the juxtaposition of time in constructing the classicism-romanticism conflict in stoppard’s...

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EXTENDED ESSAY COVER PAGE

Subject

English A1

Group

1 Language (group 1 or 2 subjects only) English

Title

The juxtaposition of time in constructing the Classicism-Romanticism conflict in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia

Word count

Essay 3999 Abstract 256

Candidate session number

0 0 2 3 2 9 3 5 8

Candidate name

Ada Yeo Ying Hua

Examination session

November

Year

2009

Candidate Name: Ada Yeo Ying Hua Candidate Session Number: 002329-358 Title: The juxtaposition of time in constructing the Classicism-Romanticism conflict in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia

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Abstract

This extended essay critically analyses the role played by the juxtaposition of time in

constructing the Classicism-Romanticism conflict in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia.

It is argued that the juxtaposition of time, as a dramatic structure, creates in the play

various sub-conflicts— Geometry v. Nature, Logic v. Intuition, Order v. Disorder, and Rationality

v. Sexual Impulse— from which the central Classicism-Romanticism tension stems. This is

achieved through four main mechanisms, each of which is examined systematically in the

investigation: (1) the juxtaposition of landscape, which subsequently lends itself to the

personification of the Classical and the Romantic temperaments, (2) the superior perspective

offered to the audience, (3) the centralisation of the setting, and (4) of the sexuality manifest in

the human interactions of the play.

The discussion aims to offer possible interpretations of the ways in which Stoppard has

created and developed the tension between Classicism and Romanticism in Arcadia. It will

consider not only the literary and symbolic functions of predominant motifs, themes, and

characters in contributing to this conflict, but also the root nature of this clash.

The course of this essay shows Stoppard’s juxtaposition of time to be the fundamental

impetus for the Classicism-Romanticism conflict: his circumvention of time’s linearity is what

allows him the polarisation of the antithetical elements present in the play. It is found that the

motif of dualism manifests itself strongly throughout Arcadia, as evidenced by dual symbols

such as fire and the piano. Further to this motif, the various sub-conflicts suggested are shown

to embrace essentially a tension of opposites.

Word Count: 256


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Table of Contents

Abstract ..……………………………………………………………………………………………….…2

Table of Contents ……………………………………………………………………………………..…3 Essay:

Introduction ...……………………...………………………………………………….……….4-5

Geometry v. Nature ……………………………………………………………………………..5 Logic v. Intuition …………………………………………………………………….…………5-7 Order v. Disorder ……………………………………………………………………….……7-11 Rationality v. Sexual Impulse ……………………………………………………………..11-16

Conclusion ………………………...………………………………………………………..16-17

Bibliography ………………………………………………………………………………..……..…19-20 Appendix A: ET IN ARCADIA EGO (1637-39) by Nicolas Poussin ……………………………….21


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Essay

The research focus of this essay, the juxtaposition of time in constructing the

Classicism-Romanticism conflict in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia, calls for an exploration of the

following: where and how exactly juxtaposition of time is used in the play; whether there is

consistent pattern of such use; if so, how its usage creates the thematic implications achieving

and furthering such conflict. These focal points will be investigated by way of arguing that

Stoppard uses the juxtaposition of time to construct certain sub-conflicts, leading to the

overarching polarisation of Classicism and Romanticism. This is accomplished through four

mechanisms: (1) the juxtaposition of landscape and subsequently personification, (2) the

superior perspective offered to the audience, (3) the centralisation of setting, and (4) of the

sexuality manifest in the human interactions of the play. The aforementioned sub-conflicts are

Geometry v. Nature, Logic v. Intuition, Order v. Disorder, and Rationality v. Sexual Impulse—

each will be systematically examined in this essay.

The Classicism-Romanticism conflict is what Stoppard identifies as the clash between

“those who have particular respect for logic, geometry and pattern, and those with a much more

spontaneous, unstructured communion with nature.” 1 Significantly, this was his “original

impetus”2 for Arcadia, and is the central conflict around which the play revolves— the intention

of this essay is thus to discuss the juxtaposition of time as root of this dynamic. Accordingly, the

juxtaposition of time will be defined in context of the play’s dramatic structure: it is the

conscious, constant alternation of scenes in different time periods, namely between 1809-1812

and “the present day”3; however, all action is confined to “a room on the garden front”4 of Sidley

1 David Nathan, “In a Country Garden (If It Is a Garden),” in Tom Stoppard in Conversation, ed. Paul Delaney (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994), 262. 2 Ibid., 261. 3 Tom Stoppard, Arcadia (London: Faber & Faber, 1993), 19. 4 Ibid., 1.


