern texts. What is exhibited
known stages of these types. Then, too, large in the performance space is an interpretation, or
rooms (called black boxes and favored by low- staging, of the play’s physical requirements set
budget, experimental groups) found in per- forth in those directions or reconceived by direc-
forming arts centers and converted warehouses tors and designers.
and garages often press audiences into partici- Dramatic space has essentially two charac-
pation in the play’s action about contemporary teristics. First, it is a “fictional” space—the char-
social and political issues. acters’ environment—described by playwrights
There are few common denominators that in dialogue and stage directions. The fictional
define drama’s stages other than the perfor- space may be the palace of Thebes (Oedipus the
mance space, the actor, and the audience. For ex- King), a nineteenth-century drawing room (The
ample, drama’s stages are large and small, open- Importance of Being Earnest), or the bare front
air or indoors, formal proscenium theaters or yard and wooden porch of the Maxon home
converted spaces. Some playwrights envision (Fences). The fictional space may encompass si-
the play’s environment in elaborate detail; oth- multaneously more than one space, such as pal-
ers leave the void of the stage space to be filled aces and battlefields or apartments and streets.
by directors and designers. As we read plays, Shakespeare’s plays require locations that are

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101 CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance
A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology page 5

FROM TEXT TO PERFORMANCE ❦ 7

miles apart, but the characters must appear in soliloquies and flashbacks. Whereas real or per-
those locales within seconds. Hamlet moves formance time moves in one direction (present
from battlements, to chambers, to graveyards. to future) and the past can never be recaptured,
Dramatic space is magical in its ability to present dramatic time can violate the relentless forward
several locales simultaneously. Bertolt Brecht’s motion of performance time measured by the
Galileo travels many miles and journeys to clock. For example, events may be shown out of
many cities in his pursuit of truth and reason. their chronological sequence, or they may be
Second, dramatic space always assumes the foreshortened so they occur more swiftly than
presence of a stage and an audience and a rela- they would in nature. Shakespeare’s battles, re-
tionship between the two. As we read plays, we quiring only a few minutes of swordplay on
are aware that they are written to be performed. stage, would ordinarily require days or even
While the stage where a play is produced may months in real time. In Samuel Beckett’s plays,
be almost any type—proscenium, arena, thrust, characters experience the relentless passage of
environmental—the characters may or may not time because there are no major events or crises.
be aware of the audience. In modern realistic An unchanging sameness characterizes their
plays, the characters are not aware that an audi- lives. In Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot,
ence is present. The pretense, or stage conven- Vladimir and Estragon wait for Godot’s arrival,
tion, is that a “fourth wall” exists through which which is always postponed by the messenger’s
the actors-as-characters cannot see, although au- announcement that “Mr. Godot told me to tell
diences can. No character in Henrik lbsen’s you he won’t come this evening but surely to-
Hedda Gabler ever acknowledges the audience. morrow.” In Beckett’s plays the experience of
In other plays, characters directly address the dramatic time is cyclical—day becomes night
audience, establishing an invisible flow of space and night becomes day—while his characters
between actor and audience. Oscar Wilde’s The wait out their uneventful lives in patterns that
Importance of Being Earnest has many asides are repetitive and are experienced as “waiting.”
where characters speak directly to the audience In his plays, nothing happens in the traditional
to comment briefly on some situation. As read- sense, but time erodes lives in a relentless jour-
ers, we need to be sensitive to the “look” of the ney toward death.
characters’ environment and to the intended re- Time and space in the fictional universe of
lationship of the dramatic space to the audience. drama are highly malleable and unlike the actual
time we experience in our daily lives. Consider-
ation of dramatic time and space has always
DRAMATIC TIME
played a large part in the different theories and
Dramatic time is a phenomenon of the text. Jan rules of drama. In his Poetics, Aristotle briefly
Kott wrote that “theater is a place where time is suggested that the amount of time it takes the ac-
always present.”4 Once begun, the time of a per- tors to tell the story should ideally be concurrent
formance is one-directional. It follows a linear with the actual time it takes to perform the play.
path for the two or more hours of its duration. This attention to a unity of time, as it was later
Dramatic time, in contrast to performance time, called, is still found in modern realistic plays.
is free of such constraints. In the many words written about drama over
Within the fictional world of the play, time the centuries, the most attention has been given
can be expanded or compressed. Unlike the film to the playwright’s meanings and messages.
editor’s manipulation of images in films, the
playwright does not have the advantage of edit-
DRAMA’S LANDSCAPES
ing and splicing film to carry us forward or
backward in time. Rather, dramatic time can be One critic said that “the dramatic text is incom-
accelerated by using gaps of days, months, and plete without the stage’s support.”5 A play’s lit-
even years; or, it can be slowed down by using eral, figurative, and symbolic landscape is often

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
page 6 A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology

8 ❦ INTRODUCTION

the writer’s vision of the “stage’s support” of the tumes, music, and sound effects (trumpet
dramatic text. Scenography is frequently the name flourishes, for instance) contributed to the ana-
given by theater practitioners to that support. logue between life and art.
They are defining the playwright’s concept of the Many nineteenth-century playwrights con-
stage as a fictional environment with literal and fined their characters within a stage setting de-
visible dimensions as well as figurative and sym- fined by three walls and a ceiling (called a box
bolic meanings. As readers, we seek clues in the set) to depict the landscape of a repressive soci-
text’s dialogue and stage directions for how to ety that dictated lifestyle, manners, dress codes,
imagine the “look” of the play’s fictional world social conventions, and mores. Others used lit-
but the play’s scenography is much more than eral journeys from lowlands to mountaintops to
scenic representation of literal places on stage. complement a character’s journey of the soul
Playwrights have their own kind of “liter- that culminated in a spiritual epiphany. Play-
ary” or “verbal” scenography. It includes the wrights have also used journeys from heights to
play’s geography, its interior and/or exterior en- depths to trace a character’s moral degeneration.
virons, and the symbolic meanings of those fic- The playwright’s visual landscape places the
tional worlds, whether we are visualizing dramatic material in a historical time and space.
Oedipus’ plague-ravaged kingdom, Hamlet’s The playwright inserts notes on geography, light,
haunted castle at Elsinore, or Amanda Wing- color, furniture, clothing, and develops their rela-
field’s tattered living quarters. tionship to the play’s action and characters. Stage
The playwright’s scenography has two dis- directions are a literal gold mine of this type of
tinct components: (1) scenery, costumes, sounds, scenographic detail. Ibsen meticulously de-
lighting effects, colors, objects, furnishings, and scribed in stage directions Hedda Gabler’s draw-
special effects; (2) the symbolic, cultural, and the- ing room, the scene of her social and spiritual
matic meanings of the play’s fictional world. confinement. The room is at once a fictional land-
These are the playwright’s scenographic materi- scape and a symbolic universe—all contained
als, which we may think of as a gigantic musical within a recognizable 1890s middle-class draw-
score indicating the “look” and use of the stage ing room located on the outskirts of a Norwegian
space, as well as the meaning of this environ- town. Ibsen’s detailed analogue to the virtual
ment as fictional world. world is one type of dramatic landscape—a
The open-air theaters of classical, medieval, “slice of life” representation that reflects the ev-
and Elizabethan times embraced large human eryday reality of the historical world.
actions that took place in cosmic space. The More recent texts written for the realistic
myths and legends of Greek tragedy show an theater, including The Cherry Orchard, The Glass
expansive landscape with humans and gods un- Menagerie, Fences, and Broken Eggs, use material
der pressure, confronting chaos and disorder, objects, places, décor, and clothing to define the
often in contradictory and catastrophic ways. In dramatic landscape. Then, there is the more
the landscape of Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, a complex scenography of anti-realistic writing
plague of physical and spiritual proportions wherein the stage and the performance are
overtakes a kingdom and royal family. viewed as reality that demonstrates how human
The platform stage and neutral façade of the beings live out their life’s “roles” and “act out”
Elizabethan theater held the dramatic mirror up their charades and crises. In the work of Luigi
to human experience. It was no accidental turn Pirandello, Eugène Ionesco, and Jean Genet, the
of phrase when Shakespeare wrote, “All the stage—as a place for pretense—is viewed as
world’s a stage, And all the men and women more “real” than our workaday lives. Writing in
merely players” (As You Like It). The dramatic the 1920s, Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello
landscapes of the Elizabethan playwrights understood the essence of human nature as pre-
touched on all places and human actions, in- tense—the putting on of masks as social perso-
cluding magical islands and battlefields. Cos- nas to play out public roles. The theater with its

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

[Link] 6 11/12/12 3:07 PM

UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101 CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance
A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology page 7

