Національна Академія Мистецтв України Інститут культурології

This hazardous quality of drama means the necessity of building conjectures that would supplement the text. These conjectures are to be verified or falsified in examinations. Conjectural way of dramatic text’s development ensues from its inferential nature. Then the just discussed fatalistic and adventurous attachments of drama being reciprocal inversions, the phantom of virtual implicit level of contents accompanies them. The role of outer observer in creating such effect of phantom can be exemplified with the image of the notorious Damocles’ sword: it is not the instability of the sword itself that endangers the visitor, but his or her own expectations of catastrophe. Phantoms ensue from the indispensable presence of observer, therefore fata morgana can be said to become the constant satellite of drama. It is already the scenic illusion that evokes the effect of phantoms. It is due to the attachment to fate that drama evokes phantoms, and it is here that the strict distinction from rite is to be demarcated. Drama is incompatible with rite due to its hazardous nature. Dramatic phantom arises already as the product of specific communicative conditions and interpretative activity.

This incompatibility contradicts to widely spread opinions so that one must take into account the disputability of the folklore attachments of theatre. It would become erroneously to assign the generic origins to ritual, the game and struggle being earlier forms than those of fixed ritualistic behavior. In particular one has already paid attention to dramatic sources that can be traced in the transmission of tale in folklore environment conducted in the manner of staging respective narration. It correlates with the composition of tale betraying dramatic features⁷⁴⁵. The statement on the dramatic nature of tales’ retelling practice comes back to the famous P.G. Bogatyriov’s observations and conclusions⁷⁴⁶. These conclusions have been confirmed and essentially widened due to the researches conducted by L. Britsyna and I. Golovakha who have demonstrated in particular the role of such prosodic means as the distribution of main and secondary emphatic stresses and of the tempo of declamation (especially the pattering) [Бріцина, Головаха, 2004, 55]. One could add here also the dramatic interpretation of proverbs that are themselves to be regarded as the germs of potential theatrical sketches. Meanwhile such parallels turn out to be elusive while there are no vestiges of free decision and risk in ritual and cognate improvised actions.

The substantiation for the parallels is of communicative nature. It is the demands of communicative comprehensibility and the ensuing minimalism that build up the common foundations of drama and folklore. All symbols of folklore must be easily deciphered; otherwise they will be excluded from its terrain. When in drama an incomprehensible trope as a puzzle becomes a force of retardation, such obscure places in folklore are esteemed as something strange that can’t be adopted within its limits. To sum up all the observations of the kind one has the grounds to come to the conclusion as to the universal presence of scenic but not dramatic element in folklore. As an alternative to the viewpoint of mythological and ritualistic prevalence one would suggest regarding folklore as a thorough theatre. It goes not only about the mode of reproducing tales before an audience or about the dialogues in ballads with their gradual disclosure of circumstances peculiar for dramatic genus. For example, the primary source for correctional reciprocal negations of a dramatic dialogue (with the aim of attaining final decision) and for the respective gradual development of action’s circumstances is to be seen in the riddles’ solutions procedure of catechism as ritual species. Enigmatic dialogues as the interchange of riddles and solutions with their gradual corrections are to be seen as the prototype for further drama’s formation. An intermediary link here can be found in balladic dialogues. The very way of the transmission of folklore tradition betrays the features of a mundane theatre where the whole world becomes stage. The question arises then about the limits of dramatic action as well as of its poetic and artistic qualities.

The general conclusions can be put here pertaining to the nature of reflection as such. In this regard rites exert external pressure that can’t be the primary force. Vice versa ritual always involves something artificial and it acts as violating force. Ritual always implies terror & aggression (as well as repression & violence) arising from the prohibition (taboo). These reasons preclude the priority of ritual in the historical development of behavior. It becomes rather the result of degeneration, degradation, destruction and general decay of the previously developed forms of activity. In opposite to ritual it is game & struggle that precede any taboo already due to their instructive role as the devices of teaching younglings. Rite as such arises as the result of the perseveration of movements and the loss of elasticity of behavior. In opposite to it game as the self-motivated activity enables isolating the performance of separate operations and in this respect precedes rite that needs essential time for the coinage of behavioral patterns.

