diff options
Diffstat (limited to '16966.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 16966.txt | 18965 |
1 files changed, 18965 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/16966.txt b/16966.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ad5aae3 --- /dev/null +++ b/16966.txt @@ -0,0 +1,18965 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Shakespearean Tragedy, by A. C. Bradley + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Shakespearean Tragedy + Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth + +Author: A. C. Bradley + +Release Date: October 30, 2005 [EBook #16966] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Lisa Reigel and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY + + +MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED + +LONDON.BOMBAY.CALCUTTA.MADRAS.MELBOURNE + + +THE MACMILLAN COMPANY + +NEW YORK.BOSTON.CHICAGO.DALLAS.SAN FRANCISCO + + +THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. + +TORONTO + + + + +SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY + +LECTURES ON + +HAMLET, OTHELLO, KING LEAR + +MACBETH + +BY + +A.C. BRADLEY + +LL.D. LITT.D., FORMERLY PROFESSOR OF POETRY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD + + +_SECOND EDITION_ (_THIRTEENTH IMPRESSION_) + + +MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON + +1919 + + +_COPYRIGHT._ + +First Edition 1904. + +Second Edition March 1905. + +Reprinted August 1905, 1906, 1908, 1910, 1911, 1912, 1914, 1915, 1916, +1918, 1919. + + +GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. +LTD. + + +TO MY STUDENTS + + + + +PREFACE + + +These lectures are based on a selection from materials used in teaching +at Liverpool, Glasgow, and Oxford; and I have for the most part +preserved the lecture form. The point of view taken in them is explained +in the Introduction. I should, of course, wish them to be read in their +order, and a knowledge of the first two is assumed in the remainder; but +readers who may prefer to enter at once on the discussion of the several +plays can do so by beginning at page 89. + +Any one who writes on Shakespeare must owe much to his predecessors. +Where I was conscious of a particular obligation, I have acknowledged +it; but most of my reading of Shakespearean criticism was done many +years ago, and I can only hope that I have not often reproduced as my +own what belongs to another. + +Many of the Notes will be of interest only to scholars, who may find, I +hope, something new in them. + +I have quoted, as a rule, from the Globe edition, and have referred +always to its numeration of acts, scenes, and lines. + +_November, 1904._ + + * * * * * + + +NOTE TO SECOND AND SUBSEQUENT IMPRESSIONS + +In these impressions I have confined myself to making some formal +improvements, correcting indubitable mistakes, and indicating here and +there my desire to modify or develop at some future time statements +which seem to me doubtful or open to misunderstanding. The changes, +where it seemed desirable, are shown by the inclusion of sentences in +square brackets. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE +INTRODUCTION 1 + + +LECTURE I. + +THE SUBSTANCE OF SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY 5 + + +LECTURE II. + +CONSTRUCTION IN SHAKESPEARE'S TRAGEDIES 40 + + +LECTURE III. + +SHAKESPEARE'S TRAGIC PERIOD--HAMLET 79 + + +LECTURE IV. + +HAMLET 129 + + +LECTURE V. + +OTHELLO 175 + + +LECTURE VI. + +OTHELLO 207 + + +LECTURE VII. + +KING LEAR 243 + + +LECTURE VIII. + +KING LEAR 280 + + +LECTURE IX. + +MACBETH 331 + + +LECTURE X. + +MACBETH 366 + + +NOTE A. Events before the opening of the action in _Hamlet_ 401 + +NOTE B. Where was Hamlet at the time of his father's death? 403 + +NOTE C. Hamlet's age 407 + +NOTE D. 'My tables--meet it is I set it down' 409 + +NOTE E. The Ghost in the cellarage 412 + +NOTE F. The Player's speech in _Hamlet_ 413 + +NOTE G. Hamlet's apology to Laertes 420 + +NOTE H. The exchange of rapiers 422 + +NOTE I. The duration of the action in + _Othello_ 423 + +NOTE J. The 'additions' in the Folio text of _Othello_. The + Pontic sea 429 + +NOTE K. Othello's courtship 432 + +NOTE L. Othello in the Temptation scene 434 + +NOTE M. Questions as to _Othello_, IV. i. 435 + +NOTE N. Two passages in the last scene of _Othello_ 437 + +NOTE O. Othello on Desdemona's last words 438 + +NOTE P. Did Emilia suspect Iago? 439 + +NOTE Q. Iago's suspicion regarding Cassio and Emilia 441 + +NOTE R. Reminiscences of _Othello_ in _King Lear_ 441 + +NOTE S. _King Lear_ and _Timon of Athens_ 443 + +NOTE T. Did Shakespeare shorten _King Lear_? 445 + +NOTE U. Movements of the _dramatis personae_ in _King + Lear_, II 448 + +NOTE V. Suspected interpolations in _King Lear_ 450 + +NOTE W. The staging of the scene of Lear's reunion with + Cordelia 453 + +NOTE X. The Battle in _King Lear_ 456 + +NOTE Y. Some difficult passages in _King Lear_ 458 + +NOTE Z. Suspected interpolations in _Macbeth_ 466 + +NOTE AA. Has _Macbeth_ been abridged? 467 + +NOTE BB. The date of _Macbeth_. Metrical Tests 470 + +NOTE CC. When was the murder of Duncan first plotted? 480 + +NOTE DD. Did Lady Macbeth really faint? 484 + +NOTE EE. Duration of the action in _Macbeth_. Macbeth's age. + 'He has no children' 486 + +NOTE FF. The Ghost of Banquo 492 + +INDEX 494 + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +In these lectures I propose to consider the four principal tragedies of +Shakespeare from a single point of view. Nothing will be said of +Shakespeare's place in the history either of English literature or of +the drama in general. No attempt will be made to compare him with other +writers. I shall leave untouched, or merely glanced at, questions +regarding his life and character, the development of his genius and art, +the genuineness, sources, texts, inter-relations of his various works. +Even what may be called, in a restricted sense, the 'poetry' of the four +tragedies--the beauties of style, diction, versification--I shall pass +by in silence. Our one object will be what, again in a restricted sense, +may be called dramatic appreciation; to increase our understanding and +enjoyment of these works as dramas; to learn to apprehend the action and +some of the personages of each with a somewhat greater truth and +intensity, so that they may assume in our imaginations a shape a little +less unlike the shape they wore in the imagination of their creator. For +this end all those studies that were mentioned just now, of literary +history and the like, are useful and even in various degrees necessary. +But an overt pursuit of them is not necessary here, nor is any one of +them so indispensable to our object as that close familiarity with the +plays, that native strength and justice of perception, and that habit of +reading with an eager mind, which make many an unscholarly lover of +Shakespeare a far better critic than many a Shakespeare scholar. + +Such lovers read a play more or less as if they were actors who had to +study all the parts. They do not need, of course, to imagine whereabouts +the persons are to stand, or what gestures they ought to use; but they +want to realise fully and exactly the inner movements which produced +these words and no other, these deeds and no other, at each particular +moment. This, carried through a drama, is the right way to read the +dramatist Shakespeare; and the prime requisite here is therefore a vivid +and intent imagination. But this alone will hardly suffice. It is +necessary also, especially to a true conception of the whole, to +compare, to analyse, to dissect. And such readers often shrink from this +task, which seems to them prosaic or even a desecration. They +misunderstand, I believe. They would not shrink if they remembered two +things. In the first place, in this process of comparison and analysis, +it is not requisite, it is on the contrary ruinous, to set imagination +aside and to substitute some supposed 'cold reason'; and it is only want +of practice that makes the concurrent use of analysis and of poetic +perception difficult or irksome. And, in the second place, these +dissecting processes, though they are also imaginative, are still, and +are meant to be, nothing but means to an end. When they have finished +their work (it can only be finished for the time) they give place to the +end, which is that same imaginative reading or re-creation of the drama +from which they set out, but a reading now enriched by the products of +analysis, and therefore far more adequate and enjoyable. + +This, at any rate, is the faith in the strength of which I venture, with +merely personal misgivings, on the path of analytic interpretation. And +so, before coming to the first of the four tragedies, I propose to +discuss some preliminary matters which concern them all. Though each is +individual through and through, they have, in a sense, one and the same +substance; for in all of them Shakespeare represents the tragic aspect +of life, the tragic fact. They have, again, up to a certain point, a +common form or structure. This substance and this structure, which would +be found to distinguish them, for example, from Greek tragedies, may, to +diminish repetition, be considered once for all; and in considering them +we shall also be able to observe characteristic differences among the +four plays. And to this may be added the little that it seems necessary +to premise on the position of these dramas in Shakespeare's literary +career. + +Much that is said on our main preliminary subjects will naturally hold +good, within certain limits, of other dramas of Shakespeare beside +_Hamlet_, _Othello_, _King Lear_, and _Macbeth_. But it will often apply +to these other works only in part, and to some of them more fully than +to others. _Romeo and Juliet_, for instance, is a pure tragedy, but it +is an early work, and in some respects an immature one. _Richard III._ +and _Richard II._, _Julius Caesar_, _Antony and Cleopatra_, and +_Coriolanus_ are tragic histories or historical tragedies, in which +Shakespeare acknowledged in practice a certain obligation to follow his +authority, even when that authority offered him an undramatic material. +Probably he himself would have met some criticisms to which these plays +are open by appealing to their historical character, and by denying that +such works are to be judged by the standard of pure tragedy. In any +case, most of these plays, perhaps all, do show, as a matter of fact, +considerable deviations from that standard; and, therefore, what is said +of the pure tragedies must be applied to them with qualifications which +I shall often take for granted without mention. There remain _Titus +Andronicus_ and _Timon of Athens_. The former I shall leave out of +account, because, even if Shakespeare wrote the whole of it, he did so +before he had either a style of his own or any characteristic tragic +conception. _Timon_ stands on a different footing. Parts of it are +unquestionably Shakespeare's, and they will be referred to in one of the +later lectures. But much of the writing is evidently not his, and as it +seems probable that the conception and construction of the whole tragedy +should also be attributed to some other writer, I shall omit this work +too from our preliminary discussions. + + + + +LECTURE I + +THE SUBSTANCE OF SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY + + +The question we are to consider in this lecture may be stated in a +variety of ways. We may put it thus: What is the substance of a +Shakespearean tragedy, taken in abstraction both from its form and from +the differences in point of substance between one tragedy and another? +Or thus: What is the nature of the tragic aspect of life as represented +by Shakespeare? What is the general fact shown now in this tragedy and +now in that? And we are putting the same question when we ask: What is +Shakespeare's tragic conception, or conception of tragedy? + +These expressions, it should be observed, do not imply that Shakespeare +himself ever asked or answered such a question; that he set himself to +reflect on the tragic aspects of life, that he framed a tragic +conception, and still less that, like Aristotle or Corneille, he had a +theory of the kind of poetry called tragedy. These things are all +possible; how far any one of them is probable we need not discuss; but +none of them is presupposed by the question we are going to consider. +This question implies only that, as a matter of fact, Shakespeare in +writing tragedy did represent a certain aspect of life in a certain way, +and that through examination of his writings we ought to be able, to +some extent, to describe this aspect and way in terms addressed to the +understanding. Such a description, so far as it is true and adequate, +may, after these explanations, be called indifferently an account of the +substance of Shakespearean tragedy, or an account of Shakespeare's +conception of tragedy or view of the tragic fact. + +Two further warnings may be required. In the first place, we must +remember that the tragic aspect of life is only one aspect. We cannot +arrive at Shakespeare's whole dramatic way of looking at the world from +his tragedies alone, as we can arrive at Milton's way of regarding +things, or at Wordsworth's or at Shelley's, by examining almost any one +of their important works. Speaking very broadly, one may say that these +poets at their best always look at things in one light; but _Hamlet_ and +_Henry IV._ and _Cymbeline_ reflect things from quite distinct +positions, and Shakespeare's whole dramatic view is not to be identified +with any one of these reflections. And, in the second place, I may +repeat that in these lectures, at any rate for the most part, we are to +be content with his _dramatic_ view, and are not to ask whether it +corresponded exactly with his opinions or creed outside his poetry--the +opinions or creed of the being whom we sometimes oddly call 'Shakespeare +the man.' It does not seem likely that outside his poetry he was a very +simple-minded Catholic or Protestant or Atheist, as some have +maintained; but we cannot be sure, as with those other poets we can, +that in his works he expressed his deepest and most cherished +convictions on ultimate questions, or even that he had any. And in his +dramatic conceptions there is enough to occupy us. + + +1 + +In approaching our subject it will be best, without attempting to +shorten the path by referring to famous theories of the drama, to start +directly from the facts, and to collect from them gradually an idea of +Shakespearean Tragedy. And first, to begin from the outside, such a +tragedy brings before us a considerable number of persons (many more +than the persons in a Greek play, unless the members of the Chorus are +reckoned among them); but it is pre-eminently the story of one person, +the 'hero,'[1] or at most of two, the 'hero' and 'heroine.' Moreover, it +is only in the love-tragedies, _Romeo and Juliet_ and _Antony and +Cleopatra_, that the heroine is as much the centre of the action as the +hero. The rest, including _Macbeth_, are single stars. So that, having +noticed the peculiarity of these two dramas, we may henceforth, for the +sake of brevity, ignore it, and may speak of the tragic story as being +concerned primarily with one person. + +The story, next, leads up to, and includes, the _death_ of the hero. On +the one hand (whatever may be true of tragedy elsewhere), no play at the +end of which the hero remains alive is, in the full Shakespearean sense, +a tragedy; and we no longer class _Troilus and Cressida_ or _Cymbeline_ +as such, as did the editors of the Folio. On the other hand, the story +depicts also the troubled part of the hero's life which precedes and +leads up to his death; and an instantaneous death occurring by +'accident' in the midst of prosperity would not suffice for it. It is, +in fact, essentially a tale of suffering and calamity conducting to +death. + +The suffering and calamity are, moreover, exceptional. They befall a +conspicuous