THE PHENOMENON
of the revival of classical Greek themes in the French theatre in the mid-twentieth
century has by now been well discussed and documented. More than one
commentator—and not least Albert Camus in his “Conference prononcée a Athènes
sur l’avenir de la tragédie”—has attempted to draw parallels between the
metaphysical climate of Periclean Greece, the Renaissance, and twentieth-century Europe.
Endeavoring to account for the appeal of classical myths in France specifically during the
Renaissance and again in modem times, Mine Jacqueline Duchemin has made a case for their
philosophical relevance to the temper of the age: “. . . il a fallu qu’ils
répondissent parfaitement aux tendances profondes qui cherchaient a s’exprimer.”
The modern French dramatist, to a far greater extent than his contemporaries in other
countries, has made use of a framework of archetypal situations and relationships
involving death, exile, violence, madness, and love in which to set the crisis of the
Western moral conscience in the modern age, especially during its time of sharpest focus:
the Second World War and the events immediately leading up to it. The work of C. G. Jung,
particularly when complemented by that of C. Kerenyi, suggests that in modern references
to classical mythology we are not confronted with convenient utilization of existing
material, a sort of cultural tomb-robbing as George Steiner sees it, in order to indulge
in jeux d’esprit. Classical tombs may well
have been robbed in France between 1920 and
1950, and the genre has undoubtedly been endowed
with an aura of frivolity—some might put it as strongly as “sacrilege”—by
some of the work of Cocteau and Giraudoux. Yet on the whole it was not for easy gain that
bodies were lifted from Troy, Thebes, and Argos and resurrected in Paris. The very limited
range of Greek myths used, and the striking obsession with one or two, seem to suggest
that the theft was a genuine response to needs of the French collective unconscious, a
theft in fact carried out in the dark shadow of a handful of archetypes. Well over a dozen
leading French authors each wrote an average of almost two “neo-Greek” plays
during this period. Yet of the enormous range of themes and characters which
were fully exploited in the Renaissance, the number transposed to the modern period is
small. Oedipus and Jocasta, Antigone and Creon, Orestes and Electra, -- these are the
characters and relationships which dominate the age, reflecting, perhaps, some of the most
significant aspects of the French malaise at this time: increasing sensitivity to the
arrogance of political power, a growing consciousness in intellectuals of metaphysical
alienation, and a general re-examination of personal (particularly sexual?) values.
Few writers of the late 1930’s
were more concerned with these and kindred dilemmas than Albert Camus. They inform every
line of his fiction, philosophical essays, and theatre. In this last medium, however,
Camus was almost the only member of the generation of leading French dramatists who came
to the fore at this time who did not draw directly on Greek mythology. He was in fact
opposed to the “movement,” and spoke of the weariness of the theatre-going
public with contemporary versions of the Atridae. In
particular he despised the ostentations intellectualism of Giraudoux (“l’un
des écrivains les moins faits pour le théâtre”), with his constant recourse to
“la grace, l’esprit, le conventionnel et le charmant.”
The nearest Camus came to a
personal treatment of a Greek myth in the theatre was the “adaptation” of Prometheus Bound which he did with the Theatre du Travail in March, 1937. By this time, it
will be remembered, Camus had been heavily involved in the creation of two semi-Brechtian,
anti-Fascist plays, Le Temps du Mépris and Révolte dans les Asturies, the latter having been
banned by the municipal authorities of Algiers. At the same time, by March, 1937, Camus
was in the process of breaking with the Algerian Communist Party, and thus dissolving an
allegiance which, as is clear from many entries in the Carnets for this period, was from the outset far
from staunch. In view of the symbolic use Camus was later to make of Prometheus in his
anti-Communist polemic, it is tempting to suppose that his Prométhée enchainé might have cast some light
on the early stages of his political and social evolution. Le Mythe de Sisyphe and L’Homme révolté are proof that Camus was not
on principle averse to borrowing mythological figures to embody his ideas. Miss G. Brée,
however, who is the only person to have succeeded in tracking down a copy of Camus’s
adaptation, reports that “he stuck very closely to the Aeschylus with very few
modifications,” and “respected the text of Aeschylus.” Surprising
though a totally scrupulous fidelity to the original text may be, and whatever the
temptation to suspect the “few modifications” as being possible evidence of
modernization, here the speculation must nevertheless end until such time as the
manuscript becomes available again. At all events it is clear from Miss Brée’s
description that Prométhée enchainé can in no
way be regarded as the same sort of highly individualistic adaptation as Gide’s OEdipe, Anouilh’s Antigone, or Giraudoux’s Electre.
