LATTER-DAY STAGES: Rogers’ Fire in the Bones
Author: Thomas F. Rogers
Title: Fire in the Bones
Play
Produced in 1978 at Greenbriar Theater, Sandy, Utah.
Published in God’s Fools and Huebener and other Plays
Reviewed by Robert Paxton. March 20, 1997, AML-list.
I recently read Thomas Rogers’ play Fire in the Bones, about John D. Lee. Though I like many things about it, I cannot accept it as Tragedy, as Rogers seems to desire. In his introduction to the play, he writes:
Faithful to Jaunita Brooks’ thorough and accurate scholarship, Fire in the Bones completely exonerates Brigham Young as the massacre’s instigator, while still suggesting the tragic dilemma into which well-meaning persons, like John D. Lee, are sometimes thrust and the sacrifices that a community, right or wrong, may require of them. Fire in the Bones is a study in tainted conscience and mob psychology. In their temperament and their fate, its characters resemble the zealots of every society and every age. Such people–ancient or modern–make tragedy as timely as ever.
To begin with, let there be no mistaking that I believe the massacre at Mountain Meadows was a tragic event, in that many people lost their lives in brutal fashion, and that many men were led–by their zeal, their sense of vengeance, their loyalty, their understanding of their duty, as well as the current preparations for war–to kill men, women, and children in a way that must have tormented them for the rest of their lives.
That said, however, Fire in the Bones is not a tragedy in the sense of dramatic form and style. While I do believe that the dilemma these men faced in choosing their actions, precisely because of the circumstancesabove listed, was a tragic dilemma, and that John D. Lee as a dramatic character has the potential for tragedy, even in the late twentieth century, Rogers seems to be attempting something different. Perhaps the play’s failure to meet my requirements of dramatic tragedy stem from a different use of the term “tragedy” and from the playwright’s choice of events dramatized.
Tragedy as a dramatic form, in the style of the Greeks or the Elizabethans, generally contains several distinct elements: a noble character; a tragic flaw; action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude, oftenwith events that eventually get beyond the control of the protagonist; a strong moral distinction between right and wrong, with the right generally being whatever the gods command or decree or whatever the noble protagonist himself decrees, and the wrong being disobedience, witting or unwitting; recognition by the protagonist of his actions, their relation to the moral standard, and his acceptance of responsibility for them; reversal of fortune, station, or action; and finally a catharsis, a sense of fear and pity on the part of the audience.
Modern tragedy, according to Arthur Miller’s definition, needs but a protagonist who is willing to throw his all into the “battle to secure his rightful place in his world.” He need not be of noble rank, nor need he necessarily recognize and take responsibility for his moral failings. And it may be that Fire in the Bones is a modern tragedy. It seems to me, though, that Mormon tragedy requires a fuller awareness of sin and repentance than most modern tragedies do. So, for the purposes of this present discussion it remains eminently useful to employ Aristotle’s definition to identify the reasons Fire in the Bones does not achieve tragic status.
Lee is not traditional nobility, but then few modern persons are. Even royalty today are rarely noble. Is Lee, then, a good man, a man of propriety, true to life, and consistent? Rogers goes to great lengths to have his characters, particularly Jacob Hamblin and George A. Smith, point out how good Lee is, and how much good his past actions have effected. According to the definition of propriety one infers from the text of the play itself, Lee is also a decidedly proper man: he obeys Brigham Young to the letter, he manages his household and his businesses in an upright and successful manner, he keeps his oath and his word, and he protects the integrity of the community, in this case the Church. In fact, because he is the adopted son of Brigham Young, and because he has enjoyed particular acclaim and status throughout his life, he might actually qualify as nobility, inasmuch as anyone in the nineteenth century could. Macbeth, after all, was a general, although destined to become king.
Does Lee have a tragic flaw in his character? By his own avowal on many occasions in the play he does. He calls it zeal, even “zeal not according to knowledge.” But it fails as a true tragic flaw, because he is somewhattoo glib about it. He even seems to glory in it, as if it were a badge of honor rather than a flaw. Thus the play is not, as Rogers suggests, about tainted conscience. And it is precisely Lee’s attitude toward his own flawwhich collapses many of the following requirements.