FROM TEXT TO PERFORMANCE ❦ 9

interactions between audience and actors was work—the novel, poem, or play—overlooking
the perfect landscape to create works about the fact that meaning is generated as the work is
playing, about theatricality, and about the hu- experienced. A play’s complete meaning does
man impulse to create fictions, revise reality, and not emerge in the early pages of a text or in the
to put on masks. Pirandello created the metathe- first moments of a performance, but quite often
atrical play in his “theater trilogy”—Six Charac- the seeds of the message can be found there.
ters in Search of an Author, Each in His Own Way, In creating the dramatic text, the playwright
and Tonight We Improvise—where the play- connects the reader (and audiences) with a com-
wright’s essential scenographic tool is the stage mon humanity through the progression of the
itself. The emphasis of this type of dramatic play’s events. Great plays confront us with life’s
writing is on theatricality and artifice rather verities, conveying the hope, courage, despair,
than on a photographic landscape of middle- compassion, violence, love, hate, exploitation,
class life and its environs. and generosity experienced by all humankind.
Another variation of the complex scenogra- They show us the possibilities of losing our fam-
phy of the post-realistic theater is found in the ilies and property through accidents, catastro-
epic staging envisioned by Bertolt Brecht and phes of war, or tyranny. Plays show us ways of
the absurdist writing of Samuel Beckett. Brecht fulfilling ourselves in relationships or confront-
uses the stage’s empty space as an undefined, ing despair and death. August Wilson’s charac-
highly flexible landscape accommodating Gali- ters struggle to show love and affection to one
leo’s journey through historical conflict with re- another. The most enduring plays explore what
ligious authority and scientific investigation. it means to be human beings in special circum-
Influenced by Brecht’s writing and staging, stances. These circumstances may be unfamiliar,
playwrights Tony Kushner and Suzan-Lori like the prince dispossessed of his rightful heri-
Parks also envision the dramatic landscape as tage through murder, marriage, and calumny
encompassing the real and surreal. (Hamlet); or bizarre, like the family that has liter-
In absurdist writing, the stage is a land- ally buried its family skeleton in the back yard
scape of emptiness and isolation. The “empty (Buried Child); or familiar, like the unwanted am-
stage” (the gaping void or cavity of the physical bitions of a mother for her children (The Glass
space) becomes the playwright’s scenographic Menagerie).
landscape of existential or metaphysical propor- Drama’s most enduring achievements, like
tions. The plays of Samuel Beckett present the the representative plays contained in this book,
absurdity of all human struggle as senseless, fu- serve as reflections of ourselves, or what poten-
tile, and oppressive. It follows that his absurdist tially could be ourselves in different times and
landscape depicts human isolation and its vi- circumstances. Drama’s best moments lead us to
sual counterpart—physical emptiness. In Wait- discoveries and reflections about our personali-
ing for Godot, two tramps in a wasted and forlorn ties, circumstances, desires, anxieties, hopes,
area inhabited by a single tree wait for Godot, and dreams. Playwrights also move beyond per-
who never arrives. Emptiness comprises Beck- sonal concerns to discuss social and political is-
ett’s landscape so much so that such minimal sues that are of a certain time, yet transcend
properties as a tree (Waiting for Godot), a rocking specific historical periods. Playwrights stimu-
chair (Rockaby), or a tape recorder (Krapp’s Last late social awareness and put us in touch with
Tape) take on visual significance and philosoph- our thoughts and feelings about issues. The aim
ical meaning. of great playwrights is to expand our conscious-
ness on old and new social and personal issues,
and to endow us with new perspectives on our hu-
DRAMA’S MEANINGS AND MESSAGES
manity and the human condition.
The play reader’s greatest temptation is to con- Plays are written as a process of unfolding
centrate on the general meaning of the literary and discovery. To read plays successfully is to

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

[Link] 7 11/12/12 3:07 PM

CHAPTER 1 From Text to Performance UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
page 8 A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology

10 ❦ INTRODUCTION

understand essentially “how” the playwright not be reduced to a single meaning. Since there
generates meaning. Scene follows scene in is usually no author’s voice in drama, as there is
meaningful patterns; dialogue communicates in the novel where the writer can speak directly
feelings and ideas; characters display motives to the reader, we are left with layers of possible
and emotions; locales give social and economic meaning based on the play’s events. We can usu-
contexts. “What” a play means involves the ally agree that Hamlet was given the task of
completed action, that is, all that has gone before avenging his father’s murder, that he hesitated
in organized, meaningful segments that, when and ultimately achieved his objective at the cost
taken in their totality, express the writer’s vision of his life. What remains open to interpretation
or conviction about the world. As readers, we is the ultimate meaning or significance of the
share that unfolding—those discoveries—with play—“what it was all about.” For that reason,
audiences. We also learn to experience the de- we can read and see Hamlet any number of times
veloping actions, events, and relationships and continue to discover new meanings in this
which, in turn, produce a coherent statement complex text. We want to learn to identify how
about individuals, societies, and the universe. playwrights order, clarify, and distill their imita-
We learn to follow the playwright’s ways and tions of real life in the dramatic text and what
means of organizing the dramatic material into a larger meanings emerge from these efforts.
coherent whole. We discover the writer’s meth-
ods for developing the psychological and phys-
CRITICS’ NOTEBOOK
ical currents of human endeavor that result in
visible (and meaningful) behavior. Bert Cardullo, dramaturg and scholar, has writ-
The same process is at work in our personal ten on the role of the dramaturg that developed
experiences. In our daily lives, we are not in- in German theaters in the late eighteenth cen-
stantly aware that some actions have repercus- tury and found its way into the American resi-
sions far beyond our expectations. As we begin dent theaters in the late twentieth century. His
a trip, we cannot know the full extent of what is notes on the work of the dramaturg, published
to come, namely, our experiences. With time, we in What Is Dramaturgy? (1995), relate to the dis-
come to understand the meaning of our experi- cussion of playwriting and performance found
ences, feelings, and actions, as well as the mo- in this introductory chapter.
tives and actions of others. In some instances,
meanings are elusive—sometimes impossible to
pin down. The same is true in understanding the Bert Cardullo, from What Is Dramaturgy?*
how and the why of the dramatic text. When ❦
Tom Wingfield brings the “gentleman caller” to
dine with his sister Laura in Tennessee Williams’ If you consult a dictionary, the meaning of the
The Glass Menagerie, he is not aware, nor are we word “dramaturgy” you find there is “the craft
as readers and audiences, of the psychological or the techniques of dramatic composition con-
damage he is imposing on Laura’s fragile emo- sidered collectively,” and a “dramaturg” is de-
tional life. fined simply as “a dramatist or playwright.”
All art condenses, clarifies, and orders the Now we know that a playwright is a “maker” or
chaos, disorder, and inconsequential happen- “worker” of plays, not merely a writer of them
ings of life. The poet William Wordsworth gives (as a shipwright is a maker of ships and a wain-
shape to girlhood innocence in his “Lucy Gray” wright a maker of wagons). This meaning of
poems. The playwright Tennessee Williams or- “playwright” is reinforced by the Greek word
ganizes Tom Wingfield’s memories of his cha-
otic and unhappy life in his mother’s home. *Bert Cardullo, What Is Dramaturgy?, American Univer-
However, great plays, like great poems, confront sity Studies, vol. 20 (New York: Peter Lang Publishing,
life’s complexities in such a way that they can- Inc., 1995): 3–4, 10–11.

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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FROM TEXT TO PERFORMANCE ❦ 11

dramaturgy (and its back formation, dramaturg), the discoverer, transmitter, and interpreter of
which is made up of the root for “action or do- playtexts both ancient and modern, a kind of
ing” (drame) and the suffix for “process or work- playwright for all ages or crossroads of dramatic
ing” (-urgy). Here we may helpfully think of the tradition. A dramaturg is to a play as a mechanic
words “metallurgy”—the working of metal— is to an automobile: he may not have built it, but
and “thaumaturgy”—the working of miracles. he knows what makes it work, and this enables
But let us venture on another meaning of the him to rebuild it as the theatrical occasion war-
word “dramaturgy,” which has come into usage rants. Playwrights—and directors as well as au-
in the American theatre fairly recently. As a re- diences—should be grateful, and should take
sult of our belated acknowledgement of Euro- advantage.
pean theatre practice, “dramaturgy” today
denotes the multi-faceted study of a given play:
REVISITING DRAMA AND PERFORMANCE
its author, content, style, and interpretive possi-
bilities, together with its historical, theatrical, As we have discovered, plays are at once literary
and intellectual background. This study is con- texts and texts for performance. For this reason,
ducted by people called “dramaturgs” in the Eu- there is a doubleness about our experience of
ropean repertory theatre, most conspicuously in them. In the theater itself, we experience plays
Germany, where each of the approximately 120 in the present time and in their performance
municipal theatres has a dramaturgical depart- space. Literary texts (called drama) also contain
ment. The dramaturg’s profession was instituted their own versions of time and space in fictional
in the United States during the rise of the re- worlds. Dramatic space, like the stage itself, is
gional theatre movement and continues to be highly malleable and can portray locations that
important in ensemble theatres as well as in are miles apart; characters can move from locale
those regional theatres that have remained non- to locale without violating our sense of the logi-
commercial. As critics-in-residence (also known cal progression of events. One play may take
as literary managers or literary advisors), drama- place wholly in a living room; another may take
turgs perform a variety of tasks. Broadly speak- place in a character’s memory; another may re-
ing, the dramaturg’s duties are (1) to select and quire battlefields, castles, and graveyards. Dra-
prepare playtexts for performance; (2) to advise matic time is likewise flexible. Within a play’s
directors and actors; and (3) to educate the audi- fictional world, time can be compressed or ex-
ence. To fulfill these duties, dramaturgs serve as panded to reflect the passage of hours or years.
script readers, translators, theatre historians, In reading plays, we progress from “what is
play adaptors or even playwrights, directorial happening next” in terms of storytelling to
assistants or sometimes apprentice directors, “what it all means.” This is our final concern be-
critics of works-in-progress, and talent scouts.... cause plays, like the lives or realities they imi-
tate, progress through action and events to a
❧ ❧ ❧ discovery that those human choices and hap-
penings have special meanings in the completed
The dramaturg is spokesman for the word if action. However, “what it is all about” is not in
not a creator of words himself; he is the cham- the least a fixed message but open to reinterpre-
pion of ideas in a theatre—and a world— tation with changing historical periods, cul-
increasingly devoid of them; and he is a believer tures, and societies. Following the Bolshevik
in the elusive if not ineffable spirit of well- revolution in Russia in 1917, the ending of An-
wrought dramatic texts, which he helps to em- ton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard was “reinter-
body in beautifully shaped, infinitely shaded, preted” as the great playwright’s forecast of the
and piercingly heard theatrical productions. political and social changes to come in the cre-
Without the dramaturg, in fact, there is no real ation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
theatre. He is its true architect and archaeologist, Today, the ending is again reinterpreted to

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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12 ❦ INTRODUCTION

capture Chekhov’s balanced view of humanity’s 2. Hellman, 151–152.

struggle to survive in a changing world. 3. Martin Esslin, The Field of Drama: How the Signs
Let us begin our process of understanding of Drama Create Meaning on Stage and Screen (Lon-
plays with the elements of drama—play structure, don: Methuen, 1987): 24.
character, and language—found in three master- 4. Jan Kott, The Theater of Essence and Other Es-
pieces of Western playwriting: Hamlet, The Glass says (Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press,
Menagerie, and The Cherry Orchard. 1984): 211.
5. Patrice Pavis, Languages of the Stage: Essays on
the Semiology of Theatre (New York: Performing Arts
NOTES Journal Publications, 1982): 145.
1. Lillian Hellman, Pentimento: A Book of Portraits
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1973): 151–152.