And yet Camus could not resist the
pull of the classical archetype at this time. A play which has not yet been considered in
the context of the “neo-classical” movement is Caligula, a work which, although believed to be
based on historical as opposed to mythological material—and Roman history at that—may
be shown to possess very real affinities with the “Greek” plays of Camus’s
contemporaries.
To begin with, the extent has not
yet been appreciated to which Caligula is based
on myth, “par
opposition a la pensée logique et a sa traduction en paroles claires, un récit d’allure merveilleuse [. . .],”
recounting “des faits légendaires, aventures
divines, exploits béroiques.” As is well known, Camus based his play on a reading of
the Lives of the Caesars by Suetonius, but
disclaimed any intention of writing an “historical” play. Most critics have
accepted this disclaimer without any difficulty, since Camus has clearly grafted on to the
character of Caligula his own highly personal sensitivity to the “absurd.” The
assessment of John Cruickshank would thus meet with general approval: “Although he
took so many facts from Suetonius Camus naturally interpreted them in a way that suited
his own ideas at the time the play was written. Caligula
belongs to the period in which he was most acutely aware of the absurd.”
But this is not enough. It is not
just in this metaphysical interpolation that Caligula
is totally unhistorical. Two far more fundamental issues have so far escaped
attention; both are relevant to a discussion of the mythic nature of Camus’s play.
In the first place, to what extent
can any modern dramatist take “facts” about the Emperor Gaius Caligula from
Suetonius? By a curious coincidence—and the temptation to regard it as anything more
should be resisted—twentieth-century historical research on Gaius Caligula built up
to a climax in the years immediately preceding Camus’s first jottings for the play.
Between 1930 and 1934 no fewer than six books or substantial articles appeared. In one of
the latter, M. P. Charlesworth explains why, of all the Julio-Claudian emperors, Gaius
Caligula is the one whose character has been, and will probably continue to be,
embellished with all the lusts and quirks which, once the propagandist has done his work,
are commonly attributed in the popular imagination to the monster-tyrant figures of
history:
For the bulk of the information we are compelled to fall back on
Suetonius and Dio Cassius, and we do not possess (as we do for the three other
Julio-Claudian Emperors) any of the books which Tacitus wrote on the reign. The lack must
be emphasized, for it is very important: in studying the reigns of Tiberius, Claudius or
Nero, we can usually rely on Tacitus to control the errors and generalisations of
Suetonius and Dio, and so can assess them at their true worth. In spite of this many
writers, in dealing with the four years of Gaius, behave as though by some kindly
compensation of Nature, once Tacitus is missing Suetonius and Dio automatically become
better authorities and their statements more worthy of credence. Such a frame of mind is
uncritically optimistic, for it goes clean contrary to all experience of these authors
elsewhere.
The task of arriving at a more objective—and
morally attenuated— assessment of Caligula than that provided by Suetonius (who was
about eighty years closer to Caligula than Dio Cassius) is thus much more complicated than
in the case of Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero. Most modern commentators would concur with
Charlesworth in his judgment that: "Suetonius and Dio Cassius are quite untrustworthy
as regards Gaius’ personal character, Dio through his love for drama and sensation,
and Suetonius because his items are often the merest hearsay or gossip. On occasion we
have evidence that definitely confutes them, and we are justified in disbelieving rumours
of habitual incest with all his three sisters, or of wallowing in gold, or of universal
poisoning plans."