In particular ritualistic fears are present in funeral rites that are not only special rites. It is the pattern and paragon for the rites as such as far as it deals with primary fear. It attests also the asymmetry of the rites of passage and initiation that it appertains to (together with nuptial rites). The inevitability of death can be regarded also as the paragon for dramatic anisotropy (irrevocability, irretrievability, irreversibility of action). Certitude as the sensual image of this anisotropy is always marked with mortal hue (reflected in the proverb vita / hora inserta, mors certa) as far as it originates from the conscience of personal mortality inherited in childhood together with language. Ritual funeral texts demonstrate also the communicative paradox of perlocution: as the appeals towards a dead person that would eternally keep silence they are addressed actually towards the third person, to that of observer’s. No need to remind that it is exactly the situation of theatre with the audience observing the perlocution as the dialogue of dramatis personae represented at a stage. Funeral rites can be regarded as the genuine origin of epic distance and thus of the narrative strategy proper for novel. It is the very mortality that creates insurmountable boundary between death and life thus generating prerequisites for the formation of epic distance. The same concerns the posthumous glorification as the plot for epic narration, as the initial point for the development of biography and the source of epic hero. It is here to take into account that the knowledge of personal mortality appears together with the mastering of language when an infant becomes a child and so it is inherent for human experience in general. Consequently epic mode of narration gets an outlook of a normal mode proper for language itself. Requiem becomes the first step of the development of narration in general. In its turn the image of personal mortality presupposes also the personal solitude so that the concept of individual existence arises together with individualistic attitude as the source for lyrics. At the same time such broad consequences of the images of death aren’t valid to find the origins of the dramatic. Dramatic adventure challenges funeral rite in opposite to epics that develop the image of distance. Despite all the enumerated traits of similitude with pompa funebra dramatic text remains not only independent from it but also comes back to perfectly different sources.

In particular it is necessary to avoid the error of identifying reflective negation with ritualistic prohibition of taboo. Be the meditation on death (as already philosophy has been defined in famous Cicero’s words “tota philosophorum vita comentatio mortis est”) the source for reflection, then pensive attitude towards sepulchral melancholy would correlate with the premises necessary for distance in presenting reality. Meanwhile it is violence that stands behind each ritual, and only as the aftermath of it the faculty of negation appears. In opposite to it there are much more diverse forms of negations that are contained within the self-motivated playground of game. Taboo signalizes about violence destroying all elasticity of action and selecting only rigid patterns while the development of partial forms of negation (as the necessary prerequisite of lyrics) would need game instead of rite.

It is here to remind the secondary derivative origin of each taboo that arises as the imitation of mortality (imitatio mortis). Mortification & mummification become the genuine prototypes for formulaic locutions. The origin of formulaic homogeneities lies in the taboo reactions (in the manner of refrains or musical ostinato) that presume fixation together with repetition (of a mantra pattern). The so called anonymous location of such locutions (as “people say”) opposes strictly to personified speech (in particular direct speech) of dramatic and epic text. Thus the idiomatic boundary arises that separates artistic text from ritual prerequisites. It has already been exemplified with the case of casual colloquialisms’ transformation into scenic conventions and their reciprocal use as the commonplaces of colloquialisms. There are folklore anonymity from one side and personification of speech (even ascribed to incognito) from the side of artistic culture. Anonymity represents mortality, personification presumes vitality. Meanwhile prohibitions and inhibitions can by no means be conceived as the primary forms of conduct. They are (with the succeeding rites) derivations of terror, of fear, as the ancient statement has put it: “primus in orbe deos fecit timor” (it was fear that has first made idols in the world), according to Statius (Thebais, 3, 661). Subsequently the opinion of the priority of prohibitions and rites is out of question.

Be funeral rite the genuine dramatic origin then it would presuppose the prevalence of tragedy where it is to be observed in the most immediate manner. Meanwhile together with the certitude and seriousness of anisotropy (inevitability & irreversibility) there are also risk & hazard representing the playfulness of drama that is proper both to tragedy and to comedy. Here the opposition fate vs. fortune comes into play that gets the outlook of seriousness vs. dubitation. It is easily to observe that seriousness obviously correlates with epic distance and doesn’t meet the demands of dramatic hazard concerning both tragedy and comedy. The certitude of personal mortality is the primary source for the irrevocability of action’s consequences as the base for seriousness. It has also its age dimension: the conscience of personal mortality comes together with childhood (and with adolescence) as opposed to infantile age when no knowledge of the kind is at hand. Ritual is the quality of adolescence (one would remind the initial rites being the introductions to this age) whereas playfulness belongs to the infantilism. Childhood will be then the age of resistance against the imposed rites.