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CHAPTER 2
❦
UNDERSTANDING PLAY STRUCTURE

Ralph Fiennes as Hamlet and Francesca Annis as Gertrude in Hamlet, directed by Jonathan Kent, in the
Almeida Theatre Company production, Hackney Empire Theatre, London, 1995. (Photo © Robbie
Jack/CORBIS.)

15
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16 ❦ ELEMENTS OF DRAMA

If art reflects life it does so with special mirrors.

—Bertolt Brecht

DRAMA’S SPECIAL MIRRORS Found in Oedipus the King and Hamlet, the
older types of play structure represent com-
In writing about the practice of making plays and pressed or expanding stories built upon cause
theater, German playwright Bertolt Brecht used and effect, commitments and consequences, or
the metaphor of “special mirrors” to describe the purposeful seeking and meaningful discovery.
changing forms, conventions, and techniques of The quest, a search for or pursuit of an objective
his day.1 In one sense, play structure is like the or goal, is perhaps the oldest mode for structur-
frame of the mirror, the incasement, that gives a ing a play. Sophocles’ plays are excellent exam-
special shape to drama’s events. ples. The journey, a passage or progress through
Drama is a pattern of imagined words and time from one point to the next, is probably the
actions having the potential for “doing” or “be- second oldest and found splendidly realized in
coming” living words and actions through hu- Elizabethan plays. In these two instances, a
man presence. Drama imitates human actions play’s structure may be climactic (the quest) or
and circumstances (Aristotle called it mimesis). episodic (the journey). In both, plot and action
Dramatic structure is the overall pattern that are based on a central conflict and organized
gives a special shape to these events, either com- usually in a progression from confrontation to
pressing or expanding the mystery of human crisis to resolution.3
behavior into a semblance of time, space, and
living presence. Over the years, we have devel-
CLIMACTIC PLAY STRUCTURE
oped a vocabulary to describe the variety of mir-
rors playwrights have used to imitate the shape Found in classical and modern plays, climactic
of human events. That common vocabulary de- structure limits the characters’ activities and in-
scribes play structure generally as climactic, epi- creases pressures on them until they are forced
sodic, situational, or reflexive. These terms are into irreversible acts. The playwright begins late
descriptive of plays by Sophocles, William in the course of the story, near the crisis and cli-
Shakespeare, Samuel Beckett, and Suzan-Lori max, and we experience a brief time in the life of
Parks. Others have devised such terms as the the characters, usually limited to a few hours or
“well-made play,” “anti-play,” “talking pieces,” days. The events of the story’s past weigh
and “synthetic fragments” to identify further heavily on the present situation, and are gradu-
the overall shape of a dramatic text. A play’s ally revealed even until the play’s final mo-
structure, as we shall discover, gives form to the ments. This gradual unfolding of background
physical, psychological, and philosophical ex- information is called retrospective exposition; it
periences contained collectively in the text’s ac- demonstrates the effects of the past on present
tion, plot, characters, speech, and landscapes. events and lives. Sophocles’ treatment of the Oe-
Suzanne K. Langer described drama thus: dipus story gradually reveals the choices made
“Drama, though it implies past actions (the ‘situ- in the past that bring the hero to the moment of
ation’), moves not toward the present, as narra- discovery and terrible self-knowledge.
tive does, but toward something beyond; it deals As the action develops in climactic structure,
essentially with commitments and conse- the characters’ options are reduced. In many
quences.”2 In Langer’s view, drama is a dynamic cases, they are aware that their choices are being
pattern of circumstances and actions, always in limited and that they are being moved toward a
the process of being completed. How drama’s im- crisis and turning point of present fortunes—
pending acts are shaped determines the labels from good to bad, or from bad to good. Climactic
we use—climactic, episodic, and so on. structure is a cause-to-effect arrangement of

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UNDERSTANDING PLAY STRUCTURE ❦ 17

events leading to a climax and quick resolution. senting the past in relation to what is happening
Oedipus the King, Hedda Gabler, and Fences are in the present while bringing all to a resolution,
three excellent examples of climactic structure. has shaped dramatic writing for 2500 years. The
In Oedipus the King, Sophocles started at a well-made play, so popular with French writers
critical point in the ancient Theban story when of the nineteenth century and adapted by Hen-
the plague descends upon the city Oedipus and rik Ibsen and more recently by August Wilson,
Jocasta had been ruling for a number of years. demonstrates the timeless appeal of climactic
The play’s action takes less than a day and con- structure. For a play to be considered “well-
sists of Oedipus’ quest for Laius’s slayer—his made,” it had to have clear exposition of the sit-
consulting the Oracle of Apollo, his interroga- uation, late point of attack, careful preparation
tion of the seer Teiresias and of a series of wit- of events, withheld secrets, unexpected but log-
nesses, ending with the old shepherd who gave ical reversals, mounting suspense, an obligatory
him as a baby to a servant of the rulers of scene revealing the secret and explaining the
Corinth. The play ends when Oedipus is unmis- writer’s social and moral viewpoints, and a log-
takably revealed as the culprit and exacts a self- ical resolution. Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler and August
inflicted punishment—blindness and exile. Wilson’s Fences are examples of well-made play
By starting the play late in the story (also structure and, therefore, are climactic.
called a point of attack), and by showing only the Let us return to the mirror as paradigm for
last crucial episodes before Oedipus’ fall, the dramatic structure. The playwright’s universal
past and present events of the protagonist’s life view of human beings in action and the mean-
are revealed simultaneously. Oedipus’ quest for ing of those actions determine the play’s struc-
the slayer of Laius becomes a search for the hid- ture. Climactic structure reflects a vision of an
den reality of his own past. As that past slowly orderly, rational universe in which causes have
comes into focus in the light of irrefutable facts, effects and deeds have moral consequences.
his quest also reaches its end. Oedipus discovers Past, present, and future have logical, traceable
himself as both the city’s savior and its pollution. kinships giving rise to a dramatic structure that
The plot and action (the search for truth) mirrors a rational world. For example, Sopho-
also have a secondary shape: a beginning, mid- cles’ tragedies demonstrate a divinely ordered
dle, and end, in time and space. The play starts universe where humans can, through suffering,
with the immediate cause (the plague) which re- learn the meaning of their deeds. No effect is
sults in Oedipus’ objective to find Laius’s slayer. without cause, no life without meaning. The
His search for a murderer turns into an intense shape of Sophocles’ plays, therefore, is logical
pursuit of truth. Complications evolve into an and ordered according to a rational pattern
unexpected climax and new understanding in whose meaning is intelligible.
the resolution. The action moves quickly and
methodically from purpose to understanding,
EPISODIC PLAY STRUCTURE
cause to effect. Oedipus suffers forces he can nei-
ther control nor understand; yet, at the same Found in medieval plays and in the work of Wil-
time, he intelligently wills each move in his liam Shakespeare, Bertolt Brecht, Tony Kushner,
search. The action is an intensive search for and Suzan-Lori Parks, episodic play structure
Laius’s killer and as Oedipus’ past is unrolled traces its characters through a journey both phys-
before us in five episodes, his whole life is seen ical and spiritual to a final understanding of the
as a quest for his true nature, identity, and des- meaning of the total experience. The journey, as
tiny. The structure also mirrors the age-old quest with any kind of travel, can always take new
of all human beings to discover who they are twists and turns, introduce new characters, and
and the meaning of what they have done. leap across years and locales. In Shakespeare’s
Sophocles’ arrangement of the story’s plays, events do not confine the characters be-
events, starting his play near the end and repre- cause the plot and action expand to include

