THE SOCIAL CONTEXT OF DENIS FONVIZIN’S
COMEDY THE MINOR

 

Ryu, Yung-kyun*

 

Denis Fonvizin의 희극 The Minor의 사회적 배경

柳     英     均

 

Contents
1. Introduction	6. The Minor and Russian Idea of Education
2. About the Playwright	7. Conclusion
3. The Plot of The Minor	8. References
4. The Minor as a Political Satire	9. Abstract in Korean
5. The Minor and Its Didacticism

 

One way of defining the function of theatre is to view theatre as “the mirror of society.” Many other artistic forms can also be defined as serving the same function.  Yet, in the case of theatre, this particular aspect seems to be relatively more intensive. A play reflects, in one way or another, portions of the social environment of a particular period its playwright lives through. It is for this reason that we often find it very difficult to fully appreciate a play without some knowledge of the social environment from which the play springs.

In general, comedy, as compared to tragedy, tends to rely more heavily on its social context. Being completely detached from its social context, a comedy can hardly stand by itself. If we find Fonvizin's comedy still funny, it is mainly because we see in the play some elements we can relate to our contemporary society. The pattern of human behavior, after all, doesn't change much in a couple of centuries.

Allardyce Nicoll's book The Theory of Drama1) discusses in one of its chapters such social aspects of comedy. Nicoll defines laughter as essentially a social thing that rises out of group mentality.

*文理學部英語英文學科, 專任講師
1) Allardyce Nicoll, The Theory of Drama, p.192

 

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He explains that when we are alone, we do not laugh as much as when the subject of laughter is shared with other people. If we do so, he says, we imagine the subject shared with others. It seems obvious to me that this sharing of laughter is fundamentally what a comedy writer intends to achieve by writing a comedy. Nicoll says that laughter is usually directed against eccentricity or insociability of the object of laughter. He concludes his reasoning on the nature of laughter with the following statement : "Laughter thus becomes an attack by society as a whole, or by a particular portion of society, on what it regards as anti-social, something out of the way and possibly provocative of harm."

   Whether this particular definition of laughter can be directly applied to comedy in general might be a disputable matter since there are more complex and sophisticated comedies being written by our contempories. Yet, in the case of Fonvizin's The Minor, Nicoll's definition certainly does apply and guides us to the essence of the play.

Fonvizin's comedy could very likely be interpreted as a play intended to lay bare the social injustices rampant in Russia during the reign of Catherine the Great. To some degree the play does sustain such an interpretation, although we recognize in the play sufficient ambiguity to possibly dispute any such one-dimensional interpretation.

Denis Ivanovich Fonvizin(1745-1792) is considered the first great Russian writer of comedies. He was born in Moscow on April 3, 1745. Throughout his University of Moscow days and civil service career, he continued to pursue his literary career. By the time he became secretary to the great statesman Count Nikita Ivanovich Panin, he was already well-known among literary circles for his satirical writings. His two major works are The Brigadier(1769) and The Minor(1782). In both plays, the plot is less important than vividly realistic characterization, pronounced local atmosphere, and finely individualized, true-to-life dialogue.

He introduced many character types that were to recur throughout the tradition of Russian social comedy. The types he inaugurated reached perfection later in the nineteenth century social satires of  Nikolai Gogol and many other playwrights of the time. Satirizing the absurdities of the Francophile Russian middle class and nobility, his plays are also very much reminiscent of Moliere in their style.

 

3.                      The Plot of The Minor

Set on the Prostakov estate in the eighteenth century, the play satirizes the crudeness and egotism of the uneducated Russian country gentry and national backwardness as its consequence. Prostakov(Mr. Simple)

 

 

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                         Denis Fonvizin의 희극 The Minor의 사회적 배경  3

and his brutish wife have abducted an orphaned relative Sofya for her money and try to marry her either to Mrs. Prostakov's brother Skotinin(Mr. Pig) or to their son Mitrofan(the Minor). Mitrofan is an overfed, spoiled boob who is encouraged in his stupidity by his mother's solicitude and by his fraudulent tutor's capitulation to his parents' values. But Sofya's uncle Starodum (mr. Old Sense), who had gone off to make his fortune, returns in time to rescue Sofya and give her in marriage to Milon (Mr. Dear), the man she really loves. Justice finally triumphs when Pravdin (mr. Truthful or mr. Justice), a government representative interested in reform, gathers enough incriminating evidence to confiscate the Prostakov property.

 

 

4.                      The Minor as a Political Satire

Fonvizin completed The Minor (Nedorosl)2) in 1781. He wanted it to be performed, but he met some difficulties in getting it mounted because of the government's censorship. The play was not performed until September 1792. The reason for the censorship is clear since the play deals with such topical issues as the abuse of serfdom, the ignorance of the landowners, the absurdities of the court, and the shallowness of education.