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Park, a large country house in Derbyshire. The two historical periods alternate, scene by scene

in the same theatrical space until they converge inexplicably in the final scene, where the

characters transgress their temporal boundaries in an act of simultaneity.

Firstly, the juxtaposition of time is the fundamental driving force for the subsequent

juxtaposition of two different landscape movements experienced by Sidley Park in the play—

the changes brought about by 180 years on one piece of space is what is being explored. In this

way, Stoppard creates the conflict between Classicism and Romanticism by projecting their

respective inclinations onto the surrounding landscape. The existing Classical, geometrical

landscape of Sidley Park in 1809, where even “the right amount of sheep are tastefully

arranged,”5 has given way to Romantic wilderness and irregularity by 1812, the picturesque6

style of which the park still prevails in the present day. Although display of the landscape is

specified to be absent from the stage, its presence features significantly in the plot, often hinting

at a larger tension: the 1809 sequence relates the beginning imposition of the “modern style”7

on the Classical scheme of Sidley Park, while the present-day sequence is driven partly by a

historian’s (Hannah Jarvis) search for the identity of the Sidley hermit, her “peg for the nervous

breakdown of the Romantic Imagination.”8 Hence, the juxtaposition of landscape plays an

important role in the creation of the Classicism-Romanticism conflict, functioning as a direct,

metaphorically physical allusion to the clash between the Geometrical and the Natural.

However, a more compelling argument for the significance of this juxtaposition of

landscape may be in its representation of the different zeitgeists of each historical period, as 5 Stoppard, 16. 6 The picturesque is “an extreme application of the idea that art should imitate nature…it made great use of jagged irregular lines and represents the furthest possible remove from geometrical regularity.” [Tom Turner, Garden Design in the British Isles History and Styles since 1650 (Woodbridge: Antique Collectors’ Club, 1986), The Garden and Landscape Guide, ed. Tom Turner. Last Accessed 15 July 2009 <http://www.gardenvisit.com/history_theory/library_online_ebooks/tom_turner_english_garden_design/picturesque_style_of_planting_design>]. 7 Stoppard, 13. 8 Ibid., 33.


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embodied by the characters living in them. This allows Stoppard to personify the Classical and

Romantic sensibilities— more specifically, the opposing archetypal inclinations of Logic and

Intuition— developing the Classicism-Romanticism conflict. For example, the mid-eighteenth

century character Septimus, an exemplar of the Enlightenment, is introduced into the play as a

“classical optimist...completely imperturbable.”9 Nevertheless, he spends the rest of his life as a

hermit, driven to madness over the untimely death of his gifted student, Thomasina. He iterates

her equations manually for 22 years despite them being calculable with only a computer, trying

desperately to disprove her instinctive discovery of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In

doing so, he emerges ironically as his temperamental opposite, “a full-blooded Romantic”10

shrouded in a reconstructed wilderness, driven to “cabalistic proofs that the world was coming to

an end.”11 Here, the sudden inversion of the Classical and Romantic temperaments in a singular

character further exposes their incongruity.

In addition, the present-day historians Hannah and Bernard are established throughout

the text as foils to each other, escalating the tension between Classicism and Romanticism in

the play. Hannah, like the early Septimus, is depicted as a typical classicist. Her humanistic

inclination towards logic and her aversion to romantic attitudes are embellished in many

instances. From the outset, Stoppard has specified her appearance and behaviour to be

grounded and sensible: “She wears nothing frivolous. Her shoes are suitable for the garden”12;

she is distinctly characterised by her “classical reserve”13; the protagonist of her best-selling

book Caro, which ironically means “feminine” is reminiscent of Hannah, a “closet intellectual

9 Paul Edwards, “Science in Hapgood and Arcadia,” in The Cambridge Companion to Tom Stoppard, ed. Katherine E. Kelly (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 182. 10 Ibid. 11 Stoppard, 36. 12 Ibid., 20. 13 Ibid., 99.


