THE CHARACTERS OF SERVANTS IN TITUŠ (TITO) BREZOVAČKI’S PLAYS

Abstract

The starting point of this paper is the notion that in Tito Brezovački’s plays the characters of servants have an important role and a privileged place – that of social testimonies. This paper is focused on investigating the features of representation and the roles of servants in two key plays: the hagiographic play Sveti Aleksij (1786) and the play Diogeneš iliti sluga dveh zgubljenih bratov (c. 1805). The plays are first situated within the temporal context after which the features of the characters of servants Favorin and Diogeneš are compared primarily in relation with the genre and comic conventions. The focus is then shifted towards the interpretation of their discourses with respect to the philosophical and/or ideological notions that they support and the critical-satirical reflections which direct interpretation towards coeval socio-political reality. Favorin has the role of the bearer of comical-entertaining parts and his function is to relieve the dominant tragic-pathetic tone, while in the philosophical context he is the conveyer of moralistic-deterministic ideological determinants. The character of Diogeneš (although he has, just like Favorin, inherited some typical comedic conventions in the display of willy servants) represents the transformed character of critical-satirical servant partly in accordance with the conventions of the emerging sentimental drama and drame bourgeois. Since he unites all the dramaturgical layers of the play the key socio-political aspects of the play are uncovered through his mediation. Given his role and purpose in the plot, along with the Kantian notion of Enlightenment and Hegelian dialectic of the master servant relationship, new possible socio-political implications of this enlightenment play are proposed in the context of the emergence of new social order.