person. They are themselves of some striking kind. They are +also, as a rule, unexpected, and contrasted with previous happiness or +glory. A tale, for example, of a man slowly worn to death by disease, +poverty, little cares, sordid vices, petty persecutions, however piteous +or dreadful it might be, would not be tragic in the Shakespearean sense. + +Such exceptional suffering and calamity, then, affecting the hero, +and--we must now add--generally extending far and wide beyond him, so as +to make the whole scene a scene of woe, are an essential ingredient in +tragedy and a chief source of the tragic emotions, and especially of +pity. But the proportions of this ingredient, and the direction taken by +tragic pity, will naturally vary greatly. Pity, for example, has a much +larger part in _King Lear_ than in _Macbeth_, and is directed in the one +case chiefly to the hero, in the other chiefly to minor characters. + +Let us now pause for a moment on the ideas we have so far reached. They +would more than suffice to describe the whole tragic fact as it +presented itself to the mediaeval mind. To the mediaeval mind a tragedy +meant a narrative rather than a play, and its notion of the matter of +this narrative may readily be gathered from Dante or, still better, from +Chaucer. Chaucer's _Monk's Tale_ is a series of what he calls +'tragedies'; and this means in fact a series of tales _de Casibus +Illustrium Virorum_,--stories of the Falls of Illustrious Men, such as +Lucifer, Adam, Hercules and Nebuchadnezzar. And the Monk ends the tale +of Croesus thus: + + Anhanged was Cresus, the proude kyng; + His roial trone myghte hym nat availle. + Tragedie is noon oother maner thyng, + Ne kan in syngyng crie ne biwaille + But for that Fortune alwey wole assaile + With unwar strook the regnes that been proude; + For whan men trusteth hire, thanne wol she faille, + And covere hire brighte face with a clowde. + +A total reverse of fortune, coming unawares upon a man who 'stood in +high degree,' happy and apparently secure,--such was the tragic fact to +the mediaeval mind. It appealed strongly to common human sympathy and +pity; it startled also another feeling, that of fear. It frightened men +and awed them. It made them feel that man is blind and helpless, the +plaything of an inscrutable power, called by the name of Fortune or some +other name,--a power which appears to smile on him for a little, and +then on a sudden strikes him down in his pride. + +Shakespeare's idea of the tragic fact is larger than this idea and goes +beyond it; but it includes it, and it is worth while to observe the +identity of the two in a certain point which is often ignored. Tragedy +with Shakespeare is concerned always with persons of 'high degree'; +often with kings or princes; if not, with leaders in the state like +Coriolanus, Brutus, Antony; at the least, as in _Romeo and Juliet_, with +members of great houses, whose quarrels are of public moment. There is a +decided difference here between _Othello_ and our three other tragedies, +but it is not a difference of kind. Othello himself is no mere private +person; he is the General of the Republic. At the beginning we see him +in the Council-Chamber of the Senate. The consciousness of his high +position never leaves him. At the end, when he is determined to live no +longer, he is as anxious as Hamlet not to be misjudged by the great +world, and his last speech begins, + + Soft you; a word or two before you go. + I have done the state some service, and they know it.[2] + +And this characteristic of Shakespeare's tragedies, though not the most +vital, is neither external nor unimportant. The saying that every +death-bed is the scene of the fifth act of a tragedy has its meaning, +but it would not be true if the word 'tragedy' bore its dramatic sense. +The pangs of despised love and the anguish of remorse, we say, are the +same in a peasant and a prince; but, not to insist that they cannot be +so when the prince is really a prince, the story of the prince, the +triumvir, or the general, has a greatness and dignity of its own. His +fate affects the welfare of a whole nation or empire; and when he falls +suddenly from the height of earthly greatness to the dust, his fall +produces a sense of contrast, of the powerlessness of man, and of the +omnipotence--perhaps the caprice--of Fortune or Fate, which no tale of +private life can possibly rival. + +Such feelings are constantly evoked by Shakespeare's tragedies,--again +in varying degrees. Perhaps they are the very strongest of the emotions +awakened by the early tragedy of _Richard II._, where they receive a +concentrated expression in Richard's famous speech about the antic +Death, who sits in the hollow crown + + That rounds the mortal temples of a king, + +grinning at his pomp, watching till his vanity and his fancied security +have wholly encased him round, and then coming and boring with a little +pin through his castle wall. And these feelings, though their +predominance is subdued in the mightiest tragedies, remain powerful +there. In the figure of the maddened Lear we see + + A sight most pitiful in the meanest wretch, + Past speaking of in a king; + +and if we would realise the truth in this matter we cannot do better +than compare with the effect of _King Lear_ the effect of Tourgenief's +parallel and remarkable tale of peasant life, _A King Lear of the +Steppes_. + + +2 + +A Shakespearean tragedy as so far considered may be called a story of +exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man in high estate. But +it is clearly much more than this, and we have now to regard it from +another side. No amount of calamity which merely befell a man, +descending from the clouds like lightning, or stealing from the darkness +like pestilence, could alone provide the substance of its story. Job was +the greatest of all the children of the east, and his afflictions were +well-nigh more than he could bear; but even if we imagined them wearing +him to death, that would not make his story tragic. Nor yet would it +become so, in the Shakespearean sense, if the fire, and the great wind +from the wilderness, and the torments of his flesh were conceived as +sent by a supernatural power, whether just or malignant. The calamities +of tragedy do not simply happen, nor are they sent; they proceed mainly +from actions, and those the actions of men. + +We see a number of human beings placed in certain circumstances; and we +see, arising from the co-operation of their characters in these +circumstances, certain actions. These actions beget others, and these +others beget others again, until this series of inter-connected deeds +leads by an apparently inevitable sequence to a catastrophe. The effect +of such a series on imagination is to make us regard the sufferings +which accompany it, and the catastrophe in which it ends, not only or +chiefly as something which happens to the persons concerned, but equally +as something which is caused by them. This at least may be said of the +principal persons, and, among them, of the hero, who always contributes +in some measure to the disaster in which he perishes. + +This second aspect of tragedy evidently differs greatly from the first. +Men, from this point of view, appear to us primarily as agents, +'themselves the authors of their proper woe'; and our fear and pity, +though they will not cease or diminish, will be modified accordingly. We +are now to consider this second aspect, remembering that it too is only +one aspect, and additional to the first, not a substitute for it. + +The 'story' or 'action' of a Shakespearean tragedy does not consist, of +course, solely of human actions or deeds; but the deeds are the +predominant factor. And these deeds are, for the most part, actions in +the full sense of the word; not things done ''tween asleep and wake,' +but acts or omissions thoroughly expressive of the doer,--characteristic +deeds. The centre of the tragedy, therefore, may be said with equal +truth to lie in action issuing from character, or in character issuing +in action. + +Shakespeare's main interest lay here. To say that it lay in _mere_ +character, or was a psychological interest, would be a great mistake, +for he was dramatic to the tips of his fingers. It is possible to find +places where he has given a certain indulgence to his love of poetry, +and even to his turn for general reflections; but it would be very +difficult, and in his later tragedies perhaps impossible, to detect +passages where he has allowed such freedom to the interest in character +apart from action. But for the opposite extreme, for the abstraction of +mere 'plot' (which is a very different thing from the tragic 'action'), +for the kind of interest which predominates in a novel like _The Woman +in White_, it is clear that he cared even less. I do not mean that this +interest is absent from his dramas; but it is subordinate to others, and +is so interwoven with them that we are rarely conscious of it apart, and +rarely feel in any great strength the half-intellectual, half-nervous +excitement of following an ingenious complication. What we do feel +strongly, as a tragedy advances to its close, is that the calamities and +catastrophe follow inevitably from the deeds of men, and that the main +source of these deeds is character. The dictum that, with Shakespeare, +'character is destiny' is no doubt an exaggeration, and one that may +mislead (for many of his tragic personages, if they had not met with +peculiar circumstances, would have escaped a tragic end, and might even +have lived fairly untroubled lives); but it is the exaggeration of a +vital truth. + +This truth, with some of its qualifications, will appear more clearly if +we now go on to ask what elements are to be found in the 'story' or +'action,' occasionally or frequently, beside the characteristic deeds, +and the sufferings and circumstances, of the persons. I will refer to +three of these additional factors. + +(_a_) Shakespeare, occasionally and for reasons which need not be +discussed here, represents abnormal conditions of mind; insanity, for +example, somnambulism, hallucinations. And deeds issuing from these are +certainly not what we called deeds in the fullest sense, deeds +expressive of character. No; but these abnormal conditions are never +introduced as the origin of deeds of any dramatic moment. Lady Macbeth's +sleep-walking has no influence whatever on the events that follow it. +Macbeth did not murder Duncan because he saw a dagger in the air: he saw +the dagger because he was about to murder Duncan. Lear's insanity is not +the cause of a tragic conflict any more than Ophelia's; it is, like +Ophelia's, the result of a conflict; and in both cases the effect is +mainly pathetic. If Lear were really mad when he divided his kingdom, if +Hamlet were really mad at any time in the story, they would cease to be +tragic characters. + +(_b_) Shakespeare also introduces the supernatural into some of his +tragedies; he introduces ghosts, and witches who have supernatural +knowledge. This supernatural element certainly cannot in most cases, if +in any, be explained away as an illusion in the mind of one of the +characters. And further, it does contribute to the action, and is in +more than one instance an indispensable part of it: so that to describe +human character, with circumstances, as always the _sole_ motive force +in this action would be a serious error. But the supernatural is always +placed in the closest relation with character. It gives a confirmation +and a distinct form to inward movements already present and exerting an +influence; to the sense of failure in Brutus, to the stifled workings of +conscience in Richard, to the half-formed thought or the horrified +memory of guilt in Macbeth, to suspicion in Hamlet. Moreover, its +influence is never of a compulsive kind. It forms no more than an +element, however important, in the problem which the hero has to face; +and we are never allowed to feel that it has removed his capacity or +responsibility for dealing with this problem. So far indeed are we from +feeling this, that many readers run to the opposite extreme, and openly +or privately regard the supernatural as having nothing to do with the +real interest of the play. + +(_c_) Shakespeare, lastly, in most of his tragedies allows to 'chance' +or 'accident' an appreciable influence at some point in the action. +Chance or accident here will be found, I think, to mean any occurrence +(not supernatural, of course) which enters the dramatic sequence neither +from the agency of a character, nor from the obvious surrounding +circumstances.[3] It may be called an accident, in this sense, that +Romeo never got the Friar's message about the potion, and that Juliet +did not awake from her long sleep a minute sooner; an accident that +Edgar arrived at the prison just too late to save Cordelia's life; an +accident that Desdemona dropped her handkerchief at the most fatal of +moments; an accident that the pirate ship attacked Hamlet's ship, so +that he was able to return forthwith to Denmark. Now this operation of +accident is a fact, and a prominent fact, of human life. To exclude it +_wholly_ from tragedy, therefore, would be, we may say, to fail in +truth. And, besides, it is not merely a fact. That men may start a +course of events but can neither calculate nor control it, is a _tragic_ +fact. The dramatist may use accident so as to make us feel this; and +there are also other dramatic uses to which it may be put. Shakespeare +accordingly admits it. On the other hand, any _large_ admission of +chance into the tragic sequence[4] would certainly weaken, and might +destroy, the sense of the causal connection of character, deed, and +catastrophe. And Shakespeare really uses it very sparingly. We seldom +find ourselves exclaiming, 'What an unlucky accident!' I believe most +readers would have to search painfully for instances. It is, further, +frequently easy to see the dramatic intention of an accident; and some +things which look like accidents have really a connection with +character, and are therefore not in the full sense accidents. Finally, I +believe it will be found that almost all the prominent accidents occur +when the action is well advanced and the impression of the causal +sequence is too firmly fixed to be impaired. + +Thus it appears that these three elements in the 'action' are +subordinate, while the dominant factor consists in deeds which issue +from character. So that, by way of summary, we may now alter our first +statement, 'A tragedy is a story of exceptional calamity leading to the +death of a man in high estate,' and we may say instead (what in its turn +is one-sided, though less so), that the story is one of human actions +producing exceptional calamity and ending in the death of such a man.[5] + + * * * * * + +Before we leave the 'action,' however, there is another question that +may usefully be asked. Can we define this 'action' further by describing +it as a conflict? + +The frequent use of this idea in discussions on tragedy is ultimately +due, I suppose, to the influence of Hegel's theory on the subject, +certainly the most important theory since Aristotle's. But Hegel's view +of the tragic conflict is not only unfamiliar to English readers and +difficult to expound shortly, but it had its origin in reflections on +Greek tragedy and, as Hegel was well aware, applies only imperfectly to +the works of Shakespeare.