There is no doubt that the action is serious and of a certain magnitude. And it is complete, in that it has a beginning, middle, and end. Rogers has chosen, though, to dramatize the aftermath, the consequences of the massacre, rather than the events directly surrounding it. After very briefly depicting the events of Mountain Meadows, without dwelling on the circumstances in which Lee must act, and which frame the decisions he makes, Rogers quickly passes on to the socio-political reaction to his choices. It seems that Rogers is attempting to justify Lee’s actions, or at least to point out the injustice of Lee’s fate and the treatment hereceived from others. In the context of the play, Lee also seems acutely aware of this injustice, and calls it such, rather than accepting it as the natural result of his heinous actions.
The moral universe, then, is somewhat stacked to demonstrate that Lee was wrongly made a scapegoat for the whole church, and should instead be seen as a martyr. It is certainly the playwright’s prerogative to share this point of view, but that choice on the part of the dramatist diverts the play from its tragic aspirations. For Lee never seems to recognize his wrong, and certainly never admits it. Rather he perjures himself again themoment before his execution. He never accepts responsibility for his actions, and consequently the audience can feel very little pity or fear for him. Rather they are asked to admire him in his dire circumstances.
A reversal certainly occurs: Lee loses his friends, his fortune, his membership in the Church, and his life. However, this reversal is the whole matter of the play, not its culmination. Where Aristotle states that “the best form of recognition is coincident with a Reversal of the Situation,” Rogers tries to create a tragedy out of a series of reversals without a hint of tragic recognition anywhere along the way. Every time another character questions Lee’s involvement, Lee returns the blame to them with a condescending “You, too?” As if to question Lee’s complicity is the ultimate evil, an evil specifically named by the wives on at least two occasions in Act 1.
Rogers has crafted the plane of moral judgment in this play in such a way that we are asked to judge, not so much the actions Lee and others took in massacring nearly two hundred men, women, and children, but rather the failure of his community to stand by him in his subsequent life. Every character other than Lee’s immediate family ultimately chooses to abandon him, or flat-out betrays him. Jacob Hamblin, upon whose testimony theverdict rests, is depicted as a venal man in an unnecessary scene with Emma prior to the final trial. Perhaps the event is documented history, but it is extraneous to the action of a tragic conclusion. It is not extraneous,however, to the purpose of casting Lee’s life in an heroic stature.
Which all adds up, finally, to no true catharsis. While the audience may feel sadness at Lee’s death, it is rather the sadness of their frustrated desires for this “heroic” man. We are asked to admire him, and to justify his actions in the face of his persecution. Perhaps we are provoked to anger at the other characters, but we cannot experience the true pity and fear which might accompany his end.
It may well be that the other historical personages behaved despicably towards Lee, especially those who were complicit in the massacre and those who had been his closest friends. It may even be that the event dramatized between Hamblin and Emma actually occurred. Certainly Lee’s actions must be judged in their historical context, whence there might be ample room for leniency and pardon. But these things don’t add up to dramatic tragedy. Instead, Fire in the Bones is more in line with heroic drama. And in this case, where the source material provides so great an opportunity to see ourselves in the historical characters, and examine our own hearts and convictions, and experience a true sense of pity and fear that “there, but for the grace of God, go I,” we are instead requested to ask ourselves a valid and important but very different question: whether we have too great a revulsion to cold-blooded murder, or too great a need for personal exoneration and self-preservation, to ignore, condone, or forgive Lee’s actions and instead would selfishly (or self-righteously) heap blame and persecution upon the sinner.
Although the play may remind us of the teaching that in him who forgives not remains the greater sin, in its single-minded attempt to right the historical record and exonerate Lee, Fire in the Bones creates a false hero through Lee’s adherence to false ideals masquerading as Christian long-suffering and devotion to a cause.
The events touched on were definitely tragic. But the play isn’t, at least for me. Perhaps I expect a Mormon dramatic tragedy to include a recognition of one’s sins, and an attempt to repent. Instead, what I find in Fire in the Bones is an attempt to excuse Lee’s actions simply because others treated him badly after the fact. While I believe that those individuals also are responsible for their behavior towards Lee, this treatment of them, in my mind, doesn’t make a tragedy.