Obviously comedy is marked with infantile return to green years of life. In opposite to seriousness & certitude laughter in its primary sources is peculiar for spontaneity and ontogenetic immediacy as the earlier state of mind. With sincere laughter (in opposite to its ritualized forms) one comes beyond the borders of adolescent experience. Therefore seriousness & certitude arise not as primary and autonomous phenomena; they become the result of the secondary rejection of laughter, the so called agelastic conduct (from Greek term  to designate those refraining from laughter). Respectively the separation of tragedy from comedy is to be seen as the derivative and not original phenomenon, ass the result of the secondary ritual prohibitions. It is important to remind that comedy was opposed to seriousness’ satellite of tedium and not to tragedy. There existed ancient tradition of examining jokes with seriousness (as well as serious statements with derision)⁷⁴⁷. The apology of comedy is based upon its infantile roots with ensuing effect of rejuvenescence. Game includes both comedy and tragedy, the last presupposing heroes fully involved in action so that it becomes their autonomous self-sufficient aim of self-sacrifice. Drama opposes to epic seriousness with its tension of playfulness both in tragic and comic forms of hazardous game that can’t tolerate the boredom of fatality.

Ritual prerequisites have predestined the dualistic mode of dramatic genus’ history, its being split into tragedy & comedy that continue the mystery vs. orgy opposition. This dualism has been alive for a long period, and it was only in secular ages that it is removed with pure or mixed dramatic genus. The durable prevalence of dualism entails consequences as to the nature of dramatic idioms where specific class of jokes & jests arises that gain certain autonomy and don’t contradict to tragic conclusions of the whole. Ritualistic mortification can be supposed to leave its tracks in epics (as the narration of absolutely finished events of the past correlating with the post-agonistic pathos of funeral rite), but it remains incompatible with the dramatic. Such incompatibility can be proved with the case of melodramatic modifications of drama where the dramatic quality is put on the brim of destruction. In particular responsible action is here substituted with artificial wonders (deus ex machina) in the manner of allegorical Jesuit theatre. It goes actually about the old problem of the theatre of representation coming back to Diderot. Melodramatic versions can be regarded as the reduction to this representations’ tradition that originates from rite. To demonstrate such ritual dependence one has to stress that it is motivation that differs drama from rite as well as from epic. It is the especially intensive necessity of motivation that discerns drama from epic narration, the reasons being dramatic attention to character in opposite to epic prevalence of plot⁷⁴⁸.

The dramatic deals with the problems of chaos as the rites do. Meanwhile these problems are conceived perfectly different. The demarcation lies between imitative operations in rite and responsible action of a free personality in drama. Rite doesn’t need decision. Dramatic action is the result of free option. Therefore rite has no motivational grounds (as far as magic images can’t be regarded as such). Respectively it is the motivational problem of textual integration that gains the primordial importance for drama. In its turn it is not only the substantiation of deeds that discerns the dramatic from the ritual. All particulars that drama deals with must have attachments to the universal problems of chaos and freedom so that the sources of free decisions would be explored till their final causes. Therefore it is inner conflict that discerns free responsible person of drama from that of rites: one says here about inner action that lasts invisibly and can be expressed in monologues. Such was the case with ancient tragedies in particular with the tragedy of Euripides⁷⁴⁹. In spite of the fatalistic dominance the ritual attachments aren’t here to be overestimated as far as the independence of heroes has become obvious so that they have always options and can offer resistance to the fate. It is still another reason against the overestimation of the fate in ancient tragedy: it is the idea of responsibility proper to all its heroes that makes them equal to gods. It is why one distorts the image of Cassandra in attributing to her the features of prophet predicting the inevitable events: vice versa the very prediction gave the optional opportunity for conduct⁷⁵⁰. Subsequently ancient fate has been replaced with the necessity of history (as the deciphering of the providence) suggesting own decision.

In opposite to epic heroes following the fate there arise discordance and disagreement where the dramatic does first appear. This rise of collisions between the Human Being and the World was transferred in the personal inner world and has given the rise for the concept of inner action. The external features of such inner disagreement as the motive forces of inner action were to be found in the invention of soliloquy. This invention has been achieved already in the post-Renaissance epoch; nevertheless its sources are to be traced till the very beginnings of drama and to be found in the very hesitation that stands behind any process of decision-making. As far as the doubts appear and the fate’s verdicts are disputed the prerequisites for dramatic inner action are at hand. Prometheus’ complaint in his first monologue in Aeschylus’ tragedy represents discontent and therefore entails protest as the premise of inner action; Oedipus is often taken as an example of fatal conduct, meanwhile he himself stresses in his answer to chorus that it was his autonomous deed of blinding himself in spite of Apollo’s verdict (in Sophocles “King Oedipus”). Where there are discontent, dubitation and protest – the premises for inner action can be found. It is the situation of misbalance and instability that correlates here with the dramatic in opposite both to epics and to rite. That is why dramatis persona’s conduct becomes unpredictable and is to be esteemed as deviational from ritual viewpoint: it can be said to be anomalous at the same time suggesting alternative norm⁷⁵¹.