[6] I shall, therefore, confine myself to the +idea of conflict in its more general form. In this form it is obviously +suitable to Shakespearean tragedy; but it is vague, and I will try to +make it more precise by putting the question, Who are the combatants in +this conflict? + +Not seldom the conflict may quite naturally be conceived as lying +between two persons, of whom the hero is one; or, more fully, as lying +between two parties or groups, in one of which the hero is the leading +figure. Or if we prefer to speak (as we may quite well do if we know +what we are about) of the passions, tendencies, ideas, principles, +forces, which animate these persons or groups, we may say that two of +such passions or ideas, regarded as animating two persons or groups, are +the combatants. The love of Romeo and Juliet is in conflict with the +hatred of their houses, represented by various other characters. The +cause of Brutus and Cassius struggles with that of Julius, Octavius and +Antony. In _Richard II._ the King stands on one side, Bolingbroke and +his party on the other. In _Macbeth_ the hero and heroine are opposed to +the representatives of Duncan. In all these cases the great majority of +the _dramatis personae_ fall without difficulty into antagonistic +groups, and the conflict between these groups ends with the defeat of +the hero. + +Yet one cannot help feeling that in at least one of these cases, +_Macbeth_, there is something a little external in this way of looking +at the action. And when we come to some other plays this feeling +increases. No doubt most of the characters in _Hamlet_, _King Lear_, +_Othello_, or _Antony and Cleopatra_ can be arranged in opposed +groups;[7] and no doubt there is a conflict; and yet it seems misleading +to describe this conflict as one _between these groups_. It cannot be +simply this. For though Hamlet and the King are mortal foes, yet that +which engrosses our interest and dwells in our memory at least as much +as the conflict between them, is the conflict _within_ one of them. And +so it is, though not in the same degree, with _Antony and Cleopatra_ and +even with _Othello_; and, in fact, in a certain measure, it is so with +nearly all the tragedies. There is an outward conflict of persons and +groups, there is also a conflict of forces in the hero's soul; and even +in _Julius Caesar_ and _Macbeth_ the interest of the former can hardly +be said to exceed that of the latter. + +The truth is, that the type of tragedy in which the hero opposes to a +hostile force an undivided soul, is not the Shakespearean type. The +souls of those who contend with the hero may be thus undivided; they +generally are; but, as a rule, the hero, though he pursues his fated +way, is, at least at some point in the action, and sometimes at many, +torn by an inward struggle; and it is frequently at such points that +Shakespeare shows his most extraordinary power. If further we compare +the earlier tragedies with the later, we find that it is in the latter, +the maturest works, that this inward struggle is most emphasised. In the +last of them, _Coriolanus_, its interest completely eclipses towards the +close of the play that of the outward conflict. _Romeo and Juliet_, +_Richard III._, _Richard II._, where the hero contends with an outward +force, but comparatively little with himself, are all early plays. + +If we are to include the outer and the inner struggle in a conception +more definite than that of conflict in general, we must employ some such +phrase as 'spiritual force.' This will mean whatever forces act in the +human spirit, whether good or evil, whether personal passion or +impersonal principle; doubts, desires, scruples, ideas--whatever can +animate, shake, possess, and drive a man's soul. In a Shakespearean +tragedy some such forces are shown in conflict. They are shown acting in +men and generating strife between them. They are also shown, less +universally, but quite as characteristically, generating disturbance and +even conflict in the soul of the hero. Treasonous ambition in Macbeth +collides with loyalty and patriotism in Macduff and Malcolm: here is the +outward conflict. But these powers or principles equally collide in the +soul of Macbeth himself: here is the inner. And neither by itself could +make the tragedy.[8] + +We shall see later the importance of this idea. Here we need only +observe that the notion of tragedy as a conflict emphasises the fact +that action is the centre of the story, while the concentration of +interest, in the greater plays, on the inward struggle emphasises the +fact that this action is essentially the expression of character. + + +3 + +Let us turn now from the 'action' to the central figure in it; and, +ignoring the characteristics which distinguish the heroes from one +another, let us ask whether they have any common qualities which appear +to be essential to the tragic effect. + +One they certainly have. They are exceptional beings. We have seen +already that the hero, with Shakespeare, is a person of high degree or +of public importance, and that his actions or sufferings are of an +unusual kind. But this is not all. His nature also is exceptional, and +generally raises him in some respect much above the average level of +humanity. This does not mean that he is an eccentric or a paragon. +Shakespeare never drew monstrosities of virtue; some of his heroes are +far from being 'good'; and if he drew eccentrics he gave them a +subordinate position in the plot. His tragic characters are made of the +stuff we find within ourselves and within the persons who surround them. +But, by an intensification of the life which they share with others, +they are raised above them; and the greatest are raised so far that, if +we fully realise all that is implied in their words and actions, we +become conscious that in real life we have known scarcely any one +resembling them. Some, like Hamlet and Cleopatra, have genius. Others, +like Othello, Lear, Macbeth, Coriolanus, are built on the grand scale; +and desire, passion, or will attains in them a terrible force. In almost +all we observe a marked one-sidedness, a predisposition in some +particular direction; a total incapacity, in certain circumstances, of +resisting the force which draws in this direction; a fatal tendency to +identify the whole being with one interest, object, passion, or habit of +mind. This, it would seem, is, for Shakespeare, the fundamental tragic +trait. It is present in his early heroes, Romeo and Richard II., +infatuated men, who otherwise rise comparatively little above the +ordinary level. It is a fatal gift, but it carries with it a touch of +greatness; and when there is joined to it nobility of mind, or genius, +or immense force, we realise the full power and reach of the soul, and +the conflict in which it engages acquires that magnitude which stirs not +only sympathy and pity, but admiration, terror, and awe. + +The easiest way to bring home to oneself the nature of the tragic +character is to compare it with a character of another kind. Dramas like +_Cymbeline_ and the _Winter's Tale_, which might seem destined to end +tragically, but actually end otherwise, owe their happy ending largely +to the fact that the principal characters fail to reach tragic +dimensions. And, conversely, if these persons were put in the place of +the tragic heroes, the dramas in which they appeared would cease to be +tragedies. Posthumus would never have acted as Othello did; Othello, on +his side, would have met Iachimo's challenge with something more than +words. If, like Posthumus, he had remained convinced of his wife's +infidelity, he would not have repented her execution; if, like Leontes, +he had come to believe that by an unjust accusation he had caused her +death, he would never have lived on, like Leontes. In the same way the +villain Iachimo has no touch of tragic greatness. But Iago comes nearer +to it, and if Iago had slandered Imogen and had supposed his slanders to +have led to her death, he certainly would not have turned melancholy and +wished to die. One reason why the end of the _Merchant of Venice_ fails +to satisfy us is that Shylock is a tragic character, and that we cannot +believe in his accepting his defeat and the conditions imposed on him. +This was a case where Shakespeare's imagination ran away with him, so +that he drew a figure with which the destined pleasant ending would not +harmonise. + +In the circumstances where we see the hero placed, his tragic trait, +which is also his greatness, is fatal to him. To meet these +circumstances something is required which a smaller man might have +given, but which the hero cannot give. He errs, by action or omission; +and his error, joining with other causes, brings on him ruin. This is +always so with Shakespeare. As we have seen, the idea of the tragic hero +as a being destroyed simply and solely by external forces is quite alien +to him; and not less so is the idea of the hero as contributing to his +destruction only by acts in which we see no flaw. But the fatal +imperfection or error, which is never absent, is of different kinds and +degrees. At one extreme stands the excess and precipitancy of Romeo, +which scarcely, if at all, diminish our regard for him; at the other the +murderous ambition of Richard III. In most cases the tragic error +involves no conscious breach of right; in some (_e.g._ that of Brutus or +Othello) it is accompanied by a full conviction of right. In Hamlet +there is a painful consciousness that duty is being neglected; in Antony +a clear knowledge that the worse of two courses is being pursued; but +Richard and Macbeth are the only heroes who do what they themselves +recognise to be villainous. It is important to observe that Shakespeare +does admit such heroes,[9] and also that he appears to feel, and exerts +himself to meet, the difficulty that arises from their admission. The +difficulty is that the spectator must desire their defeat and even their +destruction; and yet this desire, and the satisfaction of it, are not +tragic feelings. Shakespeare gives to Richard therefore a power which +excites astonishment, and a courage which extorts admiration. He gives +to Macbeth a similar, though less extraordinary, greatness, and adds to +it a conscience so terrifying in its warnings and so maddening in its +reproaches that the spectacle of inward torment compels a horrified +sympathy and awe which balance, at the least, the desire for the hero's +ruin. + +The tragic hero with Shakespeare, then, need not be 'good,' though +generally he is 'good' and therefore at once wins sympathy in his error. +But it is necessary that he should have so much of greatness that in his +error and fall we may be vividly conscious of the possibilities of human +nature.[10] Hence, in the first place, a Shakespearean tragedy is never, +like some miscalled tragedies, depressing. No one ever closes the book +with the feeling that man is a poor mean creature. He may be wretched +and he may be awful, but he is not small. His lot may be heart-rending +and mysterious, but it is not contemptible. The most confirmed of cynics +ceases to be a cynic while he reads these plays. And with this greatness +of the tragic hero (which is not always confined to him) is connected, +secondly, what I venture to describe as the centre of the tragic +impression. This central feeling is the impression of waste. With +Shakespeare, at any rate, the pity and fear which are stirred by the +tragic story seem to unite with, and even to merge in, a profound sense +of sadness and mystery, which is due to this impression of waste. 'What +a piece of work is man,' we cry; 'so much more beautiful and so much +more terrible than we knew! Why should he be so if this beauty and +greatness only tortures itself and throws itself away?' We seem to have +before us a type of the mystery of the whole world, the tragic fact +which extends far beyond the limits of tragedy. Everywhere, from the +crushed rocks beneath our feet to the soul of man, we see power, +intelligence, life and glory, which astound us and seem to call for our +worship. And everywhere we see them perishing, devouring one another and +destroying themselves, often with dreadful pain, as though they came +into being for no other end. Tragedy is the typical form of this +mystery, because that greatness of soul which it exhibits oppressed, +conflicting and destroyed, is the highest existence in our view. It +forces the mystery upon us, and it makes us realise so vividly the worth +of that which is wasted that we cannot possibly seek comfort in the +reflection that all is vanity. + + +4 + +In this tragic world, then, where individuals, however great they may be +and however decisive their actions may appear, are so evidently not the +ultimate power, what is this power? What account can we give of it which +will correspond with the imaginative impressions we receive? This will +be our final question. + +The variety of the answers given to this question shows how difficult it +is. And the difficulty has many sources. Most people, even among those +who know Shakespeare well and come into real contact with his mind, are +inclined to isolate and exaggerate some one aspect of the tragic fact. +Some are so much influenced by their own habitual beliefs that they +import them more or less into their interpretation of every author who +is 'sympathetic' to them. And even where neither of these causes of +error appears to operate, another is present from which it is probably +impossible wholly to escape. What I mean is this. Any answer we give to +the question proposed ought to correspond with, or to represent in terms +of the understanding, our imaginative and emotional experience in +reading the tragedies. We have, of course, to do our best by study and +effort to make this experience true to Shakespeare; but, that done to +the best of our ability, the experience is the matter to be interpreted, +and the test by which the interpretation must be tried. But it is +extremely hard to make out exactly what this experience is, because, in +the very effort to make it out, our reflecting mind, full of everyday +ideas, is always tending to transform it by the application of these +ideas, and so to elicit a result which, instead of representing the +fact, conventionalises it. And the consequence is not only mistaken +theories; it is that many a man will declare that he feels in reading a +tragedy what he never really felt, while he fails to recognise what he +actually did feel. It is not likely that we shall escape all these +dangers in our effort to find an answer to the question regarding the +tragic world and the ultimate power in it. + +It will be agreed, however, first, that this question must not be +answered in 'religious' language. For although this or that _dramatis +persona_ may speak of gods or of God, of evil spirits or of Satan, of +heaven and of hell, and although the poet may show us ghosts from +another world, these ideas do not materially influence his +representation of life, nor are they used to throw light on the mystery +of its tragedy. The Elizabethan drama was almost wholly secular; and +while Shakespeare was writing he practically confined his view to the +world of non-theological observation and thought, so that he represents +it substantially in one and the same way whether the period of the story +is pre-Christian or Christian.