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18 ❦ ELEMENTS OF DRAMA

many people and considerable time and dis- Episodic plotting required little exposition,
tance. Hamlet takes place over several months usually because not much had happened before
and countries. And the expanding plot takes in a the play began. Although many years earlier
variety of events, including encounters with a the elder Hamlet defeated the elder Fortinbras
ghost, a suicide, a funeral, and an ill-fated duel. to reclaim Denmark, this information is not vi-
In this loose structure, characters are not caught tal to Hamlet’s situation at the play’s start.
in circumstances but maneuver within them as What is vital is that Hamlet’s uncle has recently
Brecht’s Galileo maneuvers to outwit the reac- usurped the throne and married his mother and
tionary powers of seventeenth-century Italy at a ghost has appeared to the palace guards. The
the dawn of a new scientific age. forward movement of the plot requires Ham-
Episodic play structure begins early in the let’s encounter with the ghost. It is typical of ep-
story (called an early point of attack) and involves isodic structure that some force occurs early in
many people, places, and events that do not the opening scenes, or just before them, to impel
confine the characters or necessarily restrict the characters to act. The ghost in Hamlet is one
their choices and movements. Unlike climactic such instance.
structure, people are not perceived as victims of Episodic structure takes its name from the
their past histories, but only of their present cir- end-to-end arrangement of a series of events,
cumstances. Accordingly, the plot develops a each of which is completed before another be-
variety of events and activities. There may also gins. Usually, in Shakespeare’s plays, exits mark
be more than one plot involving, for example, the end of scenes together with couplets or solil-
the stories of two families which, as in King Lear, oquies. Each scene has one of three functions, or
eventually impact on each other in the play’s a combination thereof: (1) to propel the plot to-
resolution. ward its crisis and resolution; (2) to develop
Elizabethans thought of the play (and the traits of character; or (3) to compare and contrast
stage) as a “mirror held up to nature,” as situations among the characters.
Shakespeare said, reflecting the behavior and The episodes were developed within a five-
sociopolitical conditions of the time. Since most part form the Elizabethans probably adopted
Elizabethan playwrights, including Shakes- from their classical studies of Seneca and Ter-
peare, turned to popular romances and histo- ence, Roman playwrights. However, within the
ries for their plots, their material did not lend five parts, the Elizabethans spread out the events
itself to tight plotting of incidents. Instead, writ- of the plot and shaped the dramatic action to de-
ers concentrated on the rapid and expanding velop the highest tension during the middle of
progress of a story from high point to high the play and revived it again toward the end.
point, opting for effects more than causes. Therefore, in the Elizabethan model, the first
Shakespeare emphasized the effects of Dun- three parts were an expanding and complicating
can’s murder in Macbeth and of Hamlet’s pro- of events leading to a climax. The fourth part in-
crastination. In addition, we find in Hamlet the cluded events that reduced tensions, and the
appearance of a ghost, the staging of a play final part concluded with another climactic mo-
within a play (Hamlet’s “Mousetrap”), Polo- ment and a resolution of the conflict. One read-
nius’ murder, Ophelia’s suicide and burial, the ing of Hamlet places the first climax at the
duel between Hamlet and Laertes and multiple moment when Hamlet kills Polonius, resulting
deaths, and Fortinbras’ martial entrance to in an irreversible course of events from which
claim the kingdom. In this type of structure, there is no turning back; the second combines
plots were composed of events (or episodes) the fatal poisoning and duel. Episodic structure
placed end to end to tell a story about active juxtaposes, repeats, and contrasts the play’s
lives—killing kings, fighting over kingdoms, events in a sweep of action that has repercus-
usurping thrones, avenging wrongs, and so on. sions for all involved.

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UNDERSTANDING PLAY STRUCTURE ❦ 19

Shakespeare’s plays often ended with a progress of humankind in this figurative jour-
public resolution of the conflict. Usually, an au- ney of life called episodic structure.
thority figure (a king, judge, or governor) meted
out justice, married lovers, and reordered the
SITUATIONAL PLAY STRUCTURE
body politic. The means of bringing about a
play’s ending varied; it ranged from the discov- In absurdist plays of the 1950s and recent plays
ery of true identities to a trial, execution, or sin- of the contemporary theater, situation shapes the
gle combat. In Macbeth and Hamlet, a single action, not plot or character. Situation, presented
combat decides the issue against the forces of in a concrete stage image, takes the place of the
evil. Following this type of critical event, some- journey or the quest. The situation in Waiting for
one in authority pronounced judgment, declar- Godot presents two tramps waiting in a sparse
ing the meaning of the action and reasserting landscape for a person named Godot who never
order. Usually, these final lines were little more arrives. What they do while they “wait” is the
than ceremonial, and they were followed by the interest and statement of Beckett’s text.
stately exit of all persons to clear the stage. The principal absurdist writers of the post-
Like Shakespeare, Bertolt Brecht used epi- war era—Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, and
sodic structure to mirror persons caught up in Arthur Adamov—shared a deep sense of human
historical moments and making choices that had isolation and the irremediable nature of the hu-
moral consequences. Brecht’s epic writing, link- man condition. In their individual views of the
ing contrasting episodes, mirrors a world whose world’s absurdity, these writers expressed the
materialism confounds the gullible and the na- same futility and pointlessness of human effort,
ive. While Brecht used historical events as back- the impossibility of human communication, and
ground to dramatic action, he believed that art the same inevitable failure of hope. The element
had a social function: to show society’s ills in of the absurd that informs the structure of this type
such a way as to convince audiences that social of play was defined by Ionesco as “that which has
change was possible and desirable. Mother no purpose, or goal, or objective.”4 Absurdist
Courage, in Mother Courage and Her Children, ac- play structure must, therefore, reject logical pro-
cording to Brecht, does not learn from her gression and reveal the irrationality of the human
wrong choices that result in the deaths of her condition. Dramatic conventions of previous ep-
children and her moral and material impover- ochs reflected an accepted moral order, a world
ishment. Nevertheless, audiences learn from ob- with aims and objectives, an unquestioned belief
serving her choices, her children’s fates, and her in religious faith and secular progress. One critic
diminishing circumstances. explained the results of the modern loss of an in-
Linking episodes end to end gives an ex- tegrated world picture in this way:
panding shape and sequential order to activities
taking place in time and space. It mirrors histor- The decline of religious faith, the destruction of the
ical process and provides a venue for the play- belief in automatic social and biological progress,
the discovery of vast areas of irrational and uncon-
wright’s statement about the meaning of human
scious forces within the human psyche, the loss of
events for individuals, societies, and kingdoms.
control over rational human development in an age
Shakespeare’s universe is as orderly as Sopho-
of totalitarianism and weapons of mass destruc-
cles’. Evil will be uncovered and punished, and
tion, have all contributed to the erosion of the basis
innocence, though temporarily tainted, will be for a dramatic convention in which the action pro-
restored in reputation even in death. ceeds within a fixed and self-evident framework of
Like climactic structure, episodic structure generally accepted values.5
displays order in disorder and rationality in
chaos. A progression of events mirrors historical To mirror the human predicament as con-
moments and comments on the potential tradictory and absurd, the older play forms

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20 ❦ ELEMENTS OF DRAMA

were unworkable. They belonged to another age “philosophical wisdom,” followed by the dis-
where actions were meaningful, plots clear-cut, appointing message that Godot will not come
characters recognizable, and endings tidy reso- that evening. The second act builds through the
lutions. In the conventional theater, action al- return of Pozzo and Lucky with their positions
ways proceeds toward a definable end. Will of master and slave mysteriously reversed, fol-
Oedipus make the discovery? Will Hamlet lowed by the message that once again Godot
avenge the murder of his father? Will Hedda Ga- will not appear. Although developed in two
bler reconcile herself to middle-class life? The parts, Beckett recycles the ending of each act so
interest is on what will happen in a known that, clearly, the situation is unchanged. (Only
framework of accepted values and a rational time has passed, for the ubiquitous tree has
view of life. grown leaves between the two parts.) More-
The problem for absurdist writers was to over, the characters repeat the same dialogue, in
find a dramatic structure to present a world de- reverse, in the final moments of each part. Es-
void of clear-cut purpose with infinite possibili- tragon (I), Vladimir (II): “Well, shall we go?”
ties for bitter truths. Situation, then, became the Vladimir (I), Estragon (II): “Yes, let’s go.” Stage
mirror of an unchanging reality with an infinite directions (I, II): They do not move.
number of interpretations. Does Godot, so fer- Situational structure relates to older con-
vently and vainly awaited by Vladimir and Es- ventions only in the sense that it mirrors the
tragon, stand for God? Or, does Godot merely writer’s world view. Absurdist plays, emerging
represent the ever elusive tomorrow, human- in Europe following the Second World War, con-
ity’s hope that one day something will happen vey a sense of alienation, of people having lost
that will render our existence meaningful? The their bearings in an illogical and ridiculous
force and poetic power of the play lie precisely world. Divorced from a rational universe mir-
in the impossibility of ever reaching a conclu- rored in the ordered structure of climactic and
sive answer to this question. episodic plays, situational structure also con-
The suspense of the absurdist play is: Will veys a patterned meaning: the paradox and irra-
the next incident add to our understanding of tionality of the human condition.
what is happening? Although there may be an in-
creasing number of contradictory and bewilder-
REFLEXIVE STRUCTURE
ing clues, the final question is never wholly
answered. Audiences are compelled to puzzle The playwright’s view of a postmodern world
out the meaning of what they have seen. Of this in the 1980s required new critical terms to de-
type of writing, Martin Esslin said, “All they can scribe the subversion of familiar staging and
show is that while the solutions have evapo- writing conventions. Borrowing their discon-
rated the riddle of our existence remains—com- tents from Samuel Beckett who wrote in End-
plex, unfathomable, and paradoxical.”6 game, “...you’re on earth, there’s no cure for
It would be incorrect to imply that situa- that,” the postmoderns have substituted narra-
tional plays do not have inner patterns. The sit- tive for dialogue, signs for characters, perfor-
uation has its own rhythms, which are like the mance for action, and fragments for plot. In a
basic rhythms of life: birth to death, day to dramatic text bereft of such familiar signposts as
night, summer to winter, and so on. Although plot, action, character, and dialogue, we find a
the situation usually remains unchanged at the proliferation of self-canceling images. In Ger-
play’s end, these rhythms move in a recurring man playwright Heiner Müller’s Hamletma-
cycle beginning with a situation that develops chine, written for a postindustrial age, we ask
(a) increasing tension, (b) leading to some type ourselves are Hamlet and Ophelia Shakes-
of explosion, (c) and returning to the original sit- peare’s characters? Or, are these mere images la-
uation. In the first act, Waiting for Godot builds beled Hamlet and Ophelia? If so, what are we to
toward Lucky’s much-vaunted gibberish of think? What does it all mean? Are our assump-

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UNDERSTANDING PLAY STRUCTURE ❦ 21

tions about Shakespeare’s characters being used matic forms for “imaging” contemporary his-
to say something about the ego and the self in tory and a postindustrial world. The new
the postmodern age? Or, is the image not its own structure reduces dramatic form to imagistic
reality? Because of the many images and scene fragments enacted in time and space without re-
fragments, we refer to these plays as having a re- gard for coherent, linear plot or whole charac-
flexive structure. The critical term comes from En- ters. The performance of these texts may require
glish grammar: a reflexive verb or pronoun is hours or minutes. By “re-imaging” our survival
identical with its subject. It is at once alike and and annihilation in disparate fragments of im-
unlike its referent. An example of a reflexive ages, sounds, and narrative, such writers as Hei-
verb is “She dresses herself.” While we know that ner Müller and Robert Wilson have devised a
Hamletmachine is not Shakespeare’s play, we are new dramatic structure for postmodern times.
asked to reflect upon the older play, not to com- Their dramatic fragments are like cracked mir-
ment upon the past in the present, but as a mode rors reflecting broken images of a too rapidly
of self-criticism and as an avenue of new insight. changing reality and the imagined horrors of the
In this century of holocaustic annihilation ultimate threat to humanity’s survival—a nu-
and pandemic disease, writers seek new dra- clear explosion.

Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

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CHAPTER 2 Understanding Play Structure UNDERSTANDING THEATRE KTB101
page 18 A publication from Pearson Custom Publishing exclusively for the Queensland University of Technology

The Tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmark

❦
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was born in Strat- to the English throne upon the death of Queen
ford-on-Avon where he received a grammar school ed- Elizabeth I.
ucation and married the twenty-six-year-old Anne Hamlet is an example of episodic play struc-
Hathaway when he was eighteen. They had three chil- ture. Several elementary facts account for the
dren, Susanna and twins Judith and Hamnet. structure of this play, in addition to what we said
Other facts about Shakespeare’s life have been es- earlier in this chapter about the episodic journey
tablished. By 1587–1588, leaving his family in Strat- as a structural archetype. Hamlet belongs to a
ford, he had moved to London where he remained well-known type of Elizabethan drama known
until 1611, except for occasional visits to his Strat- as the “revenge” play which had its own set of
ford home. He appears to have found work almost at writing conventions. Perfect vengeance for a
once in the London theater as actor and writer. By crime against a close relative required uncom-
1592, he was regarded as a promising playwright; by mon strategies for bringing about the villain’s
1594, he had won the patronage of the Earl of death. The revenge play required a crime, usu-
Southampton for two poems, Venus and Adonis ally a murder, where the vengeance fell upon the
and The Rape of Lucrece. next of kin as a pious duty; the discovery of the
By 1594, he had joined James Burbage’s theater murder by the avenger; obstacles to revenge; and
company, The Lord Chamberlain’s Men, as actor and the triumphant conclusion in which the mur-
playwright; later, he became a company shareholder derer is destroyed and condemned everlastingly
and part owner of the Globe and Blackfriars theaters. to hell. The revenge pattern was usually accom-
He wrote over thirty plays for this company, suiting panied by ghosts, madness, gore, poisonings,
them to the talents of the great tragic actor Richard and violent (often bizarre) deaths.
Burbage and other members of the troupe, including Hamlet combines two modes of Elizabethan
the popular clowns Will Kempe and Robert Armin. writing: the episodic journey and the revenge
Near the end of his life, he retired to Stratford as a conventions. Shakespeare’s play is further com-
well-to-do country gentleman. plicated by two simultaneous journeys in the
Shakespeare wrote sonnets, tragedies, comedies, figure of the hero. One is the progress of Ham-
history plays, and tragicomedies, including some of let’s intellect and soul as he wrestles with the
the greatest plays written in English: Macbeth, cruel paradoxes of existence. The second is his
King Lear, The Tempest, Othello, and Hamlet. journey through successful revenge with delays
owing to his ethical and psychological needs to
confirm facts and to consider his actions.
CRITICAL INTRODUCTION TO HAMLET
On one level, the twin arcs of Hamlet’s jour-
Hamlet was written around 1600, performed in ney trace his wrestling with the need for re-
the 1600–1601 season, and published in 1603 as venge, his becoming an avenger, and the
The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke. obstacles in his pathway to success. On another
It was the property of the King’s Men (formerly level, the hero’s inner life, revealed in his solilo-
the Lord Chamberlain’s Men), as the company quies, retards the usual revenge journey which
was renamed with the ascension of King James I is ordinarily mean, violent, and swift. Hamlet

22
Barranger, MS 2003, Understanding Plays, 3rd edn., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Sadler River, New Jersey.

[Link] 18 11/12/12 3:07 PM

Other documents randomly have
different content
decided upon Sevenoaks as a good starting-place. I will see you
there to-night.

"A.T."

CHAPTER XXVII

A fortunate chance revealed to Seth Dumbrick the knowledge of

the Duchess's flight many hours before she intended him to become
acquainted with it. Both he and Sally had observed a strange and
unaccountable excitement in the Duchess's manner, and had spoken
of it in confidence to each other. She had been absent twice during
the day, and when on the second occasion she returned, her
restlessness was so marked that it communicated itself to her
friends. It was not without fear, nor without some sense of the
ingratitude of the act, that the Duchess prepared secretly for flight,
and more than once her courage almost failed her; but she fortified
herself with the reflection that she could return at the last moment if
she wished, and that she had time before her to retract.

She had no real love for Ned Chester. She liked him, and had
been led away by his attentions and flatteries, by the handsome
presents he had given her, and by the belief that he was rich and a
gentleman. All the sentiment that the future contained for her was
that she would be able to live like a lady. In all other respects the
page was blank, and her history would be written from experiences
to come.
Early in the afternoon there was a heavy fall of snow, which, from
appearance, bid fair to continue through the night. In the midst of
the storm, the Duchess stole away from Rosemary Lane.

Within half a mile from home she entered a cab, as she believed
unobserved. But Sally, who was at that moment returning from the
establishment which supplied her with needlework, saw the
Duchess's face, as the cab drove swiftly off. The truth flashed upon
her instantly; the Duchess had gone away from them for ever.
Wringing her hands in despair, she ran after the cab, but it was soon
out of sight, and seeing the hopelessness of pursuit she retraced her
steps, and ran swiftly to Rosemary Lane to acquaint Seth Dumbrick
with the circumstance.

Mention has frequently been made of Mrs. Preedy. To this woman

the Duchess had entrusted a letter accompanied with a bribe, and
the instruction that it was not to be delivered to Seth until the
following morning. In the course of the few anxious minutes which
Seth (after hearing what Sally had to tell him) devoted to the
endeavour to discover a clue in Rosemary Lane, he came across Mrs.
Preedy. It needed no great shrewdness on his part to suspect, from
the woman's important manner, that she had something to impart,
and with a small exercise of cunning he extracted the letter from her.

The mere receipt of it filled him with alarm. He hurried to his

cellar, with Sally at his heels.

"I wouldn't open it before the neighbours," he said to Sally, "for

the Duchess's sake. They're only too ready to talk, and take away a
girl's character."

With this he opened the letter. The words were few:

"I have gone away, and perhaps shall never come back. I will try
and pay you and Sally for all your kindness to me. Don't blame me; I
cannot help what I am doing. When you see me again, I shall be a
lady. Goodbye."
They looked at each other with white faces.

"It has come," said Seth, in a pathetic voice, "What we dreaded

has come. Our child has deserted us. God send that she is not being
deceived; but I fear--I fear!" He paced the cellar for some moments
in anxious thought, and Sally, with all her soul in her eyes, followed
his movements. Presently he straightened himself with the air of a
man who has a serious task before him. "I am going straight to my
duty," he said. "Kiss me, my dear. Whatever a man can do, I intend
to do, without fear of consequences."

"Let me go with you, Daddy," implored Sally.

"Come along, then; it will be as well, perhaps."

No further words passed between them, and as quickly as it could

be accomplished, the shutters were put up to Seth's stall, and he
and Sally were riding to Mr. Temple's house. On his arrival there Seth
demanded to see Mr. Temple.

The servant conveyed the message to Mr. Temple, coupling it with

the information that the visitor was the person who had lately been
turned from the house by Mr. Temple's orders. Mr. Temple ordered
the servant again to expel him; but the man returned, saying that
Seth Dumbrick declared he must have an interview, and promised
that he would not detain Mr. Temple. The secret of this lay in the
servant having been bribed by Seth.

"The person is not alone, sir," said the servant; "he has a woman
with him."

"Let him come in," said Mr. Temple; "and you yourself will remain
within call."

"Now," said Mr. Temple haughtily, the moment Seth and Sally
entered, "without a word of preamble, the reason of this intrusion.
You are, perhaps, aware that I could have you locked up for forcing
your way into my house."

"In that case," said Seth firmly, "I should be compelled, in the
magistrate's court to make certain matters public. The press is open
to a man's wrongs."

"Clap-trap," exclaimed Mr. Temple. "Come at once to your

business with me."

Seth handed to Mr. Temple the note left by the Duchess with Mrs.
Preedy. Mr. Temple read it in silence, and returned it with the words,

"How does this affect me?"

"My child has fled," said Seth.

"How does that affect me?"

"Your son is with her."

"Twill satisfy you," said Mr. Temple, with a frown, "that you are
labouring under a gross error." He touched the bell; the servant
answered it. "Go to Mr. Arthur Temple, and tell him I desire to see
him."

"He is not in the house, sir."

"Has he been long absent?"

"Not long, sir," replied the man who, through a fellow-servant,

was enabled to give the information. "He left in great haste for the
railway station to catch a train, I heard."

"For what place?"

"For Sevenoaks, sir."

Mr. Temple was aware that Seth's lynx eyes were upon him, and
that it would give the common man an advantage if he exhibited
surprise.

"Send Richards to me."

"Richards left the house with your son, sir."

Throughout his life Mr. Temple had proved himself equal to

emergencies.

"You have nothing further to say to me, I presume," he said,

addressing himself to Seth.

"Nothing that your own sense of honour and justice does not
dictate," was the reply.

"It dictates nothing that you can have a claim to hear. There is
the door."

Seth had his reasons now for not wishing to prolong the
interview.

"I will not trouble you any longer, sir. I know what kind of justice I
might expect from you in such a matter as this. From this moment it
is for me to act, not to talk. I have but this to say before I leave. If
my child comes to grief through your son--if he inflicts a wrong upon
her--I will devote my life to exposing both him and you."

He quitted the room upon this, and, giving instructions to the cab-
driver, bade Sally jump in.

"Where are you going now, Daddy?" asked Sally.

"To Sevenoaks. We may yet be in time."

