For both Aristotle and Tolstoy, in rather different ways, the production of
feeling must lie at the heart of theatre. However, it is possible to admit
that art produces emotion, but to deny that this is central either to its
definition or to its success. If one thought, for example, that the role of
theatre lay in the transmission of certain truths, then the effect that theatre
has on the emotions might seem relatively insignificant. Hegel wrote that
feelings are‘the indefinite dull region of the mind’; hence, he thought, a
study of art that places emotion at its core inevitably‘becomes tedious from its
indefiniteness and vacancy, and repulsive from its attentiveness to little
subjective peculiarities’.^5
As we have already seen, a similar spectrum of views is represented in
accounts of the relationship between theatre, morality and emotion. For
some, the production of emotion at a theatrical performance is (at least)
an extremely useful contribution to moral development; for others, the
ability of the theatre to‘feed and enflame’the emotions is the subject of
intense suspicion.^6 Here again, of course, the fact that theatre moves us is not
in question–it’s just a matter of whether the effects it has are positive or
negative in moral terms. So emotions may be central to the definition and
value of theatre; or they may be peripheral, even immoral. But just the
fact that we feel strongly, or that we can feel strongly in response to
theatre, has been the subject of much philosophical debate–regardless of
what the value or significance of this emotional response is taken to be.
This chapter treats three problems in relation to the emotions that, as
we’ve seen, all can agree are produced by theatre (at least some of the time).
First, the problem of emotional responses tofictions; second, the problem of
tragic pleasure; third, the problem of catharsis. These problems may well
be related and we will have a chance to think about their connection; but
they are distinct and therefore deserve independent attention.
Emotional responses to fiction
Put as simply as possible, thefirst problem is this: why do we care about
the characters in the play, when we know that they don’t exist? I know
that Vanya and Sonya are Chekhov’s creations, played by actors; the actors
may or may not have similar general life concerns, but that is completely
irrelevant, and in any case they are hardly stuck in a country estate, con-
demned to slave away in misery for the rest of their lives. And yet it came
naturally to me to say that I pitied them. And not just to me: recall the
centrality of pity to Aristotle’sdefinition of tragedy.
This is an old problem: Plato was aware of it; Hamlet comments on it.^7
It continues to bother us. It has become conventional to set it out in the
form of three claims, each of which looks intuitive, but that cannot all be
true together:
130 From the Stage to the World