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shafted by a male society.”14 Most tellingly, she extols the Classical landscape of the past— she

calls it a “paradise in the age of reason” 15 — while demonstrating obvious distaste for

Romanticism, which to her is a “sham…a setting of cheap thrills and false emotion.”16 Hannah

often clashes verbally with Bernard, who represents the Romantic inclination of Intuition.

Stoppard has similarly specified Bernard’s “tendency to dress flamboyantly,” 17 and places

constant emphasis on his impulsiveness, what he calls the “part of you which doesn’t reason.”18

Hence, by personifying respectively Logic and Intuition in Hannah and Bernard, Stoppard is able

to exploit the rift between Classicism and Romanticism, providing the audience with additional

insight into each worldview and how they may conflict.

Secondly, Stoppard’s juxtaposition of scenes in alternate time periods confers upon us,

the audience, a perspective vastly superior to that of the characters. We are able to gain access

to the change in zeitgeist between the two historical periods: the mid-eighteenth century set of

characters demonstrate the “Enlightenment impression that Newton’s science can sort out the

universe; everything may eventually prove capable of being explained, and even predicted,”

while in the present day these Classical certainties have all but collapsed.19 Thus, our privileged

perspective allows us to observe this dissolution of order, in the process creating implicitly a

major antithetical theme in the play, Order v. Disorder— clearly a subsidiary conflict between

that of Classicism and Romanticism. I have termed Stoppard’s creation of this sub-conflict

implicit as I believe the superior perspective of the audience outside of the play to be the source

of its engendering. The gradual change from the original state of order in the Sidley Park of

1809 to the disorder present in the modern era is attributed to the one-way, post-Newtonian

14 Stoppard, 17. 15 Ibid., 36. 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid., 20. 18 Ibid., 66. 19 Jim Hunter, About Stoppard: The Playwright and the Work (London: Faber & Faber, 2005), 28.


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Second Law of Thermodynamics20 associated with time’s arrow (i.e. linear progression)— the

consequential information loss is manifested throughout the play as a sub-theme.

This sub-theme of information loss is captured in a prominent episode in Scene 3, set in

1809, where Septimus and Thomasina are having a “‘Latin unseen’ lesson… [Thomasina being

described as] having some difficulty.”21 She is unaware that the text that Septimus has set her is

a Latin translation of the famous set-piece describing Cleopatra, from Shakespeare’s Antony

and Cleopatra— “The barge she sat in, like a burnish’d throne,” et cetera:

THOMASINA. …was like to – something – by, with or from lovers – oh, Septimus![…]

Regina reclinabat…the queen – was reclining – praeter descriptionem – indescribably –

in a golden tent…like Venus and yet more –

SEPTIMUS. Try to put some poetry into it.

THOMASINA. How can I if there is none in the Latin? (Stoppard, 46-7)

According to Edwards, the significance of Thomasina’s “stumbling version proves that

translation is a one-way process, and that what is once lost remains lost.”22 Therefore, we see

that Thomasina’s quest to restore order— to reclaim the “lost” poetry the text had once been in

English— has failed, creating a stark contrast between the original orderly state and the

“disorder” present after translation. This is a microcosm of the present-day situation underway in

Sidley Park, where modern characters Hannah, Bernard, and Valentine are struggling to

understand the past fully, but are unsuccessful for largely the same reasons. Stoppard

20 The Second Law of Thermodynamics “formulated in 1865 by the German physicist Rudolf Clausius…states that an increase in entropy [dispersal of heat into its surroundings] corresponds to a loss of information.” (Edwards, 180) 21 Stoppard, 46. 22 Edwards, 179.


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foreshadows the eventual development of this sub-theme by establishing in the introductory

scene of the play the absurdity of trying to “stir backward.”23

As mentioned, much of the plot of Arcadia is founded on the basis of modern scholars

trying to ascertain fully the events of the past. The sub-theme of information loss appears

recursively when they fail in their attempts, the reason being the “noise” phenomenon— what