[11] He looked at this 'secular' world +most intently and seriously; and he painted it, we cannot but conclude, +with entire fidelity, without the wish to enforce an opinion of his own, +and, in essentials, without regard to anyone's hopes, fears, or beliefs. +His greatness is largely due to this fidelity in a mind of extraordinary +power; and if, as a private person, he had a religious faith, his tragic +view can hardly have been in contradiction with this faith, but must +have been included in it, and supplemented, not abolished, by additional +ideas. + +Two statements, next, may at once be made regarding the tragic fact as +he represents it: one, that it is and remains to us something piteous, +fearful and mysterious; the other, that the representation of it does +not leave us crushed, rebellious or desperate. These statements will be +accepted, I believe, by any reader who is in touch with Shakespeare's +mind and can observe his own. Indeed such a reader is rather likely to +complain that they are painfully obvious. But if they are true as well +as obvious, something follows from them in regard to our present +question. + +From the first it follows that the ultimate power in the tragic world is +not adequately described as a law or order which we can see to be just +and benevolent,--as, in that sense, a 'moral order': for in that case +the spectacle of suffering and waste could not seem to us so fearful and +mysterious as it does. And from the second it follows that this ultimate +power is not adequately described as a fate, whether malicious and +cruel, or blind and indifferent to human happiness and goodness: for in +that case the spectacle would leave us desperate or rebellious. Yet one +or other of these two ideas will be found to govern most accounts of +Shakespeare's tragic view or world. These accounts isolate and +exaggerate single aspects, either the aspect of action or that of +suffering; either the close and unbroken connection of character, will, +deed and catastrophe, which, taken alone, shows the individual simply as +sinning against, or failing to conform to, the moral order and drawing +his just doom on his own head; or else that pressure of outward forces, +that sway of accident, and those blind and agonised struggles, which, +taken alone, show him as the mere victim of some power which cares +neither for his sins nor for his pain. Such views contradict one +another, and no third view can unite them; but the several aspects from +whose isolation and exaggeration they spring are both present in the +fact, and a view which would be true to the fact and to the whole of our +imaginative experience must in some way combine these aspects. + +Let us begin, then, with the idea of fatality and glance at some of the +impressions which give rise to it, without asking at present whether +this idea is their natural or fitting expression. There can be no doubt +that they do arise and that they ought to arise. If we do not feel at +times that the hero is, in some sense, a doomed man; that he and others +drift struggling to destruction like helpless creatures borne on an +irresistible flood towards a cataract; that, faulty as they may be, +their fault is far from being the sole or sufficient cause of all they +suffer; and that the power from which they cannot escape is relentless +and immovable, we have failed to receive an essential part of the full +tragic effect. + +The sources of these impressions are various, and I will refer only to a +few. One of them is put into words by Shakespeare himself when he makes +the player-king in _Hamlet_ say: + + Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own; + +'their ends' are the issues or outcomes of our thoughts, and these, says +the speaker, are not our own. The tragic world is a world of action, and +action is the translation of thought into reality. We see men and women +confidently attempting it. They strike into the existing order of things +in pursuance of their ideas. But what they achieve is not what they +intended; it is terribly unlike it. They understand nothing, we say to +ourselves, of the world on which they operate. They fight blindly in the +dark, and the power that works through them makes them the instrument of +a design which is not theirs. They act freely, and yet their action +binds them hand and foot. And it makes no difference whether they meant +well or ill. No one could mean better than Brutus, but he contrives +misery for his country and death for himself. No one could mean worse +than Iago, and he too is caught in the web he spins for others. Hamlet, +recoiling from the rough duty of revenge, is pushed into +blood-guiltiness he never dreamed of, and forced at last on the revenge +he could not will. His adversary's murders, and no less his adversary's +remorse, bring about the opposite of what they sought. Lear follows an +old man's whim, half generous, half selfish; and in a moment it looses +all the powers of darkness upon him. Othello agonises over an empty +fiction, and, meaning to execute solemn justice, butchers innocence and +strangles love. They understand themselves no better than the world +about them. Coriolanus thinks that his heart is iron, and it melts like +snow before a fire. Lady Macbeth, who thought she could dash out her own +child's brains, finds herself hounded to death by the smell of a +stranger's blood. Her husband thinks that to gain a crown he would jump +the life to come, and finds that the crown has brought him all the +horrors of that life. Everywhere, in this tragic world, man's thought, +translated into act, is transformed into the opposite of itself. His +act, the movement of a few ounces of matter in a moment of time, becomes +a monstrous flood which spreads over a kingdom. And whatsoever he dreams +of doing, he achieves that which he least dreamed of, his own +destruction. + +All this makes us feel the blindness and helplessness of man. Yet by +itself it would hardly suggest the idea of fate, because it shows man as +in some degree, however slight, the cause of his own undoing. But other +impressions come to aid it. It is aided by everything which makes us +feel that a man is, as we say, terribly unlucky; and of this there is, +even in Shakespeare, not a little. Here come in some of the accidents +already considered, Juliet's waking from her trance a minute too late, +Desdemona's loss of her handkerchief at the only moment when the loss +would have mattered, that insignificant delay which cost Cordelia's +life. Again, men act, no doubt, in accordance with their characters; but +what is it that brings them just the one problem which is fatal to them +and would be easy to another, and sometimes brings it to them just when +they are least fitted to face it? How is it that Othello comes to be the +companion of the one man in the world who is at once able enough, brave +enough, and vile enough to ensnare him? By what strange fatality does it +happen that Lear has such daughters and Cordelia such sisters? Even +character itself contributes to these feelings of fatality. How could +men escape, we cry, such vehement propensities as drive Romeo, Antony, +Coriolanus, to their doom? And why is it that a man's virtues help to +destroy him, and that his weakness or defect is so intertwined with +everything that is admirable in him that we can hardly separate them +even in imagination? + +If we find in Shakespeare's tragedies the source of impressions like +these, it is important, on the other hand, to notice what we do _not_ +find there. We find practically no trace of fatalism in its more +primitive, crude and obvious forms. Nothing, again, makes us think of +the actions and sufferings of the persons as somehow arbitrarily fixed +beforehand without regard to their feelings, thoughts and resolutions. +Nor, I believe, are the facts ever so presented that it seems to us as +if the supreme power, whatever it may be, had a special spite against a +family or an individual. Neither, lastly, do we receive the impression +(which, it must be observed, is not purely fatalistic) that a family, +owing to some hideous crime or impiety in early days, is doomed in later +days to continue a career of portentous calamities and sins. +Shakespeare, indeed, does not appear to have taken much interest in +heredity, or to have attached much importance to it. (See, however, +'heredity' in the Index.) + +What, then, is this 'fate' which the impressions already considered lead +us to describe as the ultimate power in the tragic world? It appears to +be a mythological expression for the whole system or order, of which the +individual characters form an inconsiderable and feeble part; which +seems to determine, far more than they, their native dispositions and +their circumstances, and, through these, their action; which is so vast +and complex that they can scarcely at all understand it or control its +workings; and which has a nature so definite and fixed that whatever +changes take place in it produce other changes inevitably and without +regard to men's desires and regrets. And whether this system or order is +best called by the name of fate or no,[12] it can hardly be denied that +it does appear as the ultimate power in the tragic world, and that it +has such characteristics as these. But the name 'fate' may be intended +to imply something more--to imply that this order is a blank necessity, +totally regardless alike of human weal and of the difference between +good and evil or right and wrong. And such an implication many readers +would at once reject. They would maintain, on the contrary, that this +order shows characteristics of quite another kind from those which made +us give it the name of fate, characteristics which certainly should not +induce us to forget those others, but which would lead us to describe it +as a moral order and its necessity as a moral necessity. + + +5 + +Let us turn, then, to this idea. It brings into the light those aspects +of the tragic fact which the idea of fate throws into the shade. And the +argument which leads to it in its simplest form may be stated briefly +thus: 'Whatever may be said of accidents, circumstances and the like, +human action is, after all, presented to us as the central fact in +tragedy, and also as the main cause of the catastrophe. That necessity +which so much impresses us is, after all, chiefly the necessary +connection of actions and consequences. For these actions we, without +even raising a question on the subject, hold the agents responsible; and +the tragedy would disappear for us if we did not. The critical action +is, in greater or less degree, wrong or bad. The catastrophe is, in the +main, the return of this action on the head of the agent. It is an +example of justice; and that order which, present alike within the +agents and outside them, infallibly brings it about, is therefore just. +The rigour of its justice is terrible, no doubt, for a tragedy is a +terrible story; but, in spite of fear and pity, we acquiesce, because +our sense of justice is satisfied.' + +Now, if this view is to hold good, the 'justice' of which it speaks must +be at once distinguished from what is called 'poetic justice.' 'Poetic +justice' means that prosperity and adversity are distributed in +proportion to the merits of the agents. Such 'poetic justice' is in +flagrant contradiction with the facts of life, and it is absent from +Shakespeare's tragic picture of life; indeed, this very absence is a +ground of constant complaint on the part of Dr. Johnson. [Greek: +Drasanti pathein], 'the doer must suffer'--this we find in Shakespeare. +We also find that villainy never remains victorious and prosperous at +the last. But an assignment of amounts of happiness and misery, an +assignment even of life and death, in proportion to merit, we do not +find. No one who thinks of Desdemona and Cordelia; or who remembers that +one end awaits Richard III. and Brutus, Macbeth and Hamlet; or who asks +himself which suffered most, Othello or Iago; will ever accuse +Shakespeare of representing the ultimate power as 'poetically' just. + +And we must go further. I venture to say that it is a mistake to use at +all these terms of justice and merit or desert. And this for two +reasons. In the first place, essential as it is to recognise the +connection between act and consequence, and natural as it may seem in +some cases (_e.g._ Macbeth's) to say that the doer only gets what he +deserves, yet in very many cases to say this would be quite unnatural. +We might not object to the statement that Lear deserved to suffer for +his folly, selfishness and tyranny; but to assert that he deserved to +suffer what he did suffer is to do violence not merely to language but +to any healthy moral sense. It is, moreover, to obscure the tragic fact +that the consequences of action cannot be limited to that which would +appear to us to follow 'justly' from them. And, this being so, when we +call the order of the tragic world just, we are either using the word in +some vague and unexplained sense, or we are going beyond what is shown +us of this order, and are appealing to faith. + +But, in the second place, the ideas of justice and desert are, it seems +to me, in _all_ cases--even those of Richard III. and of Macbeth and +Lady Macbeth--untrue to our imaginative experience. When we are immersed +in a tragedy, we feel towards dispositions, actions, and persons such +emotions as attraction and repulsion, pity, wonder, fear, horror, +perhaps hatred; but we do not _judge_. This is a point of view which +emerges only when, in reading a play, we slip, by our own fault or the +dramatist's, from the tragic position, or when, in thinking about the +play afterwards, we fall back on our everyday legal and moral notions. +But tragedy does not belong, any more than religion belongs, to the +sphere of these notions; neither does the imaginative attitude in +presence of it. While we are in its world we watch what is, seeing that +so it happened and must have happened, feeling that it is piteous, +dreadful, awful, mysterious, but neither passing sentence on the agents, +nor asking whether the behaviour of the ultimate power towards them is +just. And, therefore, the use of such language in attempts to render our +imaginative experience in terms of the understanding is, to say the +least, full of danger.[13] + +Let us attempt then to re-state the idea that the ultimate power in the +tragic world is a moral order. Let us put aside the ideas of justice and +merit, and speak simply of good and evil. Let us understand by these +words, primarily, moral good and evil, but also everything else in human +beings which we take to be excellent or the reverse. Let us understand +the statement that the ultimate power or order is 'moral' to mean that +it does not show itself indifferent to good and evil, or equally +favourable or unfavourable to both, but shows itself akin to good and +alien from evil. And, understanding the statement thus, let us ask what +grounds it has in the tragic fact as presented by Shakespeare. + +Here, as in dealing with the grounds on which the idea of fate rests, I +choose only two or three out of many. And the most important is this. In +Shakespearean tragedy the main source of the convulsion which produces +suffering and death is never good: good contributes to this convulsion +only from its tragic implication with its opposite in one and the same +character. The main source, on the contrary, is in every case evil; and, +what is more (though this seems to have been little noticed), it is in +almost every case evil in the fullest sense, not mere imperfection but +plain moral evil. The love of Romeo and Juliet conducts them to death +only because of the senseless hatred of their houses. Guilty ambition, +seconded by diabolic malice and issuing in murder, opens the action in +_Macbeth_. Iago is the main source of the convulsion in _Othello_; +Goneril, Regan and Edmund in _King Lear_. Even when this plain moral +evil is not the obviously prime source within the play, it lies behind +it: the situation with which Hamlet has to deal has been formed by +adultery and murder. _Julius Caesar_ is the only tragedy in which one is +even tempted to find an exception to this rule. And the inference is +obvious. If it is chiefly evil that violently disturbs the order of the +world, this order cannot be friendly to evil or indifferent between evil +and good, any more than a body which is convulsed by poison is friendly +to it or indifferent to the distinction between poison and food. + +Again, if we confine our attention to the hero, and to those cases where +the gross and palpable evil is not in him but elsewhere, we find that +the comparatively innocent hero still shows some marked imperfection or +defect,--irresolution, precipitancy, pride, credulousness, excessive +simplicity, excessive susceptibility to sexual emotions, and the like. +These defects or imperfections are certainly, in the wide sense of the +word, evil, and they contribute decisively to the conflict and +catastrophe. And the inference is again obvious. The ultimate power +which shows itself disturbed by this evil and reacts against it, must +have a nature alien to it. Indeed its reaction is so vehement and +'relentless' that it would seem to be bent on nothing short of good in +perfection, and to be ruthless in its demand for it. + +To this must be added another fact, or another aspect of the same fact. +Evil exhibits itself everywhere as something negative, barren, +weakening, destructive, a principle of death. It isolates, disunites, +and tends to annihilate not only its opposite but itself. That which +keeps the evil man[14] prosperous, makes him succeed, even permits him +to exist, is the good in him (I do not mean only the obviously 'moral' +good). When the evil in him masters the good and has its way, it +destroys other people through him, but it also destroys _him_. At the +close of the struggle he has vanished, and has left behind him nothing +that can stand. What remains is a family, a city, a country, exhausted, +pale and feeble, but alive through the principle of good which animates +it; and, within it, individuals who, if they have not the brilliance or +greatness of the tragic character, still have won our respect and +confidence. And the inference would seem clear. If existence in an order +depends on good, and if the presence of evil is hostile to such +existence, the inner being or soul of this order must be akin to good. + +These are aspects of the tragic world at least as clearly marked as +those which, taken alone, suggest the idea of fate. And the idea which +they in their turn, when taken alone, may suggest, is that of an order +which does not indeed award 'poetic justice,' but which reacts through +the necessity of its own 'moral' nature both against attacks made upon +it and against failure to conform to it. Tragedy, on this view, is the +exhibition of that convulsive reaction; and the fact that the spectacle +does not leave us rebellious or desperate is due to a more or less +distinct perception that the tragic suffering and death arise from +collision, not with a fate or blank power, but with a moral power, a +power akin to all that we admire and revere in the characters +themselves. This perception produces something like a feeling of +acquiescence in the catastrophe, though it neither leads us to pass +judgment on the characters nor diminishes the pity, the fear, and the +sense of waste, which their struggle, suffering and fall evoke. And, +finally, this view seems quite able to do justice to those aspects of +the tragic fact which give rise to the idea of fate. They would appear +as various expressions of the fact that the moral order acts not +capriciously or like a human being, but from the necessity of its +nature, or, if we prefer the phrase, by general laws,--a necessity or +law which of course knows no exception and is as 'ruthless' as fate. + +It is impossible to deny to this view a large measure of truth. And yet +without some amendment it can hardly satisfy. For it does not include +the whole of the facts, and therefore does not wholly correspond with +the impressions they produce. Let it be granted that the system or order +which shows itself omnipotent against individuals is, in the sense +explained, moral. Still--at any rate for the eye of sight--the evil +against which it asserts itself, and the persons whom this evil +inhabits, are not really something outside the order, so that they can +attack it or fail to conform to it; they are within it and a part of it. +It itself produces them,--produces Iago as well as Desdemona, Iago's +cruelty as well as Iago's courage. It is not poisoned, it poisons +itself. Doubtless it shows by its violent reaction that the poison _is_ +poison, and that its health lies in good. But one significant fact +cannot remove another, and the spectacle we witness scarcely warrants +the assertion that the order is responsible for the good in Desdemona, +but Iago for the evil in Iago. If we make this assertion we make it on +grounds other than the facts as presented in Shakespeare's tragedies. + +Nor does the idea of a moral order asserting itself against attack or +want of conformity answer in full to our feelings regarding the tragic +character. We do not think of Hamlet merely as failing to meet its +demand, of Antony as merely sinning against it, or even of Macbeth as +simply attacking it. What we feel corresponds quite as much to the idea +that they are _its_ parts, expressions, products; that in their defect +or evil _it_ is untrue to its soul of goodness, and falls into conflict +and collision with itself; that, in making them suffer and waste +themselves, _it_ suffers and wastes itself; and that when, to save its +life and regain peace from this intestinal struggle, it casts them out, +it has lost a part of its own substance,--a part more dangerous and +unquiet, but far more valuable and nearer to its heart, than that which +remains,--a Fortinbras, a Malcolm, an Octavius. There is no tragedy in +its expulsion of evil: the tragedy is that this involves the waste of +good. + +Thus we are left at last with an idea showing two sides or aspects which +we can neither separate nor reconcile. The whole or order against which +the individual part shows itself powerless seems to be animated by a +passion for perfection: we cannot otherwise explain its behaviour +towards evil. Yet it appears to engender this evil within itself, and in +its effort to overcome and expel it it is agonised with pain, and driven +to mutilate its own substance and to lose not only evil but priceless +good. That this idea, though very different from the idea of a blank +fate, is no solution of the riddle of life is obvious; but why should we +expect it to be such a solution? Shakespeare was not attempting to +justify the ways of God to men, or to show the universe as a Divine +Comedy. He was writing tragedy, and tragedy would not be tragedy if it +were not a painful mystery. Nor can he be said even to point distinctly, +like some writers of tragedy, in any direction where a solution might +lie. We find a few references to gods or God, to the influence of the +stars, to another life: some of them certainly, all of them perhaps, +merely dramatic--appropriate to the person from whose lips they fall. A +ghost comes from Purgatory to impart a secret out of the reach of its +hearer--who presently meditates on the question whether the sleep of +death is dreamless. Accidents once or twice remind us strangely of the +words, 'There's a divinity that shapes our ends.' More important are +other impressions. Sometimes from the very furnace of affliction a +conviction seems borne to us that somehow, if we could see it, this +agony counts as nothing against the heroism and love which appear in it +and thrill our hearts. Sometimes we are driven to cry out that these +mighty or heavenly spirits who perish are too great for the little space +in which they move, and that they vanish not into nothingness but into +freedom. Sometimes from these sources and from others comes a +presentiment, formless but haunting and even profound, that all the fury +of conflict, with its waste and woe, is less than half the truth, even +an illusion, 'such stuff as dreams are made on.' But these faint and +scattered intimations that the tragic world, being but a fragment of a +whole beyond our vision, must needs be a contradiction and no ultimate +truth, avail nothing to interpret the mystery. We remain confronted with +the inexplicable fact, or the no less inexplicable appearance, of a +world travailing for perfection, but bringing to birth, together with +glorious good, an evil which it is able to overcome only by self-torture +and self-waste. And this fact or appearance is tragedy.[15] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 1: _Julius Caesar_ is not an exception to this rule. Caesar, +whose murder comes in the Third Act, is in a sense the dominating figure +in the story, but Brutus is the 'hero.'] + +[Footnote 2: _Timon of Athens_, we have seen, was probably not designed +by Shakespeare, but even _Timon_ is no exception to the rule. The +sub-plot is concerned with Alcibiades and his army, and Timon himself is +treated by the Senate as a man of great importance. _Arden of Feversham_ +and _A Yorkshire Tragedy_ would certainly be exceptions to the rule; but +I assume that neither of them is Shakespeare's; and if either is, it +belongs to a different species from his admitted tragedies. See, on this +species, Symonds, _Shakspere's Predecessors_, ch. xi.] + +[Footnote 3: Even a deed would, I think, be counted an 'accident,' if it +were the deed of a very minor person whose character had not been +indicated; because such a deed would not issue from the little world to +which the dramatist had confined our attention.] + +[Footnote 4: Comedy stands in a different position. The tricks played by +chance often form a principal part of the comic action.] + +[Footnote 5: It may be observed that the influence of the three elements +just considered is to strengthen the tendency, produced by the +sufferings considered first, to regard the tragic persons as passive +rather than as agents.] + +[Footnote 6: An account of Hegel's view may be found in _Oxford Lectures +on Poetry_.] + +[Footnote 7: The reader, however, will find considerable difficulty in +placing some very important characters in these and other plays. I will +give only two or three illustrations. Edgar is clearly not on the same +side as Edmund, and yet it seems awkward to range him on Gloster's side +when Gloster wishes to put him to death. Ophelia is in love with Hamlet, +but how can she be said to be of Hamlet's party against the King and +Polonius, or of their party against Hamlet? Desdemona worships Othello, +yet it sounds odd to say that Othello is on the same side with a person +whom he insults, strikes and murders.] + +[Footnote 8: I have given names to the 'spiritual forces' in _Macbeth_ +merely to illustrate the idea, and without any pretension to adequacy. +Perhaps, in view of some interpretations of Shakespeare's plays, it will +be as well to add that I do not dream of suggesting that in any of his +dramas Shakespeare imagined two abstract principles or passions +conflicting, and incorporated them in persons; or that there is any +necessity for a reader to define for himself the particular forces which +conflict in a given case.] + +[Footnote 9: Aristotle apparently would exclude them.] + +[Footnote 10: Richard II. is perhaps an exception, and I must confess +that to me he is scarcely a tragic character, and that, if he is +nevertheless a tragic figure, he is so only because his fall from +prosperity to adversity is so great.] + +[Footnote 11: I say substantially; but the concluding remarks on +_Hamlet_ will modify a little the statements above.] + +[Footnote 12: I have raised no objection to the use of the idea of fate, +because it occurs so often both in conversation and in books about +Shakespeare's tragedies that I must suppose it to be natural to many +readers. Yet I doubt whether it would be so if Greek tragedy had never +been written; and I must in candour confess that to me it does not often +occur while I am reading, or when I have just read, a tragedy of +Shakespeare. Wordsworth's lines, for example, about + + poor humanity's afflicted will + Struggling in vain with ruthless destiny + +do not represent the impression I receive; much less do images which +compare man to a puny creature helpless in the claws of a bird of prey. +The reader should examine himself closely on this matter.] + +[Footnote 13: It is dangerous, I think, in reference to all really good +tragedies, but I am dealing here only with Shakespeare's. In not a few +Greek tragedies it is almost inevitable that we should think of justice +and retribution, not only because the _dramatis personae_ often speak of +them, but also because there is something casuistical about the tragic +problem itself. The poet treats the story in such a way that the +question, Is the hero doing right or wrong? is almost forced upon us. +But this is not so with Shakespeare. _Julius Caesar_ is probably the +only one of his tragedies in which the question suggests itself to us, +and this is one of the reasons why that play has something of a classic +air. Even here, if we ask the question, we have no doubt at all about +the answer.] + +[Footnote 14: It is most essential to remember that an evil man is much +more than the evil in him. I may add that in this paragraph I have, for +the sake of clearness, considered evil in its most pronounced form; but +what is said would apply, _mutatis mutandis_, to evil as imperfection, +etc.] + +[Footnote 15: Partly in order not to anticipate later passages, I +abstained from treating fully here the question why we feel, at the +death of the tragic hero, not only pain but also reconciliation and +sometimes even exultation. As I cannot at present make good this defect, +I would ask the reader to refer to the word _Reconciliation_ in the +Index. See also, in _Oxford Lectures on Poetry_, _Hegel's Theory of +Tragedy_, especially pp. 90, 91.] + + + + +LECTURE II + +CONSTRUCTION IN SHAKESPEARE'S TRAGEDIES + + +Having discussed the substance of a Shakespearean tragedy, we should +naturally go on to examine the form. And under this head many things +might be included; for example, Shakespeare's methods of +characterisation, his language, his versification, the construction of +his plots. I intend, however, to speak only of the last of these +subjects, which has been somewhat neglected;[16] and, as construction is +a more or less technical matter, I shall add some general remarks on +Shakespeare as an artist. + + +1 + +As a Shakespearean tragedy represents a conflict which terminates in a +catastrophe, any such tragedy may roughly be divided into three parts. +The first of these sets forth or expounds the situation,[17] or state of +affairs, out of which the conflict arises; and it may, therefore, be +called the Exposition. The second deals with the definite beginning, the +growth and the vicissitudes of the conflict. It forms accordingly the +bulk of the play, comprising the Second, Third and Fourth Acts, and +usually a part of the First and a part of the Fifth. The final section +of the tragedy shows the issue of the conflict in a catastrophe.[18] + +The application of this scheme of division is naturally more or less +arbitrary. The first part glides into the second, and the second into +the third, and there may often be difficulty in drawing the lines +between them. But it is still harder to divide spring from summer, and +summer from autumn; and yet spring is spring, and summer summer. + +The main business of the Exposition, which we will consider first, is to +introduce us into a little world of persons; to show us their positions +in life, their circumstances, their relations to one another, and +perhaps something of their characters; and to leave us keenly interested +in the question what will come out of this condition of things. We are +left thus expectant, not merely because some of the persons interest us +at once, but also because their situation in regard to one another +points to difficulties in the future. This situation is not one of +conflict,[19] but it threatens conflict. For example, we see first the +hatred of the Montagues and Capulets; and then we see Romeo ready to +fall violently in love; and then we hear talk of a marriage between +Juliet and Paris; but the exposition is not complete, and the conflict +has not definitely begun to arise, till, in the last scene of the First +Act, Romeo the Montague sees Juliet the Capulet and becomes her slave. + +The dramatist's chief difficulty in the exposition is obvious, and it is +illustrated clearly enough in the plays of unpractised writers; for +example, in _Remorse_, and even in _The Cenci_. He has to impart to the +audience a quantity of information about matters of which they generally +know nothing and never know all that is necessary for his purpose.