Word: bentley
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...Eric Bentley explored the "cathartic value of violent images" in farce at his fifth Charles Ellot Norton Lecture last night...
Disagreeing with Plato's view that emotional drama overly excites the audience, Bentley argued that the image of a violent or immoral act should not be equated with its actual performance. By laughing at a serious situation, the audience achieves "a healthy release of emotion" while still within the laws of society and conscience...
Pity is the "weaker side" of the appeal of melodrama, Bentley said; the stronger side is fear. Melodrama plays up irrational fear, which includes superstition, religion, and neurosis, more than "common sense fear--the fear of slipping on the ice or falling off a cliff...
...audience will allow a playwright just enough "outrageous coincidence" to "sharpen the outline" of a play, Bentley said. They will permit him to exaggerate "about 10 per cent--after all, he is an artist...
Melodrama's appeal to fear, however, is essentially "childish," Bentley concluded. "The melodramatic vision is good up to a point," he said, "and that point is childhood." Nor can melodrama be separated entirely from tragedy. "There is melodrama in every tragedy, just as there is a child in every...