J. P. V. D. Balsdon, author of a
full-length study of Gaius Caligula, is of the opinion that the incest stigma is a
complete fabrication in the first place—”mud which in antiquity was thrown at
any man who was unusually fond of his sister.” René Lugand argues that,
if not actually a gross fabricator, Suetonius was at least guilty of partiality and
elaboration. He examines two cases of allegedly outrageous conduct: the propitiation of
Caligula by human sacrifices, and secondly his intention to award his horse Incitatus a
Consulship. His conclusion is that, even if Suetonius is not exaggerating, as is
frequently the case elsewhere, such conduct was not so very monstrous for those times.
Suetonius was more of a propagandist than an historian: "Au terme de ces deux petites
etudes, la “maniere” de Suétone apparait assez clairement. Suétone n’a
pas rapporté de choses fausses; rnais son récit, volontairement décousu et anecdotique,
tient plus du pamphlet que de l’histoire. Ce n’est pas la premiere fois que l’examen
d’un detail aboutit a cette conclusion; et depuis longtemps, Suétone n’est
utilisé qu’après une sévêre critique."
Such then is the raw material which
Camus used for the plot and characters of his play: prurient sensationalism and highly
suspect history, destined to be forever doubted but seldom corrected. It is tempting to
suggest that it is precisely because it is such a text, whether or not Camus knew it to be
such, that it has served his purpose so well. Caligula has attained an almost mythic
stature, rivaling in the popular imagination such figures as Herod, Attila the Hun,
Genghis Khan, the Borgias, Richard III, Ivan the Terrible, and Adolf Hitler. He is a giant
of tyranny and depravity who, for want of an historical corrective, cannot be reduced in
size by comparison with the other eminent figures in the field at this time: Nero,
Claudius, Tiberius, and not forgetting Galba, Vitellius, and Domitian. With reference to
the difficulty of distinguishing clearly between Greek myth and Greek history, between
Gods and men, Mine Duchemin observes in addition that: "La difficulté se mesure
peut-être mieux encore a propos de certains episodes dit “historiques” et non
“mythiques” de l’histoire romaine la plus ancienne. On sait que les
recherches les plus récentes tendent a montrer dans les origines de Rome un ensemble
complexe beau-coup plus proche du mythe que de l’histoire. Devrions-nous a ce titre
étudier l’évolution mythique de tant d’Horaces,
Brutus, Lucrèces? Nous ne le ferons pas: le sujet encore plus gigantesque: mais nous
savons combien Calliope est la soeur de Clio."
We know too how much Caligula
considered himself to be the brother of Jupiter and a reincarnation of Venus in the myth
created by Suetonius and perpetuated by Camus. Fact and fiction about the empire are just
as much clouded in myth as during the early period of Roman history. “Le prestige du
personnage mythique est en effet considerable. Certains personnages historiques partagent
dans une certaine mesure ce prestige”—of few ostensibly historical figures is
Mine Duchemin’s claim truer than of the range of diabolical semi-, sub-, and
superhuman emperors enlarged, and in some cases created, for posterity by Suetonius, and
believed until relatively recent times to be accurate portraits. What Camus needed was not
history but myth, and he found it in Suetonius, and best of all in the Ljfe of Gaius Caligula.
So much for the raw material; what
of the end product? Here again, critics have not always appreciated the extent to which
the very nature of Suetonius’ account has enabled Camus to adapt and stylize his
material to suit his purpose. In a number of important respects he breaks completely away
from Suetonius. Caligula is portrayed by Camus as an admirable man who is suddenly
unhinged by the death of his sister and mistress, Drusilla. In the early drafts of the
play her death made a considerable personal impact on Caligula. He lamented to Caesonia:
"j’ai compris un soir auprès d’elle que toute ma richesse était sur cette
terre. Et c’est de ce soir-lâ que je ne peux me détacher. (Sourdement)—Avec elle c’est la terre
entière que je viens de perdre."
