The dramaturgy of Baroque court love

The central problem of the XVII– XVIII. century Baroque period can be considered as being the duality of theory and practice. We can think not only of the duality of the drama-and theatre theory handbooks and their practical application, for this epoch is the age of the theatrum mundi, the period of “representer”, illusions, dreams and play, as well as of changing identities, duplications, illusions and realities. This is the age of the individual, of that individual who, while being embedded in different genres and assuming responsibility for himself, seeks the answer to the Platonic question of “how should we live”.

In the present paper I am going to comment on the questions regarding the theoretical and practical procedure of Baroque court love, with reference to Gyöngyösi Istvan’s play Florentina, shedding light at the same time upon the process and controversies of the self-realization of the homo eroticus in the Baroque age. The notion of court life by its social and historical nature implies the idea of theatrum mundi, theatrum politicum, whereas court love, by its origin also implies the thoughts of theatrum sacrum.[1] Taking into consideration this trinity , in what follows I will try a kind of (re)reading of the play mentioned from a historical-ideological point of view. For this an approach is needed that takes the text of the play as its starting point, and doesn’t approach it with objective, dramaturgical presumptions.[2] With this we can avoid the pitfalls of value judgements of negative character, that are created around our old texts, and we can also give some kind of answer (although not intending to be exhaustive) to the problem of the legibility and accesibility of these old texts.

The range of the universe, which, by its theatrum mundi content of ideas is derived as a kind of microcosmos is marked by Gyöngyösi with the customs, culture and moral standards of that social record which was both the audience and reader of the play.[3] In this immanent world the ethical conscience of the drama is the ethical conscience of the court as microsociety itself, and in this respect it can serve also the general statements regarding the XVII–XVIII. court and noble love.

Aristotle in his “Poetics” outlines six components of the tragedy, among which the most important are the plot, the characters and the way of thinking. (Aristotle 1994: 12-14)

Based on the three structural units through the re-reading of the Florentina play, I find the undertaking of a relationship between theory and practice on a moral ground within reach. The central problem of the drama lies upon the duality of illusion and reality, and on the dissonance between the noble and court moral norms and their moral understanding. What kind of ethical standards with a stipulative characteristic do the heroes proclaim, which standards should be the cause and purpose of all of their acts and how do the heroes take them on in the reality beyond illusion, what kind of pseudo-attitudes are being created within the drama, and how is the notion of sin and bad rewritten together with the bequethed concept of love? The notion of illusion, with both its ethical and aesthetic features, becomes the organizing concept of the drama, and thus adapts to the ideology implied by the theatrum mundi. As we will see in the following, Gyöngyösi illustrates the world represented and presented by him through the mirror of the if , not only by the play’s plot and the characters` features and patterns, but also by the play’s morality, which at the same time expresses the correlation between the Baroque and the homo eroticus world.

As we know, Florentina is one of our three remaining court dramas. In its themes and patterns the play is partly in accordance with its predecessors, for according to the subtitle Gyöngyösi’s purpose is to show in the drama the Mirror of true friendship and love. [4]

The two organizing concepts of the drama are the love and friendship which define the acts of the heroes and their relationships which each other. The introduction starts with a fashionable dramatic cliche. We hear the complaints of the youngster in love, who fell in love with a girl whose social position is higher than his. The setting of the action is a very popular dramatic device in the Baroque era, the majority of the play takes place in the garden. This is the place where Philosténes, the courtier in love, asks for his friend Hermiás`s help in seducing the princess Florentina, it is here that he lures Florentina into sinful and secret love, the lovers’ first meeting is in the garden, and Áltades, the king, finds out about his daughter’s sinful liason in the garden. The loyal (!) courtier who betrays the lovers must die, according to the illusory world of the drama. His death is/should appear to happen in the spirit of divine jurisdiction. Still, during the duel fought for Florentina and his own honour we find the motif of quiproquo. Instead of Philosténes, Hermiás is the one who fights with Severus, as a sign of his true friendship, while Philosténes, also as a sign of true friendship, replaces his friend on his wedding-night. And of course during the duel Severus, both for his betrayal and in order to maintain appearances, has to pay with his life, thus removing every obstacle from the lovers` path and facilitating the covering up of the truth.

The basic dramatic situation, the device of the secret love affair, already indicates the range of the world of illusion and reality. We face on the platform of illusion the proclamation of true love and friendship as an ethical standard and its apparent taking on. The device of virtue-love, the ethical norms of beautiful good fame, beautiful virtue (FL. VII. 1-26), and true love and friendship are expressed only at an illusory level. In practice their moral taking on seems to be modified. The lovers, when their sinful relationship comes to light, still want to maintain appearances. In accordance with the lovers` proclaimed ethical norms the dramatic conflict should have been resolved by the duel which carries the tool of divine jurisdiction or by the unification of the lovers in death. The unification of the lovers in death appears as a possibility in the drama, but being read in its whole context seems rather ridiculous. Why don’t the lovers take responsability for their actions, why do they stick to maintaining appearances? In my opinion they proclaim, ethically and on an apparent level, such norms, the taking on of which would need a different ethical and especially existential solution. But because their actions oppose their standards, they need to maintain appearances, and they have to take responsability only at an illusory level.