At the same time one has to take into account the inner reasons for drama to be reduced to ritualistic forms. The very reflection over a narrative as the source of drama gives a set of disparate quotations of direct speech that can easily lose the motivational ties. It is the case of the theatre of representation where the interpretative competence (that provided textual integration) is lost and the residual fragments are collected without the motivational links that the inherited performance is void of. Such was the situation in the mediaeval epoch when ancient legacy was reproduced within the ritual experience where the interpretative keys were thrown away⁷⁵². This jeopardy of misinterpretation is still aggravated with the just mentioned deviational essence of dramatis persona’s conduct. The traditional Far Eastern hieroglyphic designation of drama (a pig in a tiger’s claws) as the symbol of passions’ exaggeration (or hyperbole) gives testimony to dramatic abstractions & extractions in regard to epics. It is special dramatic extremism that correlates with the representation of ultimate limits of action taken as the subject of a play Drama appears not only as a synecdoche of scenic speech where parts always serve as pars pro toto substitution for a total of epics but also comes to the limits of textual disjunction that presume the risk of losing motivational filament. Drama as hyperbole or synecdoche excludes epic particulars and entails the risk of incomprehensibility. The action is taken in drama in its ultimate conditions where the risk of self-destruction comes into play. One can say of a kind of dramatic “arrivisme” in the sense of dramatic strife of arriving at a certain result of action so that the motivation of separate deeds could be neglected. This hyperbolic exaggeration of action as the core of drama comes to the consequences of the risk of motivation’s destruction. Replicas become disparate and randomized so that one can expect surprises in each moment of dramatic action as the results of disordered juxtapositions. It is surprises that replace dramatic faults and obstacles to overcome. Cues of direct speech then look as a set of quotations that entail no important consequences and can be called souvenirs. All it comes to an outspoken eclecticism: dramatic textual heterogeneity with its specific mixture of juxtapositions acquires an outlook of surprises & souvenirs as the scenic effects connected also to the hyperbolic sources of the dramatics. Such eclecticism is to be found in melodramatic reduction of the dramatic.

Melodramatic element is to be compared with the Jesuit theatre of allegorical abstractions where particulars were to serve as the embellishments of generalities. The dramatic comes here to self-negation in the melodramatic redundancy and superfluity caused with its own property of exaggeration. The destruction of motivational filament is revealed in the loosened structure of a suite of self-sufficient episodes⁷⁵³. This discontinuity is to be regarded as the feature of the lack of motivational filament where one has to repay a compensation of artificially invented obstacles as the motive forces of action. It results in a disruptive series of adjacent scenes in the manner of gradation. The whole is to be conceived as the diversification of abstract scheme with the aim of entertaining audience as in the case of variegated allegorical abstractions. The sources are to be found in the simplification of dramatic hyperbole. The rejection of inner action important for genuine drama is here marked with situational determination of the dramatis personae’s behavior so that characters disclose their full dependence from the circumstances in opposite to the resistance of dramatic hero⁷⁵⁴. One can say of expositive predestination of the events coming to inevitable solution without active participation of heroes. It entails the specific quality of melodramatic dramatis personae that are distinguished just with the absence of freedom and responsibility. In opposite to genuine dramatic heroes they are void of ability to take autonomous decisions and subsequently depend upon plot in the same way as the personifications of abstraction do in allegorical plays⁷⁵⁵. Thus melodramatic dramatis personae become immutable vehicles of plot tasks without their own will as the personified abstractions in allegorical theatre are. Respectively the artificial motivation void of verisimilitude replaces the veritable development of events. Plot is ultimately simplified so that the so called effective situations are presented as self-sufficient scenes⁷⁵⁶, and it entails the loss of motivational ties⁷⁵⁷. In particular here the typical epic device of retardation becomes the essential element of plot in opposite to classical drama⁷⁵⁸.

One can say of melodramatic plot as simulating reality as far as it is endowed with arbitrariness of action wherein characters don’t participate being void of autonomous decisions’ faculty. Such