After 1943, the shadow of Drusilla is
considerably fainter. The sensual yearning and self-piteous rhetoric which her death
provoked in Caligula in the early manuscripts are now muted. He replies to Caesonia in the
corresponding speech to the one above in a very different way: "Quite pane de
Drusilla, folle? Et ne peux-tu imaginer qu’un homme pleure pour autre chose que l’amour?
[. . .1 Les hommes pleurent parce que les choses ne sont pas ce qu’elles devraient
être."
Even though in this, the final version
of these particular scenes, the relationship between Caligula and Drusilla is recast in a
considerably more abstract form than previously, the fact remains that for Camus it is the
death of Drusilla which acts as an instant catalyst on Caligula’s sensibility. That
this is entirely Camus’s invention has so far passed unnoticed. W. Strauss has
allowed his knowledge of the end-product, Camus’s play, to influence his reading of
the source, Suetonius: "the loss of Drusilla upset Caius completely; he contracted a
sudden illness from which he emerged a changed man." The transformation was so
remarkable that Suetonius felt compelled to inject a new note into his biography of
Caligula: “Thus far we have spoken of him as a prince. What remains to be said of him
bespeaks him rather a monster than a man.
Cruickshank
takes a similar view: "Drusilla suddenly died and almost overnight Caligula’s
character seemed to change completely. He abruptly became a monster of vice and cruelty.
Suetonius speaks of him as being “rather a monster than a man” [...]. In his
play Camus draws directly from Suetonius. The text of the Life does not justify either of these two
statements. The line quoted by Strauss—Hactenus
quasi de principe, reliqua ut de monstro narranda sunt—introduces the
twenty-second of the sixty numbered sections into which this Life is divided, and means: “So much for the
Emperor; it remains to deal with the Monster.” It is simply a formal device of a sort
used elsewhere by the author occasionally to divide his Lives on a moral basis. A long list of virtues is
followed by a (usually longer) list of vices. Another good example of this method is to be
found in a rather less lapidary form, at the end of the nineteenth section of the Life of Nero: "I have brought together these
acts of his, some of which are beyond criticism, while others are even deserving of no
slight praise, to separate them from his shameful and criminal deeds, of which I shall now
proceed to give an account."
The corresponding announcement in
the Life of Augustus makes Suetonius achronological
method even more explicit: Having given as it were a summary of his life, I shall now take
up its various phases one by one, not in chronological order, but by classes, to make the
account clearer and more intelligible."The crucial line does not therefore mean that
an initially virtuous Caligula was suddenly transformed into a monster. Even less does it mean that he was transformed into a monster because of the death of his sister, for the reason
that it occurs a full two pages, or numbered sections, before Suetonius deals with the death of Drusilla,
and not immediately after it, as Strauss implies.~ It is true that Drusilla’s death
caused Caligula considerable distress—since he loved her far more than the other
sisters with whom he is accused by Suetonius of living in habitual incest. But Suetonius
certainly does not state that this was the cause of Caligula’s derangement. Rather be
believes that this disorder was either an intensification of the epilepsy he suffered as
a child, or the result of an aphrodisiac administered by Caesonia.24 Furthermore,
he does not imply that this madness resulted in an abrupt deterioration of Caligula’s
moral character. As far as the latter is concerned, Suetonius does not write in fact, of
a sudden transformation at any time in Caligula’s
life. Thus for Suetonius Caligula’s madness is physiological and in no way results
from the death of Drusilla, and secondly is independent of his moral depravity. To
interpret the line: “Thus far we have
spoken of him as a prince. What remains to be said of him bespeaks him rather a monster
than a man” to mean that Suetonius “felt compelled to inject a new note into his
biography of Caligula” is therefore to misunderstand the form of all of Suetonius’
Lives as well as the content of this particular
one.