At the same time, in the idealogical meaning of the theatrum mundi, gods don’t/cannot interfere with the world’s actions, the individual is responsible for himself, fate can be beaten, the role in this case can be replaced by the mask, Philostenes with Hermias, and the real task is playing the role well. In order to play the role as perfectly as possible, drama eradicates any kind of dramatism. The conflict proves to be a quasi-conflict, because by identity-switch the traditional role of divine miracle is maintained. The characters are also fake, trying to play the traditional role defined by the love and friendship motif in the best possible way. In reality they are able to take on their proclaimed ethical standards only in the form of pseudo-ethical standards, and not only their universe, but also their ethical conscience is based on quasiality.

Still, Gyöngyösi, by the victory of morally sinful love does not only praise the court love’s slightly approved eroticism as the precursor of eroticism before marriage which is completed in marriage, as well as “decent love” and its fulfillment in marriage. According to my estimation we can witness in the drama the metamorphosis of the Baroque homo eroticus. It is not only the attitude towards gods, death and Fate that is changed, but the ethical standards concerning love are also rewritten, or we could say, they are newly aestheticized. In this respect Gyöngyösi’s illusory universe is anachronistic. By emphasizing this illusory universe, he actually emphasises its difference from reality, legitimizing and making accessible at the same time the moral standards of his reality. The drama’s characters don’t represent only the denial of sinful love, but they also represent the concept of natural, good, and beautiful love. They resist the trial of the correct or incorrect way of using human autonomy, recognizing that love is first of all like man itself, and there is no sinful and noble love. This is actually an interaction of situation and character, and only the certain passion of a certain man in a certain situation can be valued as good or bad.[5] It is therefore the realization of the fact that gods don’ t actually interfere with the world’s business, and the individual is responsible for his actions. Thus, the following of the epicurian concept of “as long as we exist, there is no death” can serve as a slogan for the heroes, for the heroism of the era lies in the praise of life, the self-realization of the characters, and in their playing of their roles as well as possible. They play themselves and their own roles at the cross-section of present and past. In the meaning of dramatic epiphany, they still appear to follow in a way the traditional ideals, even if slightly anacronistically.

As we could see, the Baroque eroticism which in reality is taken on as a pseudo-value is not free from a moralizing purpose in the drama. It is not good and bad love that is measured here, but their construction by love. That’s why Gyöngyösi eliminates every deus ex machina from the play, and that’s why he eradicates tragic features from it. Man, as the director of his own destiny, can give an immanent universal explanation to himself, within which, by his choices, he can find the right place for love and eroticism too. The play offers an answer to the question of "how should we live". And this is the concept of "living naturally", the man who takes full responsability for his actions. The judgement of the heroes` attitude, the question of whether they are ethical or non-ethical has to be put to the age itself. We can take the ambiguity of the play as a symptom of the age when global social standards that could make an attitude seem clear no longer exist. The myths that are bequethed on the work of art are reevaluated, and the proclaimed lifestyle becomes questionable. Thus, in everyday life man can cultivate different ethical attitudes, according to his personality and choices.

In my opinion the most important reason for Gyöngyösi’s popularity is the maintanance of the duality of illusion and reality. In the Gyöngyösi universe the proclaimed ethical standards cannot be questioned by the characters at the illusory level, but in reality these values aren’t workable. That’s why the heroes need a kind of “backdoor-solution" in the light of which, in reaction to illusion only one attitude can exist, and that is irony.

[1] The process of this triple theatre-concept’s history, its achievements throughout different ages, and its modifications, won’t be discussed in the present paper because of a lack of space, but I will mention the references needed for the understanding and breaking down of the problem.

[2] The text-sourced reading certainly doesn’t exclude drama-theory approaches. But in my paper I choose not to focus too much on the similarities between practical and theoretical Baroque drama-theories, and I would like to avoid the examination of the dramatic elements, as well as the pure theoretical approach of the drama, therefore I chose Arisotle’s Poetics as a theoretical reference . (Aristotle 1994)

[3] Let us consider the drama’s epithalamy-characteristic and the popularity of Gyöngyösi’s other works with historical references.

[4] I won’t analyse the reconstruction of the original structure or the playwright’s identity, nor the differences among the drama’s variants. With reference to this, see for example Badics 1914; Ludanyi 1989; Agardi 1972. The text studied in this paper can be found in the series of Magyar dramaírók XVI–XVII. század, and this coincides with the text that can be found in the RMDE series, edited by Dömötör Tekla (Dömötör 1960). Because of problems occurring in translation I didn`t translate the quotations from the drama, but I will reference quotations in brackets.

[5] In this respect the motifs of good and bad exist also in a socio-ethical category.