SOURCE: "Violence as a Technique in the Dramas and Dramatizations of Dumas père," in The Romanic Review, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, October, 1940, pp. 265-79.

In the following essay, Wenger analyzes the violent scenes in Dumas's dramatic works according to a tripartite model involving "Play," "Show," and "Struggle."

Alexandre Dumas the elder has an appeal for popular and scholarly reader alike. The present study of his dramas springs from this appeal, is undertaken because of his fame as a novelist, and is inspired by an interest in the problems of fiction. This is no paradox. Dumas is remembered today largely for his romances; yet he began his career with a drama, and, like Voltaire, he was fascinated by the stage throughout his life. Once more it is true: scratch a novelist and you find a playwright.¹ The dramatic works of a man like Dumas present an interesting aspect of...