To understand those subjects for Fonvizin's satire in the proper perspective, it is essential to look into some of the historical facts of the time. Since the death of Peter the Great, who had complete control over the class of nobility, many of his successors sought to consolidate their power as monarchs by offering more freedom and benefits to the nobility. In 1762, Peter III issued "The Decree on the Freedom of the Nobility" and granted the nobility many privileges. The decree increased, in particular, the misery and exploitation of the peasants and serfs, which became even worse during Catherine's reign. A good reference to such condition of serfdom is Aleksandr Nikolaevich Radishchev's Diary A Journey From St. Petersburg to Moscow.3)

Fonvizin's criticism against the abuse of serfdom is, however, not by any means a revolutionary  statement which claims the complete abolition of serfdom. In 1767, Fonvizin anonymously published a pamphlet A Brief Exposition on the Freedom of the French Nobility and on the Benefit of the Third Estate. In this pamphlet, Fonvizin advocates some daring proposals such as complete freedom of the nobility, emancipation of the third estate, and some freedom for the peasantry. Although he might be considered quite liberal in his political views, it is very obvious here that he was very much a member of the nobility who sought to protect the interest of their class. Marvin Kantor thus concludes in his book Dramatic Works of D. I. Fonvizin⁴⁾ as follows :

2) The Russian title is Nedorosl. It means  a) a boy, not yet of age, who is preparing for government service, and b) ever since this play's stupid young man, though from a well-to-do family, will never amount to anything.

3) Aleksandr Radishchev, A Journey From St. Petersburg To Moscow.

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Despite the very obvious attack upon serfdom and the farcical representation of its exponents, Fonvizin enters certain reservations. When Starodum says, ". . . it is unlawful to oppress one's fellow man with slavery . . . (V, i)," by "oppression" is understood the abuse of a serf-owner's power. Fonvizin sees the evils of serfdom primarily in the inhumanity of Mrs. Prostakov rather than in the very essence, indeed, the institution itself. It is not a cry for the abolition of serfdom, as some researchers seem to think, nor is it a condemnation of it; it is a plea for more humane treatment of serfs which could be achieved through an enlightened nobility guided by an enlightened monarch.

Fonvizin's next attack is upon the ignorance of the landowning class and portions of nobility. The ignorance of the landowners is best illustrated in the play through characters of the Prostakov family members.  This ignorance of the landowners and some of the nobility can be attributed to the traditional system of transmitting property and social rank solely on the basis of hereditary rights. Since the social structure and the system of promotion were based on genealogy alone, a man's career depended primarily on his family origin. Personal merit was less important and ability alone less likely to lead to promotion than family origin was. Fonvizin's personal view reflected in the play is that ignorance is the immediate source of social vices.

Peter the Great attempted to change this conventional system of promotion by establishing a new system called "The Table of Ranks," which was initiated in 1721. Vasili Klyuchevsky explains this in his book Peter the Great :5)

 

The Table of Rank in the reformed Russia substituted a bureaucratic hierarchy based on ability ro the aristocratic hierarchy based on birth and genealogy. One of the articles annexed to the Table specifically emphasized that nobility of birth in itself, without service, was of no importance and did not qualify anybody for high office.

 

Such a change in the system of promotion added more zeal to the growing awareness of Russian people for the necessity of educating themselves and their children as Russia settled solidly as an empire.

 

4) Marvin Kantor, Dramatic Works of D. I. Fonvizin, p.39.
5) Vasili Klyuchevsky, Peter the Great. P.100.

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A lot of the didacticism we find in Fonvizin's drama was obviously an outcome of social necessity in such a transitional period in which Russia was slowly moving from its simple, rough, and rustic society into a more complex and sophisticated society as it transformed itself into a powerful and well-organized empire. There was a tremendous influx of foreign culture in this period--especially French influence. In fact, theatre of the time served as a kind of 'national school" for purely educational purposes.

In the process of such a great flush of foreign influence, people inevitably came to have a tendency to imitate the superficial surface trends of foreign life without really trying to understand the profundity of it. Most of Fonvizin's didacticism is directed against such cheap and tasteless copying of foreign culture. As a reaction to this replica culture, there was also a considerable effort to find Russia's own identity. The character of Starodum represents such an anti-foreign trend. As a rustic, simple, rough and honest type, Starodum stands in the play as the embodiment of a truly Russian character, an ideal Russian character as opposed to all those foreign influences.