The same train which conveyed him and Sally to Sevenoaks,

conveyed Mr. Temple also. The men did not see each other. Mr.
Temple rode first-class, Seth and Sally third.

The snowstorm showed no sign of abatement; steadily and

heavily the white flakes fell.

The links which fate weaves around human lives were drawing
closer and closer around the lives of the actors in this story; every
yard that was traversed by the train, conveying Seth and Mr. Temple,
strengthened the threads which for years had been so far distant
from one another, that nothing but the strangest circumstance could
have prevented them from eventually breaking. As Seth gazed from
the window upon the falling snow, he prayed that he might be in
time to save the child of his love, or to assure himself that she was
on the right track. To Mr. Temple the heavy snowfall brought the
memory of a night long buried in the past, when he had stood
hidden near a quaint old church, while strangers' hands were saving
from death the woman he had betrayed. And an uneasy feeling
crept into his mind at the thought that the church was within a mile
of the place towards which he was wending his way.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

The thoughts which occupied the mind of Mrs. Lenoir and the
Duchess when they met at the railway-station were of too disturbing
a nature to allow of conversation. Only a few words were
exchanged. Mrs. Lenoir, who was the first to arrive, accosted the
Duchess immediately she entered the waiting-room.

"You are the young lady I am to accompany to Sevenoaks?"

The uttermost power of her will could not prevent her voice from
trembling.

The Duchess glanced at the speaker, but her agitation prevented

her from closely observing Mrs. Lenoir. She saw, however, that Mrs.
Lenoir's dress and manner were those of a lady.

"Mr. Temple told me I should meet a lady here," said the Duchess.

"I saw him to-day," returned Mrs. Lenoir, "and it was arranged
that I should come to you."

The gentle voice acted soothingly upon the Duchess.

"I have the tickets; the train starts at a quarter to seven. What a
dreadful night it is! We must be quick, or we shall miss the train."

"We have ample time," said Mrs. Lenoir, looking at the clock; "it is
not half-past six. You look faint and weary, my dear; have you had
tea?"

"No."

"Come into the refreshment-room, and, drink a cup. It will do you

good."

Every nerve in Mrs. Lenoir's body quivered as the girl placed her
hand in hers; they went together to the refreshment-room, where
they drank their tea, and then, hurrying to the train, they entered a
first-class carriage. The journey was made in silence; the carriage
was full, and such converse as they could hold could not take place
in the presence of strangers. The Duchess leant back upon the soft
cushions and closed her eyes, and Mrs. Lenoir watched her with
silent love. She saw in the Duchess's face so startling a likeness to
her own when she herself was a girl, that words were scarcely
needed to prove to her that her child was sitting by her side. But
that she knew that all her physical and mental strength was required
to compass the end she had in view, she could not have restrained
her feelings.

In due time they arrived at Sevenoaks, and Mrs. Lenoir inquired

whether they were to wait at the station.

"Oh, no," said the Duchess, handing a paper to Mrs. Lenoir. "Mr.
Temple has written what we are to do."

Mrs. Lenoir read the instructions, to the effect that when they
reached Sevenoaks they were to take a fly and drive to an hotel, the
"Empire," where, in accordance with a telegram he had sent to the
proprietor, they would find rooms prepared for them.

"Stay here a moment, my dear," said Mrs. Lenoir.

She went to a porter, and asked him whether the "Empire" was a
respectable hotel.

"It's one of the best in Sevenoaks," was the reply. "Shall I get you
a fly?"

"If you please."

She quickly decided that the best course to pursue was to go at

once to the hotel, where she could unravel the plot to the Duchess;
events would determine what was to follow. Before she rejoined the
Duchess she walked to a young man and woman, who were
standing on the platform a little apart from the throng, and spoke to
them. This couple had travelled third-class from London by the same
train; Mrs. Lenoir had seen them at Ludgate Hill Station, but it had
been understood between them that they should not appear to
know each other.

"You have proved yourselves good friends to me," she said to

them hurriedly; "we are going to an hotel called the 'Empire.' Follow
us at once, and be ready to come to me if I want you there."
They signified by a gesture that they understood and would obey
her, and then Mrs. Lenoir and the Duchess walked to the fly, and
drove to the "Empire."

They found the rooms ready, and the landlady herself led them up
the stairs. A bright fire was burning, and everything presented a
cheerful appearance. The Duchess took off her gloves, and Mrs.
Lenoir assisted her to remove her hat and cloak, and removed her
own hat and veil. Then, for the first time on that night, the girl saw
Mrs. Lenoir's face in full, clear light. She started back, with an
exclamation of alarm.

"I have seen you before!"

"Yes, my dear--but do not avoid me; I implore you to listen to me!

It is not I who am deceiving you--indeed, indeed, it is not! I am here
for your good."

"I do not understand," said the Duchess, looking vaguely around.

"Mr. Temple said that a lady-relative would meet me at the station.
Are you not a relative of his?"

"I am not in any way related to the man who has been paying his
addresses to you----"

"Of the gentleman, you mean," interrupted the Duchess, with a

pride that was made pitiable by the doubt and suspicion that was
mingled with it.

"As you will, my child. I will speak of him presently. There is

something nearer to my heart, which will break if you do not listen
to what I have to say."

"I cannot listen," said the Duchess, "until you prove in some way
that you are not deceiving me."
"Thank God, I have the proof with me. On the night you saw me
lying senseless in the snow, this gentleman you call Mr. Temple was
with you."

"Yes, and when I left you he promised to help you home."

"He kept his promise, and learned where I live. I had never seen
him before, nor had he ever seen me; we were utter strangers to
each other. Yet to-day, this very morning, he came to me, and
proposed that I should enter into a plot to betray you! He proposed
that I should present myself to you as his aunt, as a lady who was
favourable to his elopement with you, and that in this capacity I
should accompany you here. For your good I consented--to save you
I am here. Say that you believe me."

"Part of what you say must be true; but you said you have the
proof with you--what proof, and what are you going to prove?"

"That this man is no gentleman--that he is a villain--and that his

name is not Temple. On my knees--on my knees!--I thank God that
it is in my power to save you from the fatal precipice upon which
you are standing! Trust me--believe in me; I am a woman like
yourself, and my life has been a life of bitter, bitter sorrow!"

She was on her knees before the Duchess, clasping the girl's
hands, and gazing imploringly into her face. Her strange passion, the
earnestness of her words, her suffering gentle face, were not
without their effect upon the frightened girl; but some kind of
stubbornness to believe that her hopes of becoming a lady were on
the point of being overturned rendered her deaf to the appeal in any
other way than it affected herself. The threatened discovery was so
overwhelming as to leave no room for pity or sympathy for the
woman kneeling before her.

"Where is your proof?" asked the Duchess.

Mrs. Lenoir started to her feet, and ringing the bell, gave a
whispered instruction to the maid who answered it. In a few
moments Lizzie and Charlie entered the room. They were the
persons who came third-class from London, by the same train which
conveyed Mrs. Lenoir and the Duchess to Sevenoaks; with some
vague idea that she might need Charlie's testimony, Mrs. Lenoir had
begged Lizzie to ask him to come.

"Lizzie," said Mrs. Lenoir, "will you tell this young lady what you
know of me?"

"I know nothing but good, Mrs. Lenoir," replied Lizzie, taking her
hand, and kissing it; "there isn't a man or woman in our
neighbourhood who hasn't a kind word for you."

"My dear," said Mrs. Lenoir, addressing the Duchess, "this is a girl
who lives in the same house as I do, and who has known me for
years. What is the matter with you, Lizzie?" For the girl was gazing
at the Duchess with a look of wild admiration and interest.

"I beg your pardon," said Lizzie, "but is the young lady your
daughter that you spoke to me of last night----"

Lizzie was stopped in her speech by a sob from Mrs. Lenoir, who
hid her face in her hands, and turned from them, hearing as she
turned, a whisper from the Duchess:

"What does she mean? Your daughter! Oh, my God! Let me look
at you again."

But Mrs. Lenoir kept her face hidden from the girl, and said, with
broken sobs:

"Let me have my way a little, my dear. I will speak more plainly

presently, when we are alone. Give me your hand----"
She held the pretty fingers which the Duchess gave her, with a
clinging loving pressure which caused the girl's heart to thrill with
hope and fear.

"Hear what Lizzie has to say first. Lizzie, you were in my room this
morning when a gentleman called to see me?"

"Yes, Mrs. Lenoir."

"You heard him inquiring for me?"

"Yes."

"Did he give any name?"

"After he left, I heard that he called himself Mr. Temple."

While these words were spoken, Mrs. Lenoir, finding herself

unable to stand, sank into a chair, and the Duchess, sinking to her
knees, hid her face in her lap, holding Mrs. Lenoir's hand.

"Describe the man, Lizzie," said Mrs. Lenoir.

Lizzie did so in a graphic manner; the portrait she presented was

truthful and unmistakable. Every word that was being uttered was
carrying conviction to the Duchess's soul.

"When he left the house," said Mrs. Lenoir, "Charlie and you--
Charlie and Lizzie are engaged, my dear, and will soon be married,"--
this to the Duchess--"Charlie and you were in the passage, and he
passed you."

"Yes."

"Charlie, you saw his face?"

"I did, ma'am."

"And recognised it?"

"As sure as anything's sure, though a good many years have gone
by since I saw it last."

"Was his name Temple?"

"Not by a long way."

"Tell me his name again, Charlie."

"Ned Chester his name was, and is," added Charlie positively.

At the mention of the name a shudder passed through the

Duchess's frame.

"What character did he bear when you knew him?"

"A precious bad one; not to put too fine a point upon it, he was a
thief."

"That will do, Charlie. Good night; good night, Lizzie."

"Good night, Mrs. Lenoir, God bless you."

"Thank you, my dears."

In another moment Mrs. Lenoir and the Duchess were again

alone.