Valentine, a modern mathematician, explains as “Distortions. Interference.”24; it is the chief

problem in his research. He compares it a piano playing a tune, “very hard to spot the tune…it’s

playing your song, but unfortunately it’s out of whack, some of the strings are missing, and the

pianist is tone deaf and drunk – I mean, the noise! Impossible!”25 Significantly, Stoppard

employs the playing of an actual piano randomly throughout the play as an aural device

sustaining the motif of disorder stemming from the creation of “noise”. However, the piano music

is at the same time paradoxically representative of the creation of order, for “patterns [are]

making themselves out of nothing.”26 The duality of the piano as a symbol thus suggests the

singularity of Order vs. Disorder as a theme, for both elements are formally dependent on each

other for definition, as with Classicism and Romanticism. Indeed, as Stoppard remarks, the

antithetical nature of such conflicts often lends themselves “to play out in a sort of infinite

leapfrog.”27

In addition to the piano, the symbol of fire and its terminal corollary of ash are also

invoked in Arcadia as a manifestation of the thermodynamic effect of the Second Law, which

results in information loss caused by entropy as aforementioned. Fire comes to symbolise

irreversible loss, permanent destruction, and ultimately disorder. It appears in many instances,

23 Stoppard, 6. 24 Ibid., 60. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid., 101. 27 Jim Hunter, Tom Stoppard: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead, Jumpers, Travesties, Arcadia (London: Faber & Faber, 2000), 17.


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increasing the distribution of the sub-theme: Thomasina laments the burning of the great library

of Alexandria; Septimus’s and Lord Byron’s letters are burnt; the hermit’s writings were “made a

bonfire”28 of; the dialogue between the two sets of characters in the final scene bemoans the

inevitable heat death of the universe; most importantly, we learn that Thomasina was burnt to

death in a fire on the eve of her seventeenth birthday.

From here, it can be seen that the idea of irreversible destruction is also linked to the

motif of death, similarly a metaphor for disorder in Arcadia: the sound of sporadic gunshots

(again, the idea of “noise”) encapsulates Septimus’s declaration that Sidley Park has “a

calendar of slaughter”29; Ezra Chater challenges Septimus to a duel in an attempt to defend his

wife’s honour; the plot is partly driven by Bernard’s persistence in proving correct his theory that

Septimus’s schoolmate, Lord Byron, had seduced Chater’s wife and later killed Chater.

Furthermore, the Latin phrase from which the play takes its title, Et in Arcadia ego, serves as a

painful reminder of mortality against the backdrop of the paradisal English country house.

Translated unconventionally by Septimus as “‘Even in Arcadia, there am I!’,”30 Edwards remarks

that “the whole play can be seen as an exemplar of the inscription traced on the tomb by the

[Arcadian] shepherds in Poussin’s reflection on the traditional pastoral idyll: ‘Et in Arcadia

Ego.’31…it is death that is present, even in this aristocratic idyll.”32 Hence, it can be concluded

that the symbol of fire, alongside the motif of death, are appropriate representations of Disorder

intended to bring into contrast implicitly the much-idealised, but unattainable, state of Order.

Thirdly, Stoppard’s juxtaposition of time serves to emphasise the centrality of the play’s

setting, in the process underpinning again the same conflict between Order and Disorder, but

28 Stoppard, 37. 29 Ibid., 18. 30 Ibid. 31 Refer to Appendix A. 32 Edwards, 176.


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this time round explicitly. This is achieved by introducing a physical and spatial awareness into

the audience’s consciousness as the play progresses. As specified in the stage directions, “the

action of the play shuttles back and forth between the early nineteenth century and the present

day, always in this same room…The general appearance of the room should offend neither

period.”33 This common minimalist theatrical space therefore becomes a “closed system” where

disorder tends towards a maximum, due to Stoppard’s deliberate assertion of power over the

Second Law of Thermodynamics. This chaos is reflected in many aspects of the play, some of

which have been discussed: the progressive loss of knowledge and truth; the manifestations of

fire and “noise”; the converging human interactions (addressed in the final point); the

overlapping of props on the table present in the setting.

Stoppard specifies that all props should be limited to the table in the room, which “during

the course of the play, collects this and that,”34 and by the end has become “an inventory of

objects.”35 Minor anachronisms become a “theatrical feature”36: books are made to “exist in both

old and new versions,”37 an apple and its leaf, a pet tortoise (Plautus/Lightning), and even an

actor playing the teenage sons of the Croom Family (Lord Augustus/Gus) in different historical

periods are doubled. 38 It is Stoppard’s intention that “everything becomes loud and

overlapped”39— the visual display of disorder and uncertainty reflecting that of the play’s

increasingly confused progression explicitly develops the tension between Order and Disorder,

and, by extension, Classicism and Romanticism.

33 Stoppard, 19. 34 Ibid., 19. 35 Ibid., 20. 36 Hunter, 2000. 193. 37 Stoppard, 19. 38 Hunter, 2005. 91. 39 Stoppard, 76.


