PFSCL XLIII, 85 (2016) 396 Enrica Zanin: Fins tragiques: poétique et éthique du dénouement dans la tragédie de la première modernité (Italie, France, Espagne, Allemagne). Geneva: Droz, 2014 (« Travaux du Grand Siècle », n o 41). 471 p. This study of tragic endings combines an overview of theory, especially the interpretations (or misinterpretations) of Aristotle’s Poetics, with examples of dramatic practice from several European countries. However, while Enrica Zanin cites a large number of individual plays, her primary focus is on the theoretical questions. Each of the eleven chapters concentrates on one of the principal points of contention in Aristotle’s Poetics, and she is careful to contrast the views of contemporary philologists on what Aristotle really meant with the views of early modern commentators. Especially helpful are the explanations of how sixteenthand seventeenth-century theorists tended to read Aristotle through the lens of altogether different traditions. Thus, hamartia, which she translates as “faute tragique”, was linked by these theorists, in varying degrees, to the theological concept of sin. She shows how St. Augustine’s view that humans in their fallen state are automatically fallible could be used to explain how a tragic protagonist could be simultaneously good and bad, innocent and guilty. Similarly, she traces the influences of Seneca’s tragedies, of Boethius’s notion of Fortuna, of the Roman grammarians (Evanthius, Donatus, Diomedes) and of the medieval de casibus tradition on the Renaissance insistence that tragedies must end with disastrous events. While not all this material is new, Zanin succeeds in pulling together the huge amount of relevant information in a systematic way. One of the strengths of this book is its comparative approach, presenting together the theory and the practice of multiple countries, mainly Italy and France. Thus, in regard to the question of why, contrary to Aristotle, early modern writers insisted that tragedies needed to have unhappy endings, or at least double endings (the good and bad characters have opposing fates), she claims an inverse correlation between familiarity with Aristotle and the creation of a vibrant national tradition. In Italy, where several generations of expert scholars produced erudite commentaries on the Poetics, only a handful of learned poets tried their hand at writing tragedies, and these works, being slavish imitations of Greek or Latin models, failed to win popular approval; this in turn led to the almost total neglect of tragedy, except in operatic form. In Spain, the exact opposite occurred: because Aristotle was so little known and because most professional playwrights, following the lead of Lope de Vega, rejected the authority of the Ancients in favor of pleasing local audiences, tragedy, when cultivated at all, became subsumed into the larger category of comedia. In France, the reorientation of Comptes rendus 397 poetic theory (making the rules derivable from universal and timeless reason, rather than directly from the Ancients), coupled with the reliance on an eclectic group of theoretical sources (mainly Italian), allowed for the formulation of a dramaturgy capable of satisfying French tastes. Other useful comparative studies in which works from different countries are grouped together include the different approaches to happy endings in the plays of Giraldi and of Corneille, the wide variety in treatments of the Antony and Cleopatra story, and the outcomes in plays involving oracles or vows with potentially destructive impact. In one of the more original chapters, dealing with plot causality, Zanin notes the frequent tension between the principles of logical causality and moral causality. Thus, if the plot consists of a series of clearly linked actions, there is often no surprise and the audience is left with the sense that everything has happened by chance; if a “marvel” occurs, the audience feels that some higher power (providence or fate) has been at work, or at least that to some degree the basic ethical values have been preserved. An analysis of two French tragedies based on the Hecuba myth illustrates this point convincingly. Ultimately, Zanin links the tension between pathos and moral edification to her central thesis: that the Renaissance tradition focusing on deploration comes closer to the modern view of the “tragic” by proclaiming the powerlessness of even the greatest heroes and the inexplicable nature of life on earth; if there is some guiding force controlling human events, such as divine providence, we do not generally see it. Thus, these tragedies invite the viewer/ reader to the hermeneutic task of trying to make sense of the events, for which the plays furnish no single, coherent explanation. However, she notes that this type of play failed to resonate with audiences, for whom the need for a reestablishing of the moral order at the conclusion took priority over pure pathos. This need would lead to the development of the specifically French tragédie classique, which aimed to reintroduce ethical clarity by a variety of means: the final reversal led to the overt recognition of a moral perspective, usually involving poetic justice; the protagonist’s moral flaw tended to be linked to the passions, thus making the characters more relatable and perhaps more excusable; the fact that the intervention of providence is not a feature of real life led to the privileging of vraisemblance (a fictional world, however plausible) over historical truth. Moreover, the return to a moral equilibrium often meant in practice that the main plot reversal was placed in the central section of the play, rather than in the denouement. Zanin further situates the competing views of tragedy within the larger philosophical clash between Platonic or neo-Platonic idealistic PFSCL XLIII, 85 (2016) 398 notions and Aristotle’s ethical doctrine; this is linked in turn with conflicting views about literature’s moral function. The book contains an enormous amount of useful information, pulling together material about the various dramatic traditions that one rarely finds within a single volume. It is also hard to read, in part because of that very accumulation of material. The organization of individual chapters takes getting used to: due to the primary focus on theoretical and philosophical questions, there is a deliberate imbalance between analysis of theoretical texts and that of plays. In fact, within any given chapter, the discussion of specific plays tends to be segregated in the final section, and the analysis of the plays, usually drawn from two (occasionally three) countries, serves solely to illustrate a theoretical problem. Spain is represented in the body of the argument by only a handful of plays by major authors and by several late-sixteenth-century authors of poetics; in some chapters, that country disappears altogether. Likewise, apart from the principal dividing lines noted above, scant attention is paid to the historical evolution of dramatic practice (in a volume that covers two full centuries) or to the other features dividing practice in the plays from the three countries. This is not to say that Zanin is unaware of these matters, to which she occasionally refers in passing, but simply that her goal of presenting an overarching tableau requires a reliance on broad generalization. It is not clear why Germany was included in the title, since, apart from a 17-page section in the opening chapter and a brief mention in the conclusion, it plays no role in the discussion. The one useful mention of that country is her revisiting of Walter Benjamin’s claim that German Trauerspiel is radically distinct from tragedy in other literatures: she argues that in many key respects sixteenth-century German tragic plays do in fact fit in with the contemporary practice in other European countries, especially if one sets aside matters of dramaturgy. England, which was left out due to limitations of space (though there are periodic references to Shakespeare), might have been a more useful fourth country for purposes of this study. Finally, the book could have used more careful proofreading. There are numerous typos and omissions of words, plus occasional inaccuracies with plot synopses or with names (such as, on one occasion, giving the playwright Scudéry the first name of Charles). Despite these minor problems, this is an impressive work of scholarship that can serve as a useful reference. Perry Gethner