The Story of Drama: Tragedy, Comedy and Sacrifice from the Greeks to the Present by Gary Day (review)

In The Story of Drama, Gary Day says that "we cannot prove" Freud's theory of Eros and Thanatos, because "Freud's theory of the instincts may well have been supplanted by the science of genetics." Day argues, however, that it "remains an intriguing proposition" (12). This may also be the best way to approach Day's own work, which also cannot be proven, but is an "intriguing proposition." Relying heavily upon Freud, James George Frazer's The Golden Bough, and the Cambridge Ritualists (who themselves relied heavily upon Frazer, as Day reminds us), The Story of Drama finds a common thread running through Western theatre: sacrifice.

Day argues that too often "thinkers on tragedy tend to stress its spiritual or philosophical aspect at the expense of its relation to ritual" (2). This is not too dissimilar from the way most theatre educators approach tragedy in the classroom, where the discussion is dominated by Aristotle's Poetics, his six aspects of drama, and a reading of Oedipus that stresses the role of fate in the life of a character and through the workings of a plot. This pedagogy-criticism is what Day would call "spiritual" or "philosophical"; rather than continue that focus, he wants to reframe Western drama as ritual, specifically as sacrifice. While sacrifice may sound "spiritual," Day does not mean it in a wholly religious sense, but instead argues that sacrifice "is best considered as a narrative, that is, something which gives shape and meaning to existence . . . [not] in a religious way, simply in a holistic one" (9). That is to say, sacrifice needs to do something—to serve some kind of need within the community.

If all of this sounds too abstract, let me give of an example of how Day's argument works in practice. Much has been said about whether the Quem Quaeritis or Visitatio Sepulchri is or is not theatre. Day points to several scholars who have argued both ways. O. B. Hardison Jr., for instance, notes that "acting was alien to the medieval mind," while Katie Normington argues that "the use of costumes and stage directions indicate that it was indeed a piece of theatre" (64). Day avoids taking sides in this debate; instead, he argues that "whatever significance the Visitatio has in the history of theatre, it is also important because it echoes ancient rituals which celebrate the return of new life" (65). By sidestepping the debate about whether the trope is theatre, Day masterfully reframes the discussion to be about sacrifice—the common thread connecting Western performance traditions. This is an example of where the book is at its strongest. In helping us to rethink how we discuss theatre, Day is providing critics and educators a new set of tools with which to work.

He does not limit his exploration of theatre as sacrifice to ancient and medieval theatre, however. The book covers ancient Greek through twenty-first-century drama. Each chapter contains readings of plays as case studies for how the social function of sacrifice works within a given historical moment. A strength of Day's book is that many of the plays chosen are lesser-known works; for instance, he chooses to read Oscar Wilde's A Woman of No Importance rather than The Importance of Being Earnest. Other, more well-known plays include Everyman, King Lear, Waiting for Godot, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Topdog/Underdog.

The book has some problems, however. There are moments where Day makes assumptions, connections, and logical leaps that failed to convince me for lack of supporting evidence. For instance, when discussing Plautus's The Rope, he argues that "the conflict between the lovers and the older figures who oppose their union is the dramatic equivalent of the fight between winter and spring. The eventual marriage of the young couple is the socially acceptable version of ancient fertility rites" (56–57). This argument requires a leap of faith...