The Seven Basic Plots - Christopher Booker [134]
Tannhauser
A very different tragedy which shows the hero going through a profound and positive change of heart is Wagner's opera Tannhauser. Again, the move towards light is not enough to save the hero from catastrophe, but this time there is more of a hint of hope at the end.
When we first meet Tannhauser, he is in the Frustration Stage of his story. For a year he has been living on the Venusberg, the mountain of Venus, enjoying with the goddess the delights of sensual love, in a prolonged Dream Stage. But he has found the dream insubstantial, and now he yearns for something more satisfying. Escaping back to the real world, he finds that a song contest has been arranged and that the prize is the hand of the pure and beautiful Elizabeth, who has long loved and waited for him. She is his `good angel'. Tannhauser enters the contest, but when his turn comes to sing he is still so infected with the poison of Venus, his `evil angel', that he cannot help singing shamelessly of her delights. Everyone is outraged, except the faithful Elizabeth. When the hero `comes to himself' again, he is filled with remorse, and Elizabeth's father orders him to go to Rome to seek full absolution from the Pope.
A long time elapses, and Elizabeth goes out to watch in vain for Tannhauser's return. She gives up hope. Finally he appears, broken and weary, and we learn that the Pope has decreed it would no more be possible for him to grant Tannhauser forgiveness than for his papal staff to bring forth leaves. Tannhauser, in despair, is for the last time tempted to return to his dream-life with Venus, who appears to him in a vision, but when he invokes the name of Elizabeth, the goddess disappears. In fact Elizabeth, equally despairing of ever being united with her love, had died of sorrow. Tannhauser sees her body being carried past, embraces her and dies. Pilgrims enter, carrying the Pope's wooden staff. It has put forth both leaves and flowers. Tannhauser's sin has been purged. He has at last been united with his `good angel', if only in death.
Both Tannhauser and King Lear show their hero going through a change of heart under the inspiration of his `good angel', which begins to reverse the downward tendency of the plot, drawing it upwards again towards a happy ending - though neither quite reach it. In our next example, the downward tendency is similarly reversed, although this time not through the hero discovering his capacity for true love so much as through him recovering his masculine strength. Once again it is not enough to save him from the ultimate disaster which his initial weakness has set in train, but his `return to himself' is sufficient to change the whole character of the story's ending.
Samson
For twenty years Samson has been a judge over Israel. We know three things about him. The first is that he possesses superhuman strength, which is particularly important since his people are locked in continual conflict with their deadly rivals, the Philistines. The second is that he has long hair, in which somehow the secret of his strength resides; if it is ever cut, he will become as weak as any ordinary mortal. The third is that he already has another weakness, for women.
One day he goes out to sleep with a prostitute, and while he is with her he is nearly trapped by the Philistines. Only his superhuman strength enables him to escape. But it is a warning of what is to come. Next he falls in love with another woman, Delilah, and this time the Philistines are more cunning. They realise that it is no good tackling him on his superior function, his physical strength: they must go behind it, to his weakness, and they bribe Delilah to use her loving