[20] +But the process of merely acquiring information is unpleasant, and the +direct imparting of it is undramatic. Unless he uses a prologue, +therefore, he must conceal from his auditors the fact that they are +being informed, and must tell them what he wants them to know by means +which are interesting on their own account. These means, with +Shakespeare, are not only speeches but actions and events. From the very +beginning of the play, though the conflict has not arisen, things are +happening and being done which in some degree arrest, startle, and +excite; and in a few scenes we have mastered the situation of affairs +without perceiving the dramatist's designs upon us. Not that this is +always so with Shakespeare. In the opening scene of his early _Comedy of +Errors_, and in the opening speech of _Richard III._, we feel that the +speakers are addressing us; and in the second scene of the _Tempest_ +(for Shakespeare grew at last rather negligent of technique) the purpose +of Prospero's long explanation to Miranda is palpable. But in general +Shakespeare's expositions are masterpieces.[21] + +His usual plan in tragedy is to begin with a short scene, or part of a +scene, either full of life and stir, or in some other way arresting. +Then, having secured a hearing, he proceeds to conversations at a lower +pitch, accompanied by little action but conveying much information. For +example, _Romeo and Juliet_ opens with a street-fight, _Julius Caesar_ +and _Coriolanus_ with a crowd in commotion; and when this excitement has +had its effect on the audience, there follow quiet speeches, in which +the cause of the excitement, and so a great part of the situation, are +disclosed. In _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_ this scheme is employed with great +boldness. In _Hamlet_ the first appearance of the Ghost occurs at the +fortieth line, and with such effect that Shakespeare can afford to +introduce at once a conversation which explains part of the state of +affairs at Elsinore; and the second appearance, having again increased +the tension, is followed by a long scene, which contains no action but +introduces almost all the _dramatis personae_ and adds the information +left wanting. The opening of _Macbeth_ is even more remarkable, for +there is probably no parallel to its first scene, where the senses and +imagination are assaulted by a storm of thunder and supernatural alarm. +This scene is only eleven lines long, but its influence is so great that +the next can safely be occupied with a mere report of Macbeth's +battles,--a narrative which would have won much less attention if it had +opened the play. + +When Shakespeare begins his exposition thus he generally at first makes +people talk about the hero, but keeps the hero himself for some time out +of sight, so that we await his entrance with curiosity, and sometimes +with anxiety. On the other hand, if the play opens with a quiet +conversation, this is usually brief, and then at once the hero enters +and takes action of some decided kind. Nothing, for example, can be less +like the beginning of _Macbeth_ than that of _King Lear_. The tone is +pitched so low that the conversation between Kent, Gloster, and Edmund +is written in prose. But at the thirty-fourth line it is broken off by +the entrance of Lear and his court, and without delay the King proceeds +to his fatal division of the kingdom. + +This tragedy illustrates another practice of Shakespeare's. _King Lear_ +has a secondary plot, that which concerns Gloster and his two sons. To +make the beginning of this plot quite clear, and to mark it off from the +main action, Shakespeare gives it a separate exposition. The great scene +of the division of Britain and the rejection of Cordelia and Kent is +followed by the second scene, in which Gloster and his two sons appear +alone, and the beginning of Edmund's design is disclosed. In _Hamlet_, +though the plot is single, there is a little group of characters +possessing a certain independent interest,--Polonius, his son, and his +daughter; and so the third scene is devoted wholly to them. And again, +in _Othello_, since Roderigo is to occupy a peculiar position almost +throughout the action, he is introduced at once, alone with Iago, and +his position is explained before the other characters are allowed to +appear. + +But why should Iago open the play? Or, if this seems too presumptuous a +question, let us put it in the form, What is the effect of his opening +the play? It is that we receive at the very outset a strong impression +of the force which is to prove fatal to the hero's happiness, so that, +when we see the hero himself, the shadow of fate already rests upon him. +And an effect of this kind is to be noticed in other tragedies. We are +made conscious at once of some power which is to influence the whole +action to the hero's undoing. In _Macbeth_ we see and hear the Witches, +in _Hamlet_ the Ghost. In the first scene of _Julius Caesar_ and of +_Coriolanus_ those qualities of the crowd are vividly shown which render +hopeless the enterprise of the one hero and wreck the ambition of the +other. It is the same with the hatred between the rival houses in _Romeo +and Juliet_, and with Antony's infatuated passion. We realise them at +the end of the first page, and are almost ready to regard the hero as +doomed. Often, again, at one or more points during the exposition this +feeling is reinforced by some expression that has an ominous effect. The +first words we hear from Macbeth, 'So foul and fair a day I have not +seen,' echo, though he knows it not, the last words we heard from the +Witches, 'Fair is foul, and foul is fair.' Romeo, on his way with his +friends to the banquet, where he is to see Juliet for the first time, +tells Mercutio that he has had a dream. What the dream was we never +learn, for Mercutio does not care to know, and breaks into his speech +about Queen Mab; but we can guess its nature from Romeo's last speech in +the scene: + + My mind misgives + Some consequence yet hanging in the stars + Shall bitterly begin his fearful date + With this night's revels. + +When Brabantio, forced to acquiesce in his daughter's stolen marriage, +turns, as he leaves the council-chamber, to Othello, with the warning, + + Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see; + She has deceived her father, and may thee, + +this warning, and no less Othello's answer, 'My life upon her faith,' +make our hearts sink. The whole of the coming story seems to be +prefigured in Antony's muttered words (I. ii. 120): + + These strong Egyptian fetters I must break, + Or lose myself in dotage; + +and, again, in Hamlet's weary sigh, following so soon on the passionate +resolution stirred by the message of the Ghost: + + The time is out of joint. Oh cursed spite, + That ever I was born to set it right. + +These words occur at a point (the end of the First Act) which may be +held to fall either within the exposition or beyond it. I should take +the former view, though such questions, as we saw at starting, can +hardly be decided with certainty. The dimensions of this first section +of a tragedy depend on a variety of causes, of which the chief seems to +be the comparative simplicity or complexity of the situation from which +the conflict arises. Where this is simple the exposition is short, as in +_Julius Caesar_ and _Macbeth_. Where it is complicated the exposition +requires more space, as in _Romeo and Juliet_, _Hamlet_, and _King +Lear_. Its completion is generally marked in the mind of the reader by a +feeling that the action it contains is for the moment complete but has +left a problem. The lovers have met, but their families are at deadly +enmity; the hero seems at the height of success, but has admitted the +thought of murdering his sovereign; the old king has divided his kingdom +between two hypocritical daughters, and has rejected his true child; the +hero has acknowledged a sacred duty of revenge, but is weary of life: +and we ask, What will come of this? Sometimes, I may add, a certain time +is supposed to elapse before the events which answer our question make +their appearance and the conflict begins; in _King Lear_, for instance, +about a fortnight; in _Hamlet_ about two months. + + +2 + +We come now to the conflict itself. And here one or two preliminary +remarks are necessary. In the first place, it must be remembered that +our point of view in examining the construction of a play will not +always coincide with that which we occupy in thinking of its whole +dramatic effect. For example, that struggle in the hero's soul which +sometimes accompanies the outward struggle is of the highest importance +for the total effect of a tragedy; but it is not always necessary or +desirable to consider it when the question is merely one of +construction. And this is natural. The play is meant primarily for the +theatre; and theatrically the outward conflict, with its influence on +the fortunes of the hero, is the aspect which first catches, if it does +not engross, attention. For the average play-goer of every period the +main interest of _Hamlet_ has probably lain in the vicissitudes of his +long duel with the King; and the question, one may almost say, has been +which will first kill the other. And so, from the point of view of +construction, the fact that Hamlet spares the King when he finds him +praying, is, from its effect on the hero's fortunes, of great moment; +but the cause of the fact, which lies within Hamlet's character, is not +so. + +In the second place we must be prepared to find that, as the plays vary +so much, no single way of regarding the conflict will answer precisely +to the construction of all; that it sometimes appears possible to look +at the construction of a tragedy in two quite different ways, and that +it is material to find the best of the two; and that thus, in any given +instance, it is necessary first to define the opposing sides in the +conflict. I will give one or two examples. In some tragedies, as we saw +in our first lecture, the opposing forces can, for practical purposes, +be identified with opposing persons or groups. So it is in _Romeo and +Juliet_ and _Macbeth_. But it is not always so. The love of Othello may +be said to contend with another force, as the love of Romeo does; but +Othello cannot be said to contend with Iago as Romeo contends with the +representatives of the hatred of the houses, or as Macbeth contends with +Malcolm and Macduff. Again, in _Macbeth_ the hero, however much +influenced by others, supplies the main driving power of the action; but +in _King Lear_ he does not. Possibly, therefore, the conflict, and with +it the construction, may best be regarded from different points of view +in these two plays, in spite of the fact that the hero is the central +figure in each. But if we do not observe this we shall attempt to find +the same scheme in both, and shall either be driven to some unnatural +view or to a sceptical despair of perceiving any principle of +construction at all. + +With these warnings, I turn to the question whether we can trace any +distinct method or methods by which Shakespeare represents the rise and +development of the conflict. + +(1) One at least is obvious, and indeed it is followed not merely during +the conflict but from beginning to end of the play. There are, of +course, in the action certain places where the tension in the minds of +the audience becomes extreme. We shall consider these presently. But, in +addition, there is, all through the tragedy, a constant alternation of +rises and falls in this tension or in the emotional pitch of the work, a +regular sequence of more exciting and less exciting sections. Some kind +of variation of pitch is to be found, of course, in all drama, for it +rests on the elementary facts that relief must be given after emotional +strain, and that contrast is required to bring out the full force of an +effect. But a good drama of our own time shows nothing approaching to +the _regularity_ with which in the plays of Shakespeare and of his +contemporaries the principle is applied. And the main cause of this +difference lies simply in a change of theatrical arrangements. In +Shakespeare's theatre, as there was no scenery, scene followed scene +with scarcely any pause; and so the readiest, though not the only, way +to vary the emotional pitch was to interpose a whole scene where the +tension was low between scenes where it was high. In our theatres there +is a great deal of scenery, which takes a long time to set and change; +and therefore the number of scenes is small, and the variations of +tension have to be provided within the scenes, and still more by the +pauses between them. With Shakespeare there are, of course, in any long +scene variations of tension, but the scenes are numerous and, compared +with ours, usually short, and variety is given principally by their +difference in pitch. + +It may further be observed that, in a portion of the play which is +relatively unexciting, the scenes of lower tension may be as long as +those of higher; while in a portion of the play which is specially +exciting the scenes of low tension are shorter, often much shorter, than +the others. The reader may verify this statement by comparing the First +or the Fourth Act in most of the tragedies with the Third; for, speaking +very roughly, we may say that the First and Fourth are relatively quiet +acts, the Third highly critical. A good example is the Third Act of +_King Lear_, where the scenes of high tension (ii., iv., vi.) are +respectively 95, 186 and 122 lines in length, while those of low tension +(i., iii., v.) are respectively 55, 26 and 26 lines long. Scene vii., +the last of the Act, is, I may add, a very exciting scene, though it +follows scene vi., and therefore the tone of scene vi. is greatly +lowered during its final thirty lines. + +(2) If we turn now from the differences of tension to the sequence of +events within the conflict, we shall find the principle of alternation +at work again in another and a quite independent way. Let us for the +sake of brevity call the two sides in the conflict A and B. Now, +usually, as we shall see presently, through a considerable part of the +play, perhaps the first half, the cause of A is, on the whole, +advancing; and through the remaining part it is retiring, while that of +B advances in turn. But, underlying this broad movement, all through the +conflict we shall find a regular alternation of smaller advances and +retirals; first A seeming to win some ground, and then the +counter-action of B being shown. And since we always more or less +decidedly prefer A to B or B to A, the result of this oscillating +movement is a constant alternation of hope and fear, or rather of a +mixed state predominantly hopeful and a mixed state predominantly +apprehensive. An example will make the point clear. In _Hamlet_ the +conflict begins with the hero's feigning to be insane from +disappointment in love, and we are shown his immediate success in +convincing Polonius. Let us call this an advance of A. The next scene +shows the King's great uneasiness about Hamlet's melancholy, and his +scepticism as to Polonius's explanation of its cause: advance of B. +Hamlet completely baffles Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who have been +sent to discover his secret, and he arranges for the test of the +play-scene: advance of A. But immediately before the play-scene his +soliloquy on suicide fills us with misgiving; and his words to Ophelia, +overheard, so convince the King that love is _not_ the cause of his +nephew's strange behaviour, that he determines to get rid of him by +sending him to England: advance of B. The play-scene proves a complete +success: decided advance of A. Directly after it Hamlet spares the King +at prayer, and in an interview with his mother unwittingly kills +Polonius, and so gives his enemy a perfect excuse for sending him away +(to be executed): decided advance of B. I need not pursue the +illustration further. This oscillating movement can be traced without +difficulty in any of the tragedies, though