Tragic Drama and Modern Society: Studies in the Social and Literary Theory of Drama from 1870 to the Present by John Orr (review)

Book Reviews JOHN ORR. TragicDrama andModern Society:Studies in the Social andLiterary Theory ofDramaJrom 187010 the Present. Totowa. N.J.: Barnes & Noble 1981 . pp.xix, 280. $28.50. John Orr labels the tragic drama in modern times as a tragedy of "social alienation," demanding both 1iterary and social analysis, not merely "traditional literary modes of interpretation." For Orr, modem tragedy - which begins with Ibsen and ends with Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee and Gunter Grass - has as its central theme alienation from bourgeois society, has as its usual fonn naturalism with the setting usually domestic, has as its practitioners dramatists writing not in the center of a defined civilization but at its "periphery" - a "geographical transfer" that a tragedy of social alienation demands, according to Orr - and has as an important thematic continuity the "inegalitarian status of women in modern society." His exploration of tragic drama in modem society is ambitious in scope; his interdisciplinary approach is praiseworthy in intent. Unfortunately, Orr's analyses ofplays work against both the scope and the intent. Orr's main problem is that he is a victim of his own thesis. His sociology and history often stand in the way of his interpretation of the specific plays. "Social alienation" becomes the touchstone of what is or is not tragedy; it becomes the too easy handle for grasping so complex and elusive a genre as tragedy. Of course, social alienation is an important ingredient of many tragedies, including tragedies not modem, but it cannot become the only measure ofa play's effectiveness as tragedy. Because Orr seems so sure of his thesis, he is forced into critical evaluations that are unconvincing or misguided. Three examples - from Ibsen, Chekhov and O'Neill- will indicate how Orr allows his thesis to lead him to critical judgments that must be questioned. His short discussion of Ibsen's Ghosts emphasizes the physical basis of Oswald's predicament. which Orr considers to be "an artistic limitation in the tragic vision which Ibsen has created." Syphilis "reduces Oswald's social circumstance to a purely physical trap," and the play itself "relies on a vision, not of tragic alienation. but of tragic necessity, and that necessity is not ... convincingly social." Now. one can argue whether Ghosts is or is not a tragedy. but to deny the play tragic status because its tragic necessity Book Reviews 235 is not "convincingly social" must give a reader pause. Necessity, in all important discussions of tragedy, is a charged and potent idea; for many critics, it is an essential ingredient of tragedy. One must ask Orr: how "convincingly social" must necessity be? Why must it be "social" at all? Why can it not be physical or generational?Can a victim of necessity - whatever the kind of necessity - not be a tragic hero? These are the questions that Orr does not ask himself, because his basic assumption, that "social alienation" is a necessary component of tragedy, leads him away from the important idea of necessity in Ibsen's play. His thesis leads Orr to the conclusion that Chekhov's The Three Sisters does not possess tragic dimensions, because in that play Chekhov abandons the country estate, a "tragic space" that, for Orr, is necessary for Chekhovian tragedy - "once he leaves it, Chekhovian tragedy is no longer possible." Again, one must ask: why should anyone space be necessary for Chekhovian tragedy? If such a limitation must be imposed, then need it be used in such a heavy fashion and stated so categorically? When Orr discusses O'Neill's Mourning Becomes Electra. he again clearly reveals the damaging effect of his single-minded thesis. He faults the play, in part, because "the metaphor of incest acts as a constraint on the individual development and freewill of the children." He recognizes that the Mannon family is in "an emotional and psychological trap," but he does not wish to acknowledge that trap as a genuine tragic condition. Incest - in Mourning Becomes Electra and in Desire Under the Elms is a constraint, of course, and that is O'Neill's point; a kind of necessity detennines the condition of the family, even though that necessity is not "social." Orr goes on to criticize O...