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Lastly, likewise the setting, the juxtaposition of time serves to emphasise the centrality

that sexuality occupies in the human interactions of Sidley Park. For despite both sets of

characters being 180 years apart, “the underlying scheme is as elaborate as in a farce: almost

every character is partly driven or perplexed by sexual feeling.”40 A few examples to illustrate

my point: Septimus is in love with Lady Croom in 1809, but has sex with Mrs Chater in an

attempt to be rid of his “agony of unrelieved desire”41; the wanton Mrs Chater sleeps too with

Lord Byron; Thomasina at 13 is eager to learn about sex, and at 16 is sexually attracted to

Septimus, inviting him to her room; Chloë is caught having sex in the cottage with Bernard by

her mother; Bernard invites Hannah to London with him for some casual sex nearing the end of

the play. It is important, amidst this chaos, to note that the focus here is not on sexuality per se,

but rather the irrationality of sexuality, wholly embraced by the Romantic sensibility. Hence, the

heightened emphasis placed on this intricate web of sexual relations foregrounds the inherent

incompatibility between rationality and sexual impulse, which in turn serves the construction of

the Classicism-Romanticism conflict. This thematic concern is manifested in the play mainly

through the use of two central symbols: once again fire, and that of the apple.

In addition to the irreversible destruction suggested earlier in the essay, fire also comes

to symbolise passion, “the action of bodies in heat.”42 Here, the symbol of fire is imbued with the

quality of unpredictability— uncontrollable once ignited. The allure causing this impulsive

irrationality is personified chiefly in Mrs Chater, who had an illicit affair with Septimus in 1809,

triggering the subsequent chain of events driving the sequence. Mrs Chater’s notoriety, as

described by Septimus, is for “a readiness that keeps her in a state of tropical humidity as would

40 Hunter, 2000. 181. 41 Stoppard, 95. 42 Ibid., 111.


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grow orchids in her drawers in January”43; the idea of heat and fire here is invoked as being

highly symbolic of sexual energy and fecundity.

The pervasiveness of this sexual energy is underpinned in the play by an aural motif

(similar to the piano music) in the 1809-1812 scenes— a constant thumping sound, coming from

landscape architect Noakes’s new steam engine. This link is established in a subtle stage

direction in Scene 7, where Lady Croom is offstage playing a duet on the piano with her latest

conquest, Count Zelinsky44: “The piano music becomes rapidly more passionate, and then

breaks off suddenly in mid-phrase. There is an expressive silence next door which makes

Septimus raise his eyes....The silence allows us to hear the distant regular thump of the steam

engine….”45 Here, the sound of heat has twofold implications. On one hand, it symbolises heat

energy, which gives “the power to drive Mr Noakes’s engine.”46 On the other, it acquires a

sexual agency of its own, infusing the play with an erotic urgency compelling the characters

towards each other, until both historical periods converge into one. The emphasis on the

Romantic, sexual impulses experienced by almost all of the characters— most of whom are

highly intelligent— brings into question their apparent rationality, heightening the tension

between Classicism and Romanticism.

Next, an apple— “the same apple from all appearances”47— surfaces sporadically in the

play: at the end of Scene 2, Valentine’s teenage brother, Gus, who is infatuated with Hannah,

offers her an apple; at the start of Scene 3, Septimus, in the mid-eighteenth century, eats the

same apple; Thomasina, engaged in discovering a “Geometry of Irregular Forms,”48 tries to plot

43 Stoppard, 9. 44 Hersh Zeifman, “The comedy of Eros: Stoppard in love,” in The Cambridge Companion to Tom Stoppard, ed. Katherine E. Kelly (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 188. 45 Stoppard, 108-9. 46 Ibid., 116. 47 Ibid., 46. 48 Ibid., 56.