less distinctly in one or two +of the earliest. + +(3) Though this movement continues right up to the catastrophe, its +effect does not disguise that much broader effect to which I have +already alluded, and which we have now to study. In all the tragedies, +though more clearly in some than in others, one side is distinctly felt +to be on the whole advancing up to a certain point in the conflict, and +then to be on the whole declining before the reaction of the other. +There is therefore felt to be a critical point in the action, which +proves also to be a turning point. It is critical sometimes in the sense +that, until it is reached, the conflict is not, so to speak, clenched; +one of the two sets of forces might subside, or a reconciliation might +somehow be effected; while, as soon as it is reached, we feel this can +no longer be. It is critical also because the advancing force has +apparently asserted itself victoriously, gaining, if not all it could +wish, still a very substantial advantage; whereas really it is on the +point of turning downward towards its fall. This Crisis, as a rule, +comes somewhere near the middle of the play; and where it is well marked +it has the effect, as to construction, of dividing the play into five +parts instead of three; these parts showing (1) a situation not yet one +of conflict, (2) the rise and development of the conflict, in which A or +B advances on the whole till it reaches (3) the Crisis, on which follows +(4) the decline of A or B towards (5) the Catastrophe. And it will be +seen that the fourth and fifth parts repeat, though with a reversal of +direction as regards A or B, the movement of the second and third, +working towards the catastrophe as the second and third worked towards +the crisis. + +In developing, illustrating and qualifying this statement, it will be +best to begin with the tragedies in which the movement is most clear and +simple. These are _Julius Caesar_ and _Macbeth_. In the former the +fortunes of the conspiracy rise with vicissitudes up to the crisis of +the assassination (III. i.); they then sink with vicissitudes to the +catastrophe, where Brutus and Cassius perish. In the latter, Macbeth, +hurrying, in spite of much inward resistance, to the murder of Duncan, +attains the crown, the upward movement being extraordinarily rapid, and +the crisis arriving early: his cause then turns slowly downward, and +soon hastens to ruin. In both these tragedies the simplicity of the +constructional effect, it should be noticed, depends in part on the fact +that the contending forces may quite naturally be identified with +certain persons, and partly again on the fact that the defeat of one +side is the victory of the other. Octavius and Antony, Malcolm and +Macduff, are left standing over the bodies of their foes. + +This is not so in _Romeo and Juliet_ and _Hamlet_, because here, +although the hero perishes, the side opposed to him, being the more +faulty or evil, cannot be allowed to triumph when he falls. Otherwise +the type of construction is the same. The fortunes of Romeo and Juliet +rise and culminate in their marriage (II. vi.), and then begin to +decline before the opposition of their houses, which, aided by +accidents, produces a catastrophe, but is thereupon converted into a +remorseful reconciliation. Hamlet's cause reaches its zenith in the +success of the play-scene (III. ii.). Thereafter the reaction makes way, +and he perishes through the plot of the King and Laertes. But they are +not allowed to survive their success. + +The construction in the remaining Roman plays follows the same plan, but +in both plays (as in _Richard II._ and _Richard III._) it suffers from +the intractable nature of the historical material, and is also +influenced by other causes. In _Coriolanus_ the hero reaches the topmost +point of success when he is named consul (II. iii.), and the rest of the +play shows his decline and fall; but in this decline he attains again +for a time extraordinary power, and triumphs, in a sense, over his +original adversary, though he succumbs to another. In _Antony and +Cleopatra_ the advance of the hero's cause depends on his freeing +himself from the heroine, and he appears to have succeeded when he +becomes reconciled to Octavius and marries Octavia (III. ii.); but he +returns to Egypt and is gradually driven to his death, which involves +that of the heroine. + +There remain two of the greatest of the tragedies, and in both of them a +certain difficulty will be felt. _King Lear_ alone among these plays has +a distinct double action. Besides this, it is impossible, I think, from +the point of view of construction, to regard the hero as the leading +figure. If we attempt to do so, we must either find the crisis in the +First Act (for after it Lear's course is downward), and this is absurd; +or else we must say that the usual movement is present but its direction +is reversed, the hero's cause first sinking to the lowest point (in the +Storm-scenes) and then rising again. But this also will not do; for +though his fortunes may be said to rise again for a time, they rise only +to fall once more to a catastrophe. The truth is, that after the First +Act, which is really filled by the exposition, Lear suffers but hardly +initiates action at all; and the right way to look at the matter, _from +the point of view of construction_, is to regard Goneril, Regan and +Edmund as the leading characters. It is they who, in the conflict, +initiate action. Their fortune mounts to the crisis, where the old King +is driven out into the storm and loses his reason, and where Gloster is +blinded and expelled from his home (III. vi. and vii.). Then the +counter-action begins to gather force, and their cause to decline; and, +although they win the battle, they are involved in the catastrophe which +they bring on Cordelia and Lear. Thus we may still find in _King Lear_ +the usual scheme of an ascending and a descending movement of one side +in the conflict. + +The case of _Othello_ is more peculiar. In its whole constructional +effect _Othello_ differs from the other tragedies, and the cause of this +difference is not hard to find, and will be mentioned presently. But +how, after it is found, are we to define the principle of the +construction? On the one hand the usual method seems to show itself. +Othello's fortune certainly advances in the early part of the play, and +it may be considered to reach its topmost point in the exquisite joy of +his reunion with Desdemona in Cyprus; while soon afterwards it begins to +turn, and then falls to the catastrophe. But the topmost point thus +comes very early (II. i.), and, moreover, is but faintly marked; indeed, +it is scarcely felt as a crisis at all. And, what is still more +significant, though reached by conflict, it is not reached by conflict +with the force which afterwards destroys it. Iago, in the early scenes, +is indeed shown to cherish a design against Othello, but it is not Iago +against whom he has at first to assert himself, but Brabantio; and Iago +does not even begin to poison his mind until the third scene of the +Third Act. + +Can we then, on the other hand, following the precedent of _King Lear_, +and remembering the probable chronological juxtaposition of the two +plays, regard Iago as the leading figure from the point of view of +construction? This might at first seem the right view; for it is the +case that _Othello_ resembles _King Lear_ in having a hero more acted +upon than acting, or rather a hero driven to act by being acted upon. +But then, if Iago is taken as the leading figure, the usual mode of +construction is plainly abandoned, for there will nowhere be a crisis +followed by a descending movement. Iago's cause advances, at first +slowly and quietly, then rapidly, but it does nothing but advance until +the catastrophe swallows his dupe and him together. And this way of +regarding the action does positive violence, I think, to our natural +impressions of the earlier part of the play. + +I think, therefore, that the usual scheme is so far followed that the +drama represents first the rise of the hero, and then his fall. But, +however this question may be decided, one striking peculiarity remains, +and is the cause of the unique effect of _Othello_. In the first half of +the play the main conflict is merely incubating; then it bursts into +life, and goes storming, without intermission or change of direction, to +its close. Now, in this peculiarity _Othello_ is quite unlike the other +tragedies; and in the consequent effect, which is that the second half +of the drama is immeasurably more exciting than the first, it is +approached only by _Antony and Cleopatra_. I shall therefore reserve it +for separate consideration, though in proceeding to speak further of +Shakespeare's treatment of the tragic conflict I shall have to mention +some devices which are used in _Othello_ as well as in the other +tragedies. + + +3 + +Shakespeare's general plan, we have seen, is to show one set of forces +advancing, in secret or open opposition to the other, to some decisive +success, and then driven downward to defeat by the reaction it provokes. +And the advantages of this plan, as seen in such a typical instance as +_Julius Caesar_, are manifest. It conveys the movement of the conflict +to the mind with great clearness and force. It helps to produce the +impression that in his decline and fall the doer's act is returning on +his own head. And, finally, as used by Shakespeare, it makes the first +half of the play intensely interesting and dramatic. Action which +effects a striking change in an existing situation is naturally watched +with keen interest; and this we find in some of these tragedies. And the +spectacle, which others exhibit, of a purpose forming itself and, in +spite of outward obstacles and often of inward resistance, forcing its +way onward to a happy consummation or a terrible deed, not only gives +scope to that psychological subtlety in which Shakespeare is scarcely +rivalled, but is also dramatic in the highest degree. + +But when the crisis has been reached there come difficulties and +dangers, which, if we put Shakespeare for the moment out of mind, are +easily seen. An immediate and crushing counter-action would, no doubt, +sustain the interest, but it would precipitate the catastrophe, and +leave a feeling that there has been too long a preparation for a final +effect so brief. What seems necessary is a momentary pause, followed by +a counter-action which mounts at first slowly, and afterwards, as it +gathers force, with quickening speed. And yet the result of this +arrangement, it would seem, must be, for a time, a decided slackening of +tension. Nor is this the only difficulty. The persons who represent the +counter-action and now take the lead, are likely to be comparatively +unfamiliar, and therefore unwelcome, to the audience; and, even if +familiar, they are almost sure to be at first, if not permanently, less +interesting than those who figured in the ascending movement, and on +whom attention has been fixed. Possibly, too, their necessary prominence +may crowd the hero into the back-ground. Hence the point of danger in +this method of construction seems to lie in that section of the play +which follows the crisis and has not yet approached the catastrophe. And +this section will usually comprise the Fourth Act, together, in some +cases, with a part of the Third and a part of the Fifth. + +Shakespeare was so masterly a playwright, and had so wonderful a power +of giving life to unpromising subjects, that to a large extent he was +able to surmount this difficulty. But illustrations of it are easily to +be found in his tragedies, and it is not always surmounted. In almost +all of them we are conscious of that momentary pause in the action, +though, as we shall see, it does not generally occur _immediately_ after +the crisis. Sometimes he allows himself to be driven to keep the hero +off the stage for a long time while the counter-action is rising; +Macbeth, Hamlet and Coriolanus during about 450 lines, Lear for nearly +500, Romeo for about 550 (it matters less here, because Juliet is quite +as important as Romeo). How can a drama in which this happens compete, +in its latter part, with _Othello_? And again, how can deliberations +between Octavius, Antony and Lepidus, between Malcolm and Macduff, +between the Capulets, between Laertes and the King, keep us at the +pitch, I do not say of the crisis, but even of the action which led up +to it? Good critics--writers who have criticised Shakespeare's dramas +from within, instead of applying to them some standard ready-made by +themselves or derived from dramas and a theatre of quite other kinds +than his--have held that some of his greatest tragedies fall off in the +Fourth Act, and that one or two never wholly recover themselves. And I +believe most readers would find, if they examined their impressions, +that to their minds _Julius Caesar_, _Hamlet_, _King Lear_ and _Macbeth_ +have all a tendency to 'drag' in this section of the play, and that the +first and perhaps also the last of these four fail even in the +catastrophe to reach the height of the greatest scenes that have +preceded the Fourth Act. I will not ask how far these impressions are +justified. The difficulties in question will become clearer and will +gain in interest if we look rather at the means which have been employed +to meet them, and which certainly have in part, at least, overcome them. + +(_a_) The first of these is always strikingly effective, sometimes +marvellously so. The crisis in which the ascending force reaches its +zenith is followed quickly, or even without the slightest pause, by a +reverse or counter-blow not less emphatic and in some cases even more +exciting. And the effect is to make us feel a sudden and tragic change +in the direction of the movement, which, after ascending more or less +gradually, now turns sharply downward. To the assassination of Caesar +(III. i.) succeeds the scene in the Forum (III. ii.), where Antony +carries the people away in a storm of sympathy with the dead man and of +fury against the conspirators. We have hardly realised their victory +before we are forced to anticipate their ultimate defeat and to take the +liveliest interest in their chief antagonist. In _Hamlet_ the thrilling +success of the play-scene (III. ii.) is met and undone at once by the +counter-stroke of Hamlet's failure to take vengeance (III. iii.) and his +misfortune in killing Polonius (III. iv.). Coriolanus has no sooner +gained the consulship than he is excited to frenzy by the tribunes and +driven into exile. On the marriage of Romeo follows immediately the +brawl which leads to Mercutio's death and the banishment of the hero +(II. vi. and III. i.). In all of these instances excepting that of +_Hamlet_ the scene of the counter-stroke is at least as exciting as that +of the crisis, perhaps more so. Most people, if asked to mention the +scene that occupies the _centre_ of the action in _Julius Caesar_ and in +_Coriolanus_, would mention the scenes of Antony's speech and +Coriolanus' banishment. Thus that apparently necessary pause in the +action does not, in any of these dramas, come directly after the crisis. +It is deferred; and in several cases it is by various devices deferred +for some little time; _e.g._ in _Romeo and Juliet_ till the hero has +left Verona, and Juliet is told that her marriage with Paris is to take +place 'next Thursday morn' (end of Act III.); in _Macbeth_ till the +murder of Duncan has been followed by that of Banquo, and this by the +banquet-scene. Hence the point where this pause occurs is very rarely +reached before the end of the Third Act. + +(_b_) Either at this point, or in the scene of the counter-stroke which +precedes it, we sometimes find a peculiar effect. We are reminded of the +state of affairs in which the conflict began. The opening of _Julius +Caesar_ warned us that, among a people so unstable and so easily led +this