is not a little
difficulty in grasping the theory upon which he has assorted his immense
collection into exactly three dozen divisions. The logic of his grouping
is not immediately apparent, as it would have been had he taken the
passions, for instance, as the several foundations. His first situation,
for example, is that which we find in one of the earliest of Greek
plays, the 'Suppliants.' M. Polti entitles it 'To Implore,' and he
indicates varying possible subdivisions: (A1) Fugitives imploring
shelter against their enemies, as in the tragedy of AEschylus, the second
act of Shakspere's 'King John,' and repeatedly in 'Uncle Tom's Cabin';
(B1) the ship-wrecked imploring hospitality, as in more than one ancient
drama. But this first situation of his M. Polti finds to be infrequent
on the modern stage, altho often met with in the Greek theater. His
second situation, which we may call 'To Rescue from Imminent Danger,'
has been widely popular alike with the ancients and the moderns, so we
have in subdivision (A) a condemned person rescued by a hero, as in the
myth of Andromeda, the folk-tale of Bluebeard, and the first act of
'Lohengrin'; and in subdivision (B2) a condemned person rescued by a
guest of the house, as in the 'Alcestis' of Euripides.

These two situations, however, are far less effective in evoking the
special pleasure proper to the theater than the nineteenth on M. Polti's
list, "To kill unknowingly one of your own blood." The full force of the
theatric effect of this situation is dependent on the spectators'
complete knowledge of the relationship of slayer and slain, unsuspected
by the victims themselves; and the strength of the situation resides not
in the mere killing, which may indeed be averted at the last moment, but
in the steadily gathering dread which ought to accompany the
preparations for the evil deed. This situation in one or another of its
subdivisions we find in 'Nicholas Nickleby,' as well as in 'OEdipus
the King' and in 'Lady Inger of Ostraat'; in Sophocles it is a son who
murders his unknown father, and in Ibsen it is a mother who murders her
unknown son. It is to be found in the 'Semiramis' of Voltaire, in the
'Merope' of Alfieri, in the 'Ion' of Euripides, and again and again in
Victor Hugo's dramas. M. Polti points out that this single situation is
utilized as the culminating point at the very end of four of Hugo's
plays--the 'Burgraves,' 'Marie Tudor,' 'Lucrece Borgia' and 'Le Roi
s'am