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an apple leaf and deduce its equation; we observe a parallel when her modern successor

Valentine examines the apple leaf as “a mathematical object.”49 Hannah’s acceptance of Gus’s

apple may be interpreted as a symbolic attempt by Stoppard to show the inescapability of

sexual attraction even in Classicists such as Hannah— she finally concedes near the end of the

play, “like two marbles rolling around a pudding basin. One of them is always sex,”50 soon after

that accepting Gus’s invitation to dance at “a decorous distance.” 51 Similar to the

aforementioned singularity of Order v. Disorder as a theme, the contradictory elements of

Rationality and Sexual Impulse are shown as being inextricable from each other— Hunter

comments that Hannah “sums up the tension in 1809 between the Classical and the Gothic-

Romantic.”52

In a more complex analysis, Anne Barton argues that the apple is “an object that

gradually comes to symbolise…the perils of sexuality, any paradise that is lost, and the

introduction of death into the world after the Fall.”53 In a biblical reading, the apple may be

interpreted traditionally as a symbol of desire, the sweetness of flesh forbidden. In Genesis,

both Adam and Eve (Adam being tempted by Eve) ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good

and Evil despite knowing of God’s prohibition. The modern historian Bernard draws an allusion

to this biblical symbolism in his rhetoric, positing that there exists a lost letter from Lord Byron to

Septimus Hodge confirming his theories about the past, “it was the woman who bade me eat,

dear Hodge! – what a tragic business.” 54 The symbol of the apple can thus be said to

encapsulate, paradoxically, the tension between sexual impulse as a force, and the rationality

expected from the characters as logical beings in Arcadia.

49 Stoppard, 62. 50 Ibid., 84. 51 Ibid., 130. 52 Hunter, 2000. 189. 53 Anne Barton, “Twice Around the Grounds,” The New York Review of Books Vol. 42, No. 10 (1995). Last Accessed 16 July 2009 <http://faculty.uccb.ns.ca/philosophy/arcadia/library1.htm>. 54 Stoppard, 76.


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Such a reading of the play entails that we too examine the concepts of free will and

determinism, in context of both the play and the biblical. The idea of free will stems from the

Judeo-Christian concept of an all-powerful God wanting us to choose good over evil, whereas

belief in determinism may be attributed to faith “in a dictatorial God…or in ‘laws’ of physical

science.”55 In Arcadia, the deterministic, Classical certainty of Newtonian physics is constantly

pit against Romantic disorder, the latter caused by the collision of free will and sexual attraction:

CHLOË. …The universe is deterministic all right, just like Newton said, I mean it’s trying

to be, but the only thing going wrong is people fancying people who aren’t supposed to

be in that part of the plan.

VALENTINE. Ah. The attraction that Newton left out. All the way back to the apple in the

garden. (Stoppard, 97)

Apart from the symbolic function of the apple, what this dialogue affirms is the apparent

irreconcilability of determinism— an entirely Classical strand of thought— and free will, a

progressive, Romantic notion which allows for sexual desire to run unchecked by one’s intellect.

This sense of irreconcilability thus serves the construction of the Classicism-Romanticism

conflict by dramatising the clash between Sexual Impulse and Rationality.

However, to read the symbolism of the apple purely in the theological terms of Man’s

Fall and Original Sin would be to mark sexuality as a cause of decline, not divide. Alwes

contends that such an interpretation is insufficient, remarking, “Sexuality is not only literally

creative of life; it also gives meaning and value to life lived under an inescapable death

sentence.”56 It can even be argued that this sexual energy provides the play with an uplifting

55 Hunter, 2000. 174-5. 56 Derek B. Alwes, ‘Oh, Phooey to death!’: Boethian Consolation in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia” (Thesis, South Illinois University, 2000), 4. Papers on Language and Literature, FindArticles.com. Last Accessed 18 July 2009 <http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3708/is_200010/ai_n8921902/>, 4.


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resolution, despite the tragic death of teenage Thomasina. This is evidenced by an exchange in

the final scene, where Septimus tells Thomasina the meaning of death shortly before her own

fatal accident, “When we have found all the mysteries and lost all the meaning, we will be alone,

on an empty shore.”57 She responds by saying, “Then we will dance. Is this a waltz?”58 This

shows that “Dance, in addition to other forms of carnal embrace, is the only adequate response

to death.”59 Furthermore, it is suggested that Stoppard himself does not endorse such a reading

of the play:

Stoppard raises the possibility of reading the apple symbolism in familiar biblical terms,

but only to reject it. There are three rather subtle references in the play to Adam and Eve

and their apple, but the context works against our taking them as serious theological or

moral allusions.60…”knowledge” is not a “sin” in the world of the play, in which the most

attractive characters are highly educated, if not geniuses. (Alwes, 2)

Hence, it can be concluded that sexuality is more so a force of divide than decline; the two

historical periods surely exist as parallel worlds. Sexual Impulse is portrayed as being

antithetical rather than subservient to Rationality, the apple symbolism partly effecting the

invocation of the wider conflict between Classicism and Romanticism.