The questions had been asked by Mrs. Lenoir with the distinct
purpose of convincing the Duchess that she was acting in good faith
and for the girl's good. She felt that she was on her trial, as it were,
and out of the teachings of her own sad experience she gathered
wisdom to act in such a way as to win confidence. On the Duchess
the effect produced was convincing, so far as the man whose
attention she had accepted was concerned; but a dual process of
thought was working in her mind--one associated with the lover who
would have betrayed her, the other associated with the woman who
had stepped between her and her peril.

"My dear," said Mrs. Lenoir, after an interval of silence, during

which the Duchess had not raised her head, and Mrs. Lenoir was
strengthening herself for the coming trial, "will you give me what
information you can concerning yourself which will help to guide us
both in this sad hour?"

A pressure of her fingers answered her in the affirmative.

"Keep your eyes from me till I bid you rise," continued Mrs.
Lenoir, with heaving bosom. "Where do you live?"

"In Rosemary Lane."

"Have you lived all your life there?"

"Since I was a very little child."

"You were not born there?"

"Oh, no; I do not know where I was born----" Mrs. Lenoir's eyes
wandered to the window which shut out the night. She could not see
it, but she felt that the snow was falling; "and," said the Duchess in
a faltering voice, "I cannot remember seeing the face of my mother."

"Tell me all you know, my dear; conceal nothing from me."

In broken tones the girl told every particular of her history, from
her introduction into Rosemary Lane, as the incident had been
related to her by Seth Dumbrick, to the present and first great trial
in life.

"Look up, my dear."

The Duchess raised her eyes, almost blinded with tears. Mrs.
Lenoir tenderly wiped them away, and placed in the girl's hand the
miniature portrait of herself, painted in her younger and happier
days.

"It is like me," murmured the girl.

"It is my picture when I was your age." She sank to her knees by
the side of the Duchess. "At this time and in this place my story is
too long to tell. You shall learn all by-and-by, when we are safe. I
had a child--a daughter, born on such a night as this, in sorrow and
tribulation. My memory is too treacherous, and the long and severe
illness I passed through was too terrible in its effects upon me, to
enable me to recall the circumstances of that period of my life. But I
had my child, and she drew life from my breast, and brought gleams
of happiness to my troubled soul. I have no recollection how long a
time passed, till a deep darkness fell upon me; but when I
recovered, and my reason was restored to me, I was told that my
child was dead. I had no power to prove that it was false; I was
weak, friendless, penniless, and I wandered into the world solitary
and alone. But throughout all my weary and sorrowful life, a voice--
God's voice--never ceased whispering to me that my child was alive,
and that I should one day meet her, and clasp her to my heart! In
this hope alone I have lived; but for this hope I should have died
long years ago. Heaven has fulfilled its promise, and has brought
you to my arms. I look into your face, and I see the face of my child;
I listen to your voice, and I hear the voice of my child! God would
not deceive me! In time to come, when you have heard my story, we
will, if you decide that it shall be so, seek for worldly proof. I think I
see the way to it, and if it is possible it shall be found."

She rose from her knees, and standing apart from the wondering
weeping girl, said, in a low voice, between her sobs:

"In my youth I was wronged. I was innocent, as God is my judge!

My fault was, that I trusted and believed; that I, a young girl
inexperienced in the world's hard ways, listened to the vows of a
man, whom I loved with all my soul's strength; whom I believed in
as I believe in Eternal justice! That was my sin. I have been bitterly
punished; no kiss of love, no word of affection that I could receive
as truly my right, has been bestowed upon me since I was robbed of
my child. I have been in darkness for years; I am in darkness now,
waiting for the light to shine upon my soul!"

It came. Tender arms stole about her neck, loving lips were
pressed to hers. In an agony of joy she clasped the girl to her
bosom, and wept over her. For only a few moments did she allow
herself the bliss of this reunion. She looked, affrighted, to a clock on
the mantelpiece.

"At what time did that man say he would be here to meet us?"
she asked in a hurried whisper.

"At eleven o'clock," was the whispered reply.

"It wants but five minutes to the hour. We must go, child; we
must fly from this place. No breath of suspicion must attach itself to
my child's good name. Come--quickly, quickly!"

The Duchess allowed Mrs. Lenoir to put on her hat and cloak, and
before the hour struck they were in the street, hastening through
the snow.

Whither? She knew not. But fate was directing her steps.

CHAPTER XXIX.
They did not escape unobserved, and within a short time of their
departure from the hotel, were being tracked by friend and foe. The
ostler attached to the hotel saw the woman stealing away, and
noted the direction they took; and when Ned Chester drove to the
"Empire" and heard with dismay of the flight, the ostler turned an
honest penny by directing him on their road. He turned more than
one honest penny on this--to him--fortunate night. Richards, who
had made himself fully acquainted with Ned's movements, arrived at
the hotel, in company with Arthur Temple, a few minutes after the
runaway thief left it, and had no difficulty in obtaining the
information he required.

"Two birds with one stone, sir," he said to Arthur; "we shall catch
the thief and save the girl."

"We may be too late if we go afoot," said Arthur; "every moment

is precious. Now, my man," to the ostler, "your fastest horse and
your lightest trap. A guinea for yourself if they are ready without
delay; another guinea if we overtake the persons we are after."

"I'll earn them both, sir," cried the ostler, running to the stable
door. "You go into the hotel and speak to the missis."

No sooner said than done. Before the horse was harnessed, the
landlady had been satisfied.

"My name is Temple," said Arthur to her in a heat, after the first
words of explanation. "Here is my card, and here is some money as
a guarantee. It is a matter of life and death, and the safety of an
innocent girl hangs upon the moments."

His excitement communicated itself to the landlady, who was won

by his good looks and his enthusiasm, and she herself ran out to
expedite the matter. They were soon on the road, but not soon
enough to prevent Ned Chester from having more than a fair start of
them.
Richards, who held the reins, needed no such incentive to put on
the best speed as his young master's impatience unremittingly
provided. As rapidly as possible the horse ploughed its way through
the heavy snow. Their course lay beyond the railway station, and as
they passed it the few passengers by a train which had just arrived
were emerging from the door. To Arthur Temple's surprise Richards,
whose lynx eyes were watching every object, suddenly pulled up in
the middle of the road.

"Hold the reins a moment, sir," he said jumping from the

conveyance; "here's somebody may be useful."

He had caught sight of two faces he recognised, those of Sally

and Seth Dumbrick.

"Have you come here after the Duchess?" he asked, arresting his
steps.

"Yes. Oh! yes," answered Sally, in amazement. Richards pulled her

towards the conveyance, and Seth followed close at her heels.

"Jump in," said Richards, who by this time was fully enjoying the
adventure. "I'll take you to her. Don't stop to ask questions; there's
no time to answer them."

Seth hesitated, but a glance at Arthur's truthful, ingenuous face

dispelled his doubts, and he mounted the conveyance with Sally, and
entered into earnest conversation with the young man.

Mrs. Lenoir, when she stole with the Duchess through the streets
of Sevenoaks, had but one object in view--to escape from the town
into the country, where she believed they would be safe from
pursuit. Blindly she led the way until she came to the country.
Fortunately at about this time the snow ceased to fall, and the
exciting events of the night rendered her and the Duchess oblivious
to the difficulties which attended their steps. So unnerved was the
Duchess by what had occurred that she was bereft of all power over
her will, and she allowed herself unresistingly, and without question,
to be led by Mrs. Lenoir to a place of safety and refuge. They
encouraged each other by tender words and caresses, and Mrs.
Lenoir looked anxiously before her for a cottage or farmhouse,
where they could obtain shelter and a bed. But no such haven was
in sight until they were at some distance from the town, when the
devoted woman saw a building which she hoped might prove what
she was in search of. As they approached closer to the building she
was undeceived; before her stood a quaint old church, with a
hooded porch, and a graveyard by its side. A sudden faintness came
upon her as she recognised the familiar outlines of the sacred refuge
in which her child was born; but before the full force of this
recognition had time to make itself felt, her thoughts were wrested
from contemplation of the strange coincidence by sounds of
pursuing shouts.

Her mother's fears, her mother's love, interpreted the sounds

aright, and she knew that they proceeded from the man from whom
they were endeavouring to escape. Seizing the Duchess's arm, she
flew towards the porch, and reaching it at the moment Ned Chester
overtook them, thrust the girl into the deeper shadows, and stood
before her child with flashing eyes with her arms spread out as a
shield.

"So!" cried Ned Chester, panting and furious; "a pretty trick you
have played me! Serve me right for trusting to such a woman!"

He strove to push her aside, so that he might have speech with

the Duchess, and Mrs. Lenoir struck him in the face. He laughed at
the feeble blow--not lightly, but mockingly. The savage nature of the
man was roused. He raised his hand to return the blow, when the
Duchess stepped forward and confronted him. His arm dropped to
his side.

"What is the meaning of this?" he asked, endeavouring to convey

some tenderness in his tone. "What has this creature been telling
you? She has been poisoning your mind against me, if I'm a judge of
things. Come, be reasonable; take my arm, and let us return to the
hotel."

But his power over the girl was gone; the brutality of his manner
was a confirmation of the story she had heard of his treachery
towards her.

"Mr. Chester," she said--and paused, frightened at the change

which came over him at the utterance of his name. His face grew
white, and an ugly twitching played about his lips.

"What have you heard?" he demanded hoarsely.

She mustered sufficient strength to reply faintly.

"The truth."

His savage nature mastered him. With a cruel sweep of his arm,
he dashed Mrs. Lenoir to the ground, and clasped the Duchess in a
fierce embrace. Her shrieks pierced the air.

"Help! Help!"

Her appeal was answered, almost on the instant. An iron grasp

upon his neck compelled him to relinquish his hold of the terrified
girl. Seth Dumbrick held him as in a vice and he had no power to
free himself. The warning voice of Richards was needed to put a
limit to the strong man's just resentment:

"Don't hurt him any more than is necessary, Mr. Seth Dumbrick.
There's a rod in pickle for him worse than anything you can do to
him."

