Racine's Play, Britannicus

The purpose of this research is to explore the tragedy Britannicus by Jean Racine. The plan of the research will be to discuss the outline of action, and then to set forth the criticism surrounding the play, so as to reveal its principal themes and the elements of the drama that provide the most significance in the modern period.

The action of Britannicus is based on historical fact, and it is built around the decision by the firstcentury A.D. Emperor Nero to murder his adoptive half brother Britannicus, who was his closest rival for the throne until disinherited by Claudius. Urged by one evil advisor, his tutor Narcissus, to eliminate Britannicus, and by another honorable advisor, his mentor Burrus, to treat him with dignity, Nero sides with Narcissus, at once cementing his supremacy in Rome and establishing the murderous pattern of all his subsequent actions. Tilley refers to the process of Nero's decision as a contest between his good and evil genius (Tilley 26). Nero succumbs in part to what turn out to be Narcissus's political ambitions, in part to his lust for Britannicus's betrothed June, and in part to his wish to be rid of what has been the overriding influence of his powerhungry mother Agrippina, who had murdered Nero's predecessor (and her husband) Claudius so that Nero could ascend to the throne. Within this framework of action, Nero abducts June because marriage between her and Britannicus could constitute a claim to the throne. When she is brought

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ly structured and eloquent drama. The true antagonists are Nero and Agrippina, between whom there is no moral issue, only a question of power. The young Britannicus and Junie, who love each other, are children. Whether they live or die, the fate of Rome will be unaltered. Britannicus is killed and Junie escapes from Nero by becoming a vestal virgin. Rome will be controlled by one or the other of the two evil persons in the drama, and it is hardly thinkable that Rome under Agrippina would be different from Rome under Nero. How can the death of Britannicus affects us tragically, then? The play, in its psychology and rhetoric, is "for connoisseurs," as Voltaire noted, but certainly not for connoisseurs of tragedy (Abel 18). The incompleteness of Abel's argument confuses it. Granting that Britannicus may not be tragic by the lights of metatheatre's prophet, what is it that drives the action of the play? Abel does not answer this question directly, for his concern is to show that even classical and neoclassical plays that are termed tragedies do not meet the psychosocial or moral criteria of tragedy established by the Greeks (and Abel

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