In addition to the question of the
rapidity or otherwise with which Caligula went a) mad and b) depraved, and the attribution
of these disorders to the shock caused by the death of Drusilla, there is the third
problem of Caligula’s fundamental character. In the preface to the 1958 American
edition of his collected plays Camus wrote of Caligula as being, before the death of
Drusilla, “[un] prince relativement aimable jusque-lâ.” In the
opening scene of the play Cherea voices the generally accepted opinion of all the other
characters that “cet empereur était parfait.” It is above all
Scipion who stresses the moral excellence of Caligula both as a public figure and as a
private individual before the death of Drusilla: "Je l’aime. Il était bon pour
moi. Il m’encourageait et je sais par coeur certaines de ses paroles. Il me disait
que la vie n’est pas facile, mais qu’il y avait la religion, l’art, l’amour
qu’on nous porte. Il repetait souvent que faire souffrir était la seule facon de se
tromper. Il voulait être un homme juste."
But we are justified in wondering
to what extent the Caligula portrayed by Suetonius was ever “cet empereur ...
parfait.” It must be admitted that at the outset of his reign he was enthusiastically
acclaimed by the general population for various reasons of a rather negative nature:
“because of the memory of his father Germanicus and pity for a family that was all
but extinct,” and because of his known passion for sports and spectacles. But there
is no trace in Suetonius of the moral excellence implicit in Scipion’s description of
Caligula: “Il repetait souvent que faire souffrir était la seule facon de se
tromper. Il voulait être un homme juste.” Indeed, Suetonius considers him to have
been quite the contrary in his late adolescence, that is to say six or seven years before
Drusilla’s death: "Yet even at that time he could not control his natural
cruelty and viciousness, but he was a most eager witness of the tortures and executions of
those who suffered punishment, revelling at night in gluttony and adultery, disguised in a
wig and long robe, passionately devoted besides to the theatrical arts of dancing and
singing, in which Tiberius very willingly indulged him, in the hope that through these his
savage nature might be softened. This last was so clearly evident to the shrewd old man,
that he used to say now and then that to allow Gaius to live would prove the ruin of
himself and of all men, and that he was nursing a viper for the Roman people and a Phaeton
for the world."
The meritorious
actions of Caligula on his accession—liberation of prisoners, expulsion of the
spintrians, and various legal and administrative reforms—are considered by
Suetonius to be nothing more than attempts to “rouse men’s devotion by courting
popularity in every way.” The initial popularity of Caligula should not therefore be
thought to be a reflection of genuine and instinctive virtue of the sort that appealed to
Camus’s Cherea and Scipion.
By now the differences which exist
between Camus’ play and the source material from which it is derived should be clear.
Camus has drawn on the anecdotal wealth of Suetonius for most of the incidents which make
up the plot of the play, and has done so fairly accurately, as several critics have
noticed. He has given himself, however, a completely free hand with regard to the factual
essentials: the character and evolution of Caligula, his relationship with Drusilla, and
the origin, nature, and timing of his madness. Insofar as the Julio-Claudian Emperor
portrayed by Suetonius—a most unreliable historian and biographer in any case—possessed
little or no innate virtue, showed signs of depravity from his adolescence onward, went
mad for physiollogical reasons, and was not irrevocably unhinged by the death of his
sister, Camus’s Caligula may be seen to be
even less of an historical play than has previously been thought. All the more credit must
go to Camus for the ingenuity with which he has adapted the Drusila incident in a way
which is convincing in the context of the Caligula myth—it can hardly be described as
anything else—as propagated by Suetonius, and yet which at the same time serves his
purpose of illustrating “le sens de la mort.” The Life is ideally suited to this end, with its
jumbled presentation cutting completely across chronological lines, its constant
recourse to hyperbole, fantastic rumor, and transparent propaganda, and—when the
author manifests something approaching a scientific spirit—its occasional advancement
of different versions of the same anecdote. As presented by Suetonius, a macabre Homer of
Roman biography, the myths of Tiberius, Nero, Caligula, and the rest have almost the same
power of evocation in the modern consciousness as the myths of the participants in the
Trojan War. The difference—and this is perhaps where Suetonius has served Camus most
usefully—is that, paradoxically, they give an overall impression of being myths not
so much of action as of situation. They have little “plot” and do not narrate a
saga of consecutive and logically motivated deeds in a dramatic order, but instead
constitute a composite presentation of a state of tyranny and moral decay. It is possible
to discern a common pattern: the absolute ruler, scorning ethical principles, embarks upon
a campaign of increasingly brutal oppression, which inevitably leads to his
assassination. But what matters is less the course of each Life than the atmosphere—one of terror,
suspicion and decay. The twin themes are death and gratuitousness. The Lives of the Caesar is indeed the ideal raw
material out of which to forge a myth of the absurd.