"Lie there, you dog!" exclaimed Seth, forcing Ned Chester to the
ground, and placing his foot upon his breast. "Stir an inch, and I will
kill you!"
While this episode in the drama was being enacted, another of a
different kind was working itself out. When the Duchess was
released by Ned Chester, Arthur Temple threw his arm around her, to
prevent her from falling.

"Do not be frightened," he said, in a soothing tone, "you are safe

now. I am glad we are in time. My name is Arthur Temple."

They gazed at each other in rapt admiration. To Arthur, the

beauty of the Duchess was a revelation. In the struggle with Ned
Chester, her hat had fallen from her head, and her hair lay upon her
shoulders in heavy golden folds. Her lovely eyes, suffused with tears,
were raised to his face in gratitude. For a moment she was blind to
everything but the appearance of this hero, who, as it seemed to her
fevered fancy, had descended from Heaven to rescue her. But a cry
of compassion from Sally brought her back to earth, and, turning,
she saw her faithful nurse and companion kneeling in the snow, with
Mrs. Lenoir's head in her lap. She flew to her side, and tremblingly
assisted Sally in her endeavour to restore the insensible woman to
life. But the blow which Ned Chester had dealt Mrs. Lenoir was a
fierce one; she lay as one dead, and when, after some time, she
showed signs of life, she feebly waved her hands, in the effort to
beat away a shadowed horror, and moaned:

"Will he never come? Will he never come?"

She was living the past over again. Her mind had gone back to
the time when, assisted by John, the gardener of Springfield, she
had travelled in agony through the heavy snow, to implore the man
who had betrayed and deserted her to take pity on her hapless
state, and to render her some kind of human justice, if not for her
sake, for the sake of his child, then unborn. And the thought which
oppressed her and filled her with dread at that awful epoch of her
life, now found expression on her lips:

"Will he never come? Oh, my God! will he never come?"

"Do you think," whispered Arthur Temple to Seth Dumbrick, who
had given Ned Chester into Richards' charge, "that we might raise
her into the trap, and drive her slowly to the town?"

The tender arms about her desisted from their effort as she
moaned:

"If you raise me in your arms, I shall die! If you attempt to carry
me into the town, I shall die!"

The very words she had spoken to John on that night of agony.
And then again:

"Will he never come? If he saw me, he would take pity on me!

Send him to me, kind Heaven!"

Another actor appeared upon the scene,--Mr. Temple, who,

accompanied by the ostler, had found his way to the spot.

"Arthur!" he cried.

The young man rose at once to his feet, and went to his father.

Mr. Temple, in the brief glance he threw around him, saw faces he
recognised; saw Richards guarding Ned Chester, saw Seth Dumbrick
and Sally, saw, without observing her face, Mrs. Lenoir lying with her
head on the Duchess's bosom. He did not look at them a second
time. His only thought was of Arthur, the pride and hope of his life,
the one being he loved on earth.

"What has brought you here, sir?" asked Arthur. "Anxiety for you,"
replied Mr. Temple. "Why do I see you in this company? How much
is true of the story that man told me?"--pointing to Seth Dumbrick.
"If you have got yourself into any trouble----"

The look of pained surprise in Arthur's face prevented the

completion of the sentence. The father and son had moved a few
paces from the group, and the words they exchanged were heard
only by themselves.

"If I have got myself into any trouble!" echoed Arthur, struggling
with the belief his father's words carried to his mind. "What trouble
do you refer to?"

"We must not play with words, Arthur. My meaning is plain. If that
man's story is true, and you have entangled yourself with a woman--
such things commonly happen----"

"For both our sakes," said Arthur, drawing himself up, "say not
another word. I came here to save an innocent girl from a villain's
snare. When you find me guilty of any such wickedness as your
words imply, renounce me as your son--as I would renounce a son
of mine if unhappily he should prove himself capable of an act so
base and cruel! The name of Temple is not to be sullied by such
dishonour!"

Mr. Temple shuddered involuntarily, remembering that it was on

this very spot he, a mature and worldly-wise man, had been guilty of
an act immeasurably more base and dishonourable than that in the
mind of his generous-hearted son.

"Come, sir," said Arthur, taking his father's hand, and leading him
to the group, "do justice to others as well as to myself. This is the
young lady whom, happily, we have saved. Confess that you have
never looked upon a fairer face, nor one more innocent."

Mr. Temple's breath came and went quickly as the Duchess raised
her tear-stained face to his. At this moment, Mrs. Lenoir, with a deep
sigh, opened her eyes and saw Mr. Temple bending over her. With a
shriek that struck terror to the hearts of those who surrounded her,
she struggled from the arms of the Duchess, and embraced the
knees of Mr. Temple.
"You have come, then--you have come! Heaven has heard my
prayers! I knew you would not desert me! Oh, God! my joy will kill
me!"

And looking down upon the kneeling woman, clasping his knees in
a delirium of false happiness, Mr. Temple, with a face that rivalled in
whiteness the snow-covered plains around him, gazed into the face
of Nelly Marston!

A suspicion of the possible truth struggled to the mind of the

Duchess.

"Mother!" she said, in a voice of much tenderness, raising the

prostrate woman from her knees, and supporting her, "why should
you kneel to him?"

The tender voice, the tender embrace, the sudden flashing upon
her senses of the forms standing about her, recalled Mrs. Lenoir
from her dream, and she clung to her daughter with a fierce and
passionate clinging.

"My child! my child! They shall not take you from me! Say that
you will not desert me--promise me, my child! I will work for you--I
will be your servant--anything----"

"Hush, mother!" said the girl. "Be comforted. I will never leave
you. No power can part us."

With a supreme effort of will, Mr. Temple tore himself from the
contemplation of the shameful discovery, and the likely
consequences of the exposure.

"Come, Arthur," he said, holding out his trembling hand to his

son; "this is no place for us."

His voice was weak and wandering, and he seemed to have

suddenly grown ten years older.
Arthur did not stir from the side of Mrs. Lenoir.

"Come, I say!" cried Mr. Temple petulantly; "have you no

consideration for me? It can all be explained; we will talk over the
matter when we are alone."

"We must talk of it now," said Arthur solemnly, "with God's light
shining upon us, and before His House of Prayer."

A high purpose shone in the young man's face, and his manner
was sad and earnest. He took Mrs. Lenoir's hand with infinite
tenderness and respect:

"Will you answer, with truth, what I shall ask you?"

"As truthfully as I would speak in presence of my Maker!" replied

Mrs. Lenoir, with downcast head.

"This gentleman is my father. What is he to you?"

"He is the father of my dear child, torn from me by a cruel fraud,

and now, thank God, Oh, thank God! restored to me by a miracle.
He should have been my husband. When he prevailed upon me to
fly with him--I loved him, and was true to him in thought and deed,
as God is my Judge!--he promised solemnly to marry me."

"And then----"

"I can say no more," murmured Mrs. Lenoir with sobs that shook
the souls of all who heard; "he deserted me, and left me to shame
and poverty. O, my child!" she cried, turning her streaming eyes to
the Duchess, "tell me that you forgive me!"

"It is not you who need forgiveness, mother," sobbed the

Duchess, falling into her mother's arms.
A terrible silence ensued, broken by the querulous voice of Mr.
Temple:

"This woman's story is false. Arthur, will you take her word
against mine? Remember what I have done for you--think of the
love I bear you! Do nothing rash, I implore you! Say, if you like, that
she has not lied. I will be kind to her, and will see that her life is
passed in comfort. Will that content you?" He paused between every
sentence for his son to speak, but no sound passed Arthur's lips.
From the depths of his soul, whose leading principles were honour
and justice, the young man was seeking for the right path.
Exasperated by his silence, Mr. Temple continued, and in a rash
moment said: "What can she adduce but her bare word? What
evidence that the girl is my child?"

A voice from the rear of the group supplied the proof he asked
for. It was Richards who spoke.

"I can give the evidence. The girl is your child."

Mr. Temple turned upon him with a look of fear, and the eyes of
all were directed to Richards' face.

The scene had produced so profound an effect upon the man

that, holding the last link required to complete the chain, he was
impressed with a superstitious dread that a judgment would fall
upon him if he held back at this supreme moment.

"The child is yours. Before you instructed me to ascertain the

particulars concerning Seth Dumbrick's life, I had made the
discovery. It was I who took the child to Rosemary Lane, and left her
there."

"You traitor!" cried Mr. Temple, almost frenzied; "you have

deceived and betrayed me!"
"You told me," said Richards, in a dogged voice, "that you wished
the child placed in such a position in life that she should never be
able to suspect who was her father, and I did the best I could. You
employed me to do your dirty work, and I did it, and was paid for it.
And when, to try you, I told you that your child had died, you
expressed in your manner so little pity, that, having learned to know
you, I thought it as well not to undeceive you."

The last link was supplied, and the chain was complete. This
disclosure effected a startling change in Mr. Temple's demeanour. He
drew himself up haughtily. "Arthur, I command you to come with
me."

"I cannot obey you, sir," said Arthur sadly and firmly. "You have
broken the tie which bound us. I will never enter your house again;
nor will I share your dishonour. Justice shows me the road where
duty lies, and I will follow it."

He held out his hand to the Duchess; she accepted it, and clasped
it in love and wonder; and passing his disengaged arm around Mrs.
Lenoir's waist, he turned his back upon his father, and took the road
which justice pointed out to him.

* * * * * *

But a short distance from the country place in which Seth

Dumbrick and the children of his adoption spent their holiday, is a
pretty and comfortable residence standing in its own grounds. Here
lives Nelly Marston and her daughter, no longer bearing the name of
the Duchess of Rosemary Lane, but the more simple and natural one
of Kate. Happily the faults of our young heroine are not
uneradicable, and under the loving ministration of her devoted
mother she is gradually developing a sweetness and simplicity of
nature which will bear good fruit in the future. The long-suffering
mother is happy beyond her wildest hopes, and night and morning
she bends her knees in gratitude, and offers up prayers of