way or that, the enterprise of Brutus is hopeless; the days of the +Republic are done. In the scene of Antony's speech we see this same +people again. At the beginning of _Antony and Cleopatra_ the hero is +about to leave Cleopatra for Rome. Where the play takes, as it were, a +fresh start after the crisis, he leaves Octavia for Egypt. In _Hamlet_, +when the counter-stroke succeeds to the crisis, the Ghost, who had +appeared in the opening scenes, reappears. Macbeth's action in the first +part of the tragedy followed on the prediction of the Witches who +promised him the throne. When the action moves forward again after the +banquet-scene the Witches appear once more, and make those fresh +promises which again drive him forward. This repetition of a first +effect produces a fateful feeling. It generally also stimulates +expectation as to the new movement about to begin. In _Macbeth_ the +scene is, in addition, of the greatest consequence from the purely +theatrical point of view. + +(_c_) It has yet another function. It shows, in Macbeth's furious +irritability and purposeless savagery, the internal reaction which +accompanies the outward decline of his fortunes. And in other plays also +the exhibition of such inner changes forms a means by which interest is +sustained in this difficult section of a tragedy. There is no point in +_Hamlet_ where we feel more hopeless than that where the hero, having +missed his chance, moralises over his irresolution and determines to +cherish now only thoughts of blood, and then departs without an effort +for England. One purpose, again, of the quarrel-scene between Brutus and +Cassius (IV. iii), as also of the appearance of Caesar's ghost just +afterwards, is to indicate the inward changes. Otherwise the +introduction of this famous and wonderful scene can hardly be defended +on strictly dramatic grounds. No one would consent to part with it, and +it is invaluable in sustaining interest during the progress of the +reaction, but it is an episode, the removal of which would not affect +the actual sequence of events (unless we may hold that, but for the +emotion caused by the quarrel and reconciliation, Cassius would not have +allowed Brutus to overcome his objection to the fatal policy of offering +battle at Philippi). + +(_d_) The quarrel-scene illustrates yet another favourite expedient. In +this section of a tragedy Shakespeare often appeals to an emotion +different from any of those excited in the first half of the play, and +so provides novelty and generally also relief. As a rule this new +emotion is pathetic; and the pathos is not terrible or lacerating, but, +even if painful, is accompanied by the sense of beauty and by an outflow +of admiration or affection, which come with an inexpressible sweetness +after the tension of the crisis and the first counter-stroke. So it is +with the reconciliation of Brutus and Cassius, and the arrival of the +news of Portia's death. The most famous instance of this effect is the +scene (IV. vii.) where Lear wakes from sleep and finds Cordelia bending +over him, perhaps the most tear-compelling passage in literature. +Another is the short scene (IV. ii.) in which the talk of Lady Macduff +and her little boy is interrupted by the entrance of the murderers, a +passage of touching beauty and heroism. Another is the introduction of +Ophelia in her madness (twice in different parts of IV. v.), where the +effect, though intensely pathetic, is beautiful and moving rather than +harrowing; and this effect is repeated in a softer tone in the +description of Ophelia's death (end of Act IV.). And in _Othello_ the +passage where pathos of _this_ kind reaches its height is certainly that +where Desdemona and Emilia converse, and the willow-song is sung, on the +eve of the catastrophe (IV. iii.). + +(_e_) Sometimes, again, in this section of a tragedy we find humorous or +semi-humorous passages. On the whole such passages occur most frequently +in the early or middle part of the play, which naturally grows more +sombre as it nears the close; but their occasional introduction in the +Fourth Act, and even later, affords variety and relief, and also +heightens by contrast the tragic feelings. For example, there is a touch +of comedy in the conversation of Lady Macduff with her little boy. +Purely and delightfully humorous are the talk and behaviour of the +servants in that admirable scene where Coriolanus comes disguised in +mean apparel to the house of Aufidius (IV. v.); of a more mingled kind +is the effect of the discussion between Menenius and the sentinels in V. +ii.; and in the very middle of the supreme scene between the hero, +Volumnia and Virgilia, little Marcius makes us burst out laughing (V. +iii.) A little before the catastrophe in _Hamlet_ comes the grave-digger +passage, a passage ever welcome, but of a length which could hardly be +defended on purely dramatic grounds; and still later, occupying some +hundred and twenty lines of the very last scene, we have the chatter of +Osric with Hamlet's mockery of it. But the acme of audacity is reached +in _Antony and Cleopatra_, where, quite close to the end, the old +countryman who brings the asps to Cleopatra discourses on the virtues +and vices of the worm, and where his last words, 'Yes, forsooth: I wish +you joy o' the worm,' are followed, without the intervention of a line, +by the glorious speech, + + Give me my robe; put on my crown; I have + Immortal longings in me.... + +In some of the instances of pathos or humour just mentioned we have been +brought to that part of the play which immediately precedes, or even +contains, the catastrophe. And I will add at once three remarks which +refer specially to this final section of a tragedy. + +(_f_) In several plays Shakespeare makes here an appeal which in his own +time was evidently powerful: he introduces scenes of battle. This is the +case in _Richard III._, _Julius Caesar_, _King Lear_, _Macbeth_ and +_Antony and Cleopatra_. Richard, Brutus and Cassius, and Macbeth die on +the battlefield. Even if his use of this expedient were not enough to +show that battle-scenes were extremely popular in the Elizabethan +theatre, we know it from other sources. It is a curious comment on the +futility of our spectacular effects that in our theatre these scenes, in +which we strive after an 'illusion' of which the Elizabethans never +dreamt, produce comparatively little excitement, and to many spectators +are even somewhat distasteful.[22] And although some of them thrill the +imagination of the reader, they rarely, I think, quite satisfy the +_dramatic_ sense. Perhaps this is partly because a battle is not the +most favourable place for the exhibition of tragic character; and it is +worth notice that Brutus, Cassius and Antony do not die fighting, but +commit suicide after defeat. The actual battle, however, does make us +feel the greatness of Antony, and still more does it help us to regard +Richard and Macbeth in their day of doom as heroes, and to mingle +sympathy and enthusiastic admiration with desire for their defeat. + +(_g_) In some of the tragedies, again, an expedient is used, which +Freytag has pointed out (though he sometimes finds it, I think, where it +is not really employed). Shakespeare very rarely makes the least attempt +to surprise by his catastrophes. They are felt to be inevitable, though +the precise way in which they will be brought about is not, of course, +foreseen. Occasionally, however, where we dread the catastrophe because +we love the hero, a moment occurs, just before it, in which a gleam of +false hope lights up the darkening scene; and, though we know it is +false, it affects us. Far the most remarkable example is to be found in +the final Act of _King Lear_. Here the victory of Edgar and the deaths +of Edmund and the two sisters have almost made us forget the design on +the lives of Lear and Cordelia. Even when we are reminded of it there is +still room for hope that Edgar, who rushes away to the prison, will be +in time to save them; and, however familiar we are with the play, the +sudden entrance of Lear, with Cordelia dead in his arms, comes on us +with a shock. Much slighter, but quite perceptible, is the effect of +Antony's victory on land, and of the last outburst of pride and joy as +he and Cleopatra meet (IV. viii.). The frank apology of Hamlet to +Laertes, their reconciliation, and a delusive appearance of quiet and +even confident firmness in the tone of the hero's conversation with +Horatio, almost blind us to our better knowledge, and give to the +catastrophe an added pain. Those in the audience who are ignorant of +_Macbeth_, and who take more simply than most readers now can do the +mysterious prophecies concerning Birnam Wood and the man not born of +woman, feel, I imagine, just before the catastrophe, a false fear that +the hero may yet escape. + +(_h_) I will mention only one point more. In some cases Shakespeare +spreads the catastrophe out, so to speak, over a considerable space, and +thus shortens that difficult section which has to show the development +of the counter-action. This is possible only where there is, besides the +hero, some character who engages our interest in the highest degree, and +with whose fate his own is bound up. Thus the murder of Desdemona is +separated by some distance from the death of Othello. The most +impressive scene in _Macbeth_, after that of Duncan's murder, is the +sleep-walking scene; and it may truly, if not literally, be said to show +the catastrophe of Lady Macbeth. Yet it is the opening scene of the +Fifth Act, and a number of scenes in which Macbeth's fate is still +approaching intervene before the close. Finally, in _Antony and +Cleopatra_ the heroine equals the hero in importance, and here the death +of Antony actually occurs in the Fourth Act, and the whole of the Fifth +is devoted to Cleopatra. + + * * * * * + +Let us now turn to _Othello_ and consider briefly its exceptional scheme +of construction. The advantage of this scheme is obvious. In the second +half of the tragedy there is no danger of 'dragging,' of any awkward +pause, any undue lowering of pitch, any need of scenes which, however +fine, are more or less episodic. The tension is extreme, and it is +relaxed only for brief intervals to permit of some slight relief. From +the moment when Iago begins to poison Othello's mind we hold our breath. +_Othello_ from this point onwards is certainly the most exciting of +Shakespeare's plays, unless possibly _Macbeth_ in its first part may be +held to rival it. And _Othello_ is such a masterpiece that we are +scarcely conscious of any disadvantage attending its method of +construction, and may even wonder why Shakespeare employed this +method--at any rate in its purity--in this tragedy alone. Nor is it any +answer to say that it would not elsewhere have suited his material. Even +if this be granted, how was it that he only once chose a story to which +this method was appropriate? To his eyes, or for his instinct, there +must have been some disadvantage in it. And dangers in it are in fact +not hard to see. + +In the first place, where the conflict develops very slowly, or, as in +_Othello_, remains in a state of incubation during the first part of a +tragedy, that part cannot produce the tension proper to the +corresponding part of a tragedy like _Macbeth_, and may even run the +risk of being somewhat flat. This seems obvious, and it is none the less +true because in _Othello_ the difficulty is overcome. We may even see +that in _Othello_ a difficulty was felt. The First Act is full of stir, +but it is so because Shakespeare has filled it with a kind of +preliminary conflict between the hero and Brabantio,--a personage who +then vanishes from the stage. The long first scene of the Second Act is +largely occupied with mere conversations, artfully drawn out to +dimensions which can scarcely be considered essential to the plot. These +expedients are fully justified by their success, and nothing more +consummate in their way is to be found in Shakespeare than Othello's +speech to the Senate and Iago's two talks with Roderigo. But the fact +that Shakespeare can make a plan succeed does not show that the plan is, +abstractedly considered, a good plan; and if the scheme of construction +in _Othello_ were placed, in the shape of a mere outline, before a +play-wright ignorant of the actual drama, he would certainly, I believe, +feel grave misgivings about the first half of the play. + +There is a second difficulty in the scheme. When the middle of the +tragedy is reached, the audience is not what it was at the beginning. It +has been attending for some time, and has been through a certain amount +of agitation. The extreme tension which now arises may therefore easily +tire and displease it, all the more if the matter which produces the +tension is very painful, if the catastrophe is not less so, and if the +limits of the remainder of the play (not to speak of any other +consideration) permit of very little relief. It is one thing to watch +the scene of Duncan's assassination at the beginning of the Second Act, +and another thing to watch the murder of Desdemona at the beginning of +the Fifth. If Shakespeare has wholly avoided this difficulty in +_Othello_, it is by treating the first part of the play in such a manner +that the sympathies excited are predominantly pleasant and therefore not +exhausting. The scene in the Council Chamber, and the scene of the +reunion at Cyprus, give almost unmixed happiness to the audience; +however repulsive Iago may be, the humour of his gulling of Roderigo is +agreeable; even the scene of Cassio's intoxication is not, on the whole, +painful. Hence we come to the great temptation-scene, where the conflict +emerges into life (III. iii.), with nerves unshaken and feelings much +fresher than those with which we greet the banquet-scene in _Macbeth_ +(III. iv.), or the first of the storm-scenes in _King Lear_ (III. i.). +The same skill may be observed in _Antony and Cleopatra_, where, as we +saw, the second half of the tragedy is the more exciting. But, again, +the success due to Shakespeare's skill does not show that the scheme of +construction is free from a characteristic danger; and on the whole it +would appear to be best fitted for a plot which, though it may cause +painful agitation as it nears the end, actually ends with a solution +instead of a catastrophe. + +But for Shakespeare's scanty use of this method there may have been a +deeper, though probably an unconscious, reason. The method suits a plot +based on intrigue. It may produce intense suspense. It may stir most +powerfully the tragic feelings of pity and fear. And it throws into +relief that aspect of tragedy in which great or beautiful lives seem +caught in the net of fate. But it is apt to be less favourable to the +exhibition of character, to show less clearly how an act returns upon +the agent, and to produce less strongly the impression of an inexorable +order working in the passions and actions of men, and labouring through +their agony and waste towards good. Now, it seems clear from his +tragedies that what appealed most to Shakespeare was this latter class +of effects. I do not ask here whether _Othello_ fails to produce, in the +same degree as the other tragedies, these impressions; but Shakespeare's +preference for them may have been one reason why he habitually chose a +scheme of construction which produces in the final Acts but little of +strained suspense, and presents the catastrophe as a thing foreseen and +following with a psychological and moral necessity on the action +exhibited in the first part of the tragedy. + + +4 + +The more minute details of construction cannot well be examined here, +and I will not pursue the subject further. But its discussion suggests a +question which will have occurred to some of my hearers. They may have +asked themselves whether I have not used the words 'art' and 'device' +and 'expedient' and 'method' too boldly, as though Shakespeare were a