It is of more than passing
interest, finally, to consider how Camus came to be interested in Suetonius. One of the
works which made the greatest impact on Camus in his formative years was a collection of
meditative and semi-autobiographical essays, Les
Iles, by his friend and teacher, Jean Grenier. In one of the essays, a particularly
sensitive one called “L’Ile de Paques,” Grenier treats the themes of
isolation and death (“ce fait aveuglant et écrasant de la mort”) in a way that
could not fail to appeal to Camus at this time. It is in this essay that Grenier explains
the title of the whole collection: "D’oü vient i’impression d’étouffement
qu’on éprouve en pensant a des iles? Ou a-t-on pourtant mieux que dans une ile l’air
du large, la mer libre a tous les horizons, ou peut-on mieux vivre dans l’exaltation
physique? Mais on y est “isolé” (n’est-ce pas l’étymologie) Une ile
ou un homme seul. Des lies ou des hommes seuls."
The narrator describes his relationship
with an invalid, a simple, uneducated man and very much “un homme seul,” being a
paranoiac, who esteems his company for his enlightened conversation. The invalid senses
that death may be imminent and tries to elicit the narrator’s opinion about the
possibility of “la vie future,” evidently considering him a likely actuary of
such metaphysical hazards (“vous qui avez fait des etudes”). But the narrator
hedges, for this is by no means his province: “Je ne sais si le boucher s’en
rendait compte: ce qui rendait possibles nos conversations a nous qui n’avions rien
de commun, c’êtait une épouvante commune et quotidienne de mourrir.” And in
fact, just as it had always been his custom in the past to avoid such speculation by means
of a heavy program of reading and cultural activity, so he now tries to distract his
friend: "Pour éviter qu’il ne m’interrogeat de nouveau, je pris l’habitude
de porter un livre quelconque dont je lui lisais quelques passages. Ses goiits ne
ressemblaient guêre aux miens. Ii n’aima pas un romancier qui pourtant parlait en
termes pathétiques de la vie et de La mort. “En voilâ un, disait-il, qui doit avoir
son bifteck cuit tous les jours.” J e lui apportai Suétone (je préparais un examen
de latin). Les vies de Tibère et de Caligula le ravirent et c’était signe qu’il
allait mieux. Dieu sait queues atrocités Suétone raconte. Chez le boucher ce n’était
pas du tout plaisir de ‘decadent’ mais plaisir très humain et três naturel de
l’homme bien portant, comme un dieu ou un enfant s’amusant aux récits de
massacres. Voyant qu’on se prepare a tuer une victime sur l’autel Caligula
saisit a pleines mains le maillet et assomme le sacrificateur. Un jour ii fait tuer tous
les inculpés, témoins, avocats d’un procès en criant: “Ils sont tous aussi
coupables.” Si l’on faisait son testament en sa faveur pour lui plaire, il
vous faisait empoisonner, disant que sans cela le testament eüt été une plaisanterie.
Je ne goütais guère que la couleur locale de ces histoires dont quelques-unes sont bien
plus belles—et n’en voyais pas le sens
profond." “Voilâ
des durs, disait le boucher. Ah! Que la vie est belle! Votre lecture m’a fait du
bien.” Ce n’était qu’un mieux passager.
