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Untitled Article
sprouting / ( The greatest tragedies that were ever written are thiu to be considered as sprouts J ) 'What was its essence ? Redundancy of diction . " «« Composition might then be defined the art of multiply ing phrases , to afft-ct the ear of the multitude with a variety of sound , and astound them by what appeared an inexhaustible richness of expression . Under thie exuberant foliage , this puflfv husk of diction , there was 1
generally ho thingbut the commonest meaning : common sentiment , common ] thought , the very substance of the popular tales of" that period without the least improvement . Writing was then an art , in the lowest , not in the highe&t sense ; it might be learnt in the most purely technical manner . A long list of objects for metaphors and
comparisons , which with a little dexteriLy might he applied to every subject , not only directly but by opposition ; contrasts of high and low , first and last , sweet and bitter , hot and cold , si If should be noted in the book of topics , till they became familiar to the mitul . The commonest thought should then be exhausted , as children exhaust a letter , repeating it under ten or twelve metaphorical dfesses . The above applies very aptly to the third rate play-wrights who preceded and followed the Elizabethian dramatists . A
recipe for writing a tragedy on the model of Shakspeare , Webster , Chapman , Marlow , Beaumont , and Fletcher , &c . is then whisked from the pen in the following * off-h and style ;—" As for the story , it might be told with no better arrangement than what would be required to amuse a circle of boys and girls in the evening when tired of their play . In that style of writing there is no weed of showing the ] grou th mid gradual development of some terrific or degrading passion . State any horror at once ; the legitimimac 3 of its birth will not be questioned . Mix the niObt inconsistent frelings , producing contrasts which , to all but children in taste and moral observation , will appear a parody of the tragio character . Convey all this in a mighty stream of words , a / id you have written a play , which , could you contrive to shove it , dust y and worm-eaten , into the collection of some antiquarian of the late Air . Donees standing and fame , would be sure to be extracted and praised to the akies by some industrious pupil of Mr . Lamb ' s school . "
There is something peculiarly funny in the illogical dogmatism of this classical prig of style and diction . One of Lamb ' s children of taste and moral observation might rather iuoro fairly assume that were any first-class boy in a public school to write the most pert , marnrsvless , vapid play in Latin , and ingeniously foist it into a scarce old edition of Terence , and
ehove it among the mortal remains of Dr . Parr , it would be sure to bfe scratched up with a shrill plaudite Pisones , as a miracle of caustic innuendo and fine touches , by the ' scholar' of the London " Review 1
' * Were we to choose a specimen of the viock tragic which abounds in the compositions from which Mr , Lamb hue taken his specimen ^ vrt would nx upon the Dn ? he »« of MalTy , "
Untitled Article
$ 36 TAe Zvndon Review v . Thv British Drama .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1836, page 236, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2656/page/44/
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