My purpose here is to do a little superstitious rapping in the hope of persuading into existence something a little different in the kind of criticism we normally bring to bear upon Greek tragedy. If this seems pretentious, blame the subject in part: Greek tragedy requires, I think, a formidable apparition by way of an adequate criticism and certainly a larger one than I can summon up, though also a larger one than presently attends the scene. What I want to do is to outline the nature of the job to be done, as I see it, and to discuss what seems to me inadequate in both the traditional and contemporary ways of writing about Greek tragedy.

It has become common to view drama in the post-Ibsen period as falling into two broad categories. On the one hand there was a strong and persistent tradition of the A Doll's House type of play, called for convenience “social problem plays,” and on the other a number of diverse styles of drama that represent counter-realism; plays in verse, expressionism, formalistic styles as in Yeats’ plays, revivals of myths, fantastic drama, surrealism, plays of Freudian psychology, Cocteau-ish poésie de théâtre, and so on, all of which, however different from each other, have in common that they turn away both from social problems and from the dramatic style associated with them. They do not necessarily, however, renounce realism for “romance,” or for something “poetic” in the escapist sense. Neither are the themes they treat always without relevance to the social situation.

The hallmark of Yeats’ dramatic writing is a pattern of profound complexity within a Spartan simplicity and brevity. Brevity is easily enough established: most of the plays are quite short. Even the few exceptions indicate that the full-length play was not a form Yeats found sympathetic. Of the two longest plays in the current Collected volume, one is The Countess Cathleen, Yeats's first stage-piece. This work straight forwardly dramatizes the efforts of Satan's agents to buy the souls of Irish peasants and their defeat at the hands of the great lady of the district, who sacrifices her own soul to save the peasants. The conflict is mainly external. Here is none of that spiritual and intellectual subtlety that marks the later plays; every thought and every emotion seem no more than reflections of stock peasant and Christian attitudes. Lady Cathleen gives up her soul; the sacrifice is great but conventional.