Having thus been distracted from mortal
speculation by this macabre encyclopedia of death, the butcher dies and the essay ends on
this ironic note. The enigmatic allusion to “le sens profond” has subsequently
been explained by Grenier: “j’ai du en parler [de Suétone] plusieurs fois a
Albert Camus en en faisant ressortir le sens nietzschéen de vies comme celles de
Caligula.” In one of his earliest works, an “Essai sur la musique,”
written shortly after he had come under the influence of Grenier in the 1ère supérieure at the Lycée d’Ager, Camus was
writing of Greek civilization in precisely Nietzschean terms, those of the Birth of Tragedy, which will find a direct echo
in Caligula a few years later: "En effet, l’apollonisme et le dionysisme résultent du besoin de fuir
une vie trop douloureuse. Les Grecs ont été déchires par les luttes politiques, par l’ambition,
par la jalousie, par toutes sortes de violences. Mais, direz-vous, il en est de même pour
d’autres peuples? En effet. Mais par leur sensibilité et par leur emotivité, les
Grecs ont été les plus aptes a la souffrance. Ils ont plus cruellement senti l’horreur
de leur vie et ont été ainsi fatalement destinés au dionysisme barbare. De la le
besoin de remédier a ces horreurs sauvages, en créant des forines ou plutôt des rêves,
plus beaux que chez aucun autre peuple. Et pour cela us se sont servis de la danse et de
la musique."
This immediately suggests a link
between Caligula and “le sens nietzchéen”
which Grenier attached to the original Suetonius account. The Emperor transforms himself
into Venus, “Déesse des douleurs et de la danse” and justifies himself with an
argument which appears to be directly inspired by Der
Wille zur Macht: "Tout
ce qu’on peut me reprocher aujourd’hui, c’est d’avoir fait encore un
petit progrès sur la voie de la puissance et de la liberté. Pour un homme qui aime le
pouvoir, la rivalité des dieux a quelque chose d’agaçant. J’ai supprimé cela.
J’ai prouve a ces dieux illusoires qu’un homme, s’il en a la volonté, peut
exercer, sans apprentissage, leur métier ridicule." But
this Appolonian antidote to suffering is only a masquerade, a game played in front of a
mirror. Right until the end of the play Caligula appears to be content with his “dionysisine
barbare”: “je vis, je tue, j’exerce le pouvoir délirant du destructeur,
auprès de quoi celui de créateur parait une singerie.” However, it is the failure
of Hélicon to bring the moon which elevates Caligula to the truly Nietzschean plane of anagnorisis at the end of the play: “Je n’ai
pas pris la voie qu’il fallait, je n’aboutis a rien. Ma liberté n’est pas
la bonne.” It remains for Caligula to shatter the mirror of delusion and be struck
down by the mediocre, but relatively harmless, representatives of humanity. Critics have
interpreted the direction “Cherea [le frappe] en pleine figure” to indicate
Cherea’s “loyalty” in contrast with the blow delivered by the old
patrician. It would, however, have been just as loyal, and yet less brutal, for him to
stab Caligula from the front, but in the body instead
of in the face. Cherea’s earlier remark to Caligula that “on ne peut pas amer
celui de ses visages qu’on essaie de masquer en soi” suggests that there is
rather a symbolic significance to this precise blow. Cherea, the true Dionysus-Apollo
synthesis, shatters the mask of the false one, of the unbridled and self-deluding Dionysus
which he himself might have become.
It
is no doubt from this Nietzchean perspective that it is most appropriate to end an
examination of this highly unusual play. At the prompting of Jean Grenier, Camus has
succeeded in turning a late-Roman ragbag of prurience and propaganda into a tragedy which,
relative to the transpositions of Cocteau, Giraudoux, Anouilh, et al., is more metaphysical, more primordial,
and—why not ?—more Greek.
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