In conclusion, the role played by the juxtaposition of time in constructing the

Classicism-Romanticism conflict in Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia is fundamental, and should

not go understated. Stoppard’s circumvention of time’s linearity allows him to alternate scenes

in different historical periods, polarising various sub-conflicts through the four mechanisms.

Firstly, the juxtaposition of the geometrical and the picturesque landscape of Sidley Park in

57 Stoppard, 126. 58 Ibid. 59 Alwes, 4. 60 The three references may be found on p. 7, 76, and 97 of the primary text; the latter two instances have been cited and used for supplementation in p. 10-11 of this essay.


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different time periods functions as a direct allusion to the conflict between the Geometrical and

the Natural. Accordingly, the landscapes, which are representative of their zeitgeists, allow

Stoppard the personification of opposing archetypal inclinations such as Logic and Intuition

within a single character (Septimus), and amongst characters (Hannah and Bernard). Secondly,

the superior perspective of the audience creates an implicit conflict between Order and

Disorder, the impetus for revelation being our observing the transformation undergone by Sidley

Park in the span of 180 years. Thirdly, the centrality of the setting is emphasised, creating a

visual display of disorder and invoking explicitly the same conflict of Order v. Disorder. Lastly,

the irrational influence of sexuality manifest in the human interactions of the play is likewise

centralised by the juxtaposition of time, foregrounding the inherent tension between Rationality

and Sexual Impulse within the characters. These antithetical themes serve in the polarisation of

Classicism and Romanticism, hence constructing the overarching conflict and tension in the

play.

It is perhaps apt that the abstract motif of dualism pervades Arcadia at every turn. On

closer reading, symbols such as fire and the piano, as well as the antithetical themes discussed,

embrace essentially a tension of opposites. However, this is not to say that Stoppard attempts

the reconciliation of these various contrasting ideas— he is much more interested in observing

their complex interplay. He remarks revealingly, “None of us is tidy; none of us is classifiable.

Even the facility to perceive and define two ideas such as the classical and the romantic in

opposition to each other indicates that one shares a little bit of each.”61 Indeed, Stoppard’s

usage of the juxtaposition of time in Arcadia as a literary and dramatic device has captured

Man’s essence as both a sentient and logical being; it is the existence of one element that

defines the other, much like Classicism and Romanticism.

61 Nathan, 263.


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Word Count: 3997


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Bibliography

Print Sources:

Edwards, Paul. “Science in Hapgood and Arcadia.” In The Cambridge Companion to Tom

Stoppard, edited by Katherine E. Kelly. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press,

2001.

Zeifman, Hersh. “The comedy of Eros: Stoppard in love.” In The Cambridge Companion to Tom

Stoppard, edited by Katherine E. Kelly. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press,

2001.

Hunter, Jim. About Stoppard: The Playwright and the Work. London: Faber & Faber, 2005.

---. Tom Stoppard: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead, Jumpers, Travesties, Arcadia.

London: Faber & Faber, 2000.

Nathan, David. “In a Country Garden (If It Is a Garden).” In Tom Stoppard in Conversation,

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Stoppard, Tom. Arcadia. London: Faber & Faber, 1993.

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<http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3708/is_200010/ai_n8921902/>.


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Barton, Anne. “Twice Around the Grounds.” The New York Review of Books Vol. 42, No. 10

(1995). Last Accessed 16 July 2009

<http://faculty.uccb.ns.ca/philosophy/arcadia/library1.htm>.

Poussin, Nicolas. Et in Arcadia Ego. 1637-39. Musée du Louvre, Paris. Web Gallery of Art,

edited by Emil Kren and Daniel Marx. Last accessed 23 July 2009

<http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/p/poussin/2a/23arcadi.html>.

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Appendix A

ET IN ARCADIA EGO (1637-39) by Nicolas Poussin (Musée du Louvre, Paris) Picture taken from:

Nicolas Poussin, 1637-39. Et in Arcadia Ego. Web Gallery of Art. Last accessed 23 July 2009

<http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/p/poussin/2a/23arcadi.html>.

the juxtaposition of time in constructing the classicism-romanticism conflict in stoppard’s...

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