24 THE CRIME OF PROMETHEUS

mask, the later hero, on the contrary, is complex of counte-
nance and opaque of character. The scene of his drama is inter-
ior, a cloistered ego set, however, in a landscape unconfined.
Hamlet, an internalized Orestes, is no longer capable of a sim-
ple deed, but faced with the vista of an infinite field for action
is inwardly paralyzed by the paradox of action itself, of act-
ion that will be necessarily fateful and at the same time free.
His drama is a process taking place within him. Its attention
centers about his motives. He is thus of interest only *in
himself”’ and not through any real gain to the audience.

Contrary to the method of Greek tragedy, modern drama
stresses both the personal idiosycrasies of the hero and his
basic identity with the rest of humanity. Interest in him is
gained by the faculty of sympathy—it is only by chance that
he is not someone else, or, in other words, responsibility for
his action is assigned to such a wide variety of causes, hered-
itary, environmental, and fortuitous, that any other person
might be charged, in equal justice, with his deed. Having
been made common, he 1s necessarily lowered in stature. He
has no longer the capacity for committing the terrible crime for
the gain and hurt of men of which the Western culture-god
was guilty. He is but peccant or, at worst, merely acts in
bad faith and therefore cannot inspire real terror or wonder,
for his motives are basically “understandable.”” Since the time
Faust transformed his evil, all of which consisted in seduc-
tions from fidelity, into good by good will and good works,
the hero’s evil deed elicits sympathy rather than dread and
awe. Since a share of this responsibilities is taken from him by
the communal personality, his deed is not effectively his to
give. He has no singular fate, no real doom. Nature is good
to him and her instruction consoling. He belongs to the audien-
ce, not to the chorus. His communicants are the mass, not a
select and inspired band.

Since the hero of modern drama is conceived as the vic-
tim of common chance and destiny and his greatest crime
ill-will, the interest of the audience is directed toward the prog-

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