 

6.                      The Minor and Russian Idea of Education

Russian nobility and landowners interpreted education as imitating chiefly the French mode of life--knowing how to use a snuff box, how to dress in a proper manner, etc., etc. According to the decree of 1714, children of noblemen had to learn arithmetic and elementary geometry, and were forbidden to marry until they had done so. Mitrofan's remark, "I don't want to study, I want to marry" reflects such superficiality of education imposed by the state. Education became a mere means to promotion. Fonvizin stresses in the play his conviction that moral and spiritual progress would lead to social improvements. He constantly emphasizes the importance of soul or a good heart over the actual contents of education.

Because of such intense didacticism, the structure of the play limits somewhat its potentially diverse scope. We almost see in the play a kind of typical Oriental morality play in which a good guy always gets his reward after many ups and downs and a bad guy gets punished in the end. There is a clean-cut division between the good guys (Strarodum, Milon, Pravdin, and Sofya) and bad guys (the Prostakov family). The bad guys illustrate the outcome of improper education, which is followed by the "preaching" of good guys. The bad guys are punished by the intervention of the state and the good guys are rewarded.

In a way, the positive characters at the end of The Minor illustrate how a social order should function in order to reward virtue. Fonvizin's personal idea for this matter is strongly suggested

 

 

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through the author's mouthpiece Strarodum. Mitrofan's two supplementary tutors are dismissed at the play's end. Kuteykin presents an outrageous bill for his services; Tsyfirkin, however, seeks nothing on the ground that his student has learned nothing. Kuteykin is completely put to shame and obtains nothing while Milon, Starodum, and Pravdin all voluntarily grant Tsyfirkin sums of money "because of his good heart." Here we see a strong personal statement Fonvizin tried to project in the play:

Honesty and goodness should be materially rewarded in some such manner, while avarice and evil behavior would gain nothing or even get punished.

Fonvizin's personal view of the ideal society regulated and enforced by the state or Tsar is best illustrated in one of Strarodum's lines. Starodum responds to Pravdin's question as to how people can be made good:

The means to make people happy are in the sovereign's hands. As soon as everyone sees that without virtuous conduct no one can get on in society, that neither by base service nor for any amount of money can what merit deserves be bought, that people are chosen for positions and not positions abducted by people--then each will find it in his advantage to be decent and each will become good.

The only problem we see here is how to restructure society so that it is to everyone's material advantage to be virtuous--in a word, to establish a state which functions as if it were itself virtuous and all the individuals within it will become virtuous.

 

7.                      Conclusion

I have discussed the social and political background for Fonvizin's comedy The Minor. I have also tried to discuss the strong tendency of didacticism through which Fonvizin tried to express his personal views on various topical issues of the time. The social satire and the didacticism we find in the play seem to be compatible with each other since the play tends to become a moral sermon rather than a social satire in the pure sense. It is obvious that this strong didacticism somewhat dissipates the overall comic spirit of the play. Yet there is such a clear division between the didactical portions of the play and the comic and satirical portions that the story of the Prostakov family can very possibly stand by itself as an excellent and delightful piece of comic satire. In fact, the satire of the play finally outshines its didacticism.

 

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國文要約

 

Shakespeare는 그가 創造한 不朽의 劇中人物 Hamlet의 입을 빌려 演劇을 "holding a mirror up to nature"라고 定義하고 있다. 演劇에 대해 여러 角度에서 多樣한 定義가 可能하겠지만 演劇의 社會的 機能面에서 생각할 때 한 時代의 社會相을 超然하게 그리고 客觀的으로 비쳐 볼 수 있는 社會의 거울로서의 演劇의 機能을 無視할 수 없다.

    모든 人間狀況과 行動樣式은 그가 속한 時代의 社會的環境속에서 일어나며 演劇이 本質的으로 人間의 問題를 다루고 있다는 점에서 볼 때 作家의 意識的인 意圖가 있든 없든 간에 그 作品속에는 그 作品이 씌여진 時代를 어떤 면에서든 反映하는 바가 必然的으로 있게 마련이다. 한편의 戱曲이 그 戱曲이 씌여진 時代의 社會的 背景에 대한 理解없이 제대로 鑑賞되어지기 어려운 경우가 많은 까닭도 바로 이러한 점에 起因한다고 본다.

    本文에서는 戱曲文學중에서도 悲劇과 비교해 볼 때 喜劇이 --특히 諷刺劇이-- 지니는 社會性(social implication)이 훨씬 두드러진다는 점을 說明하고 이러한 觀點에서 Denis Fonvizin의 The Minor의 社會的 背景을 이루는 여러 要素들을 調査하고 資料를 통해 얻어진 觀點에 비추어 이 작품을 解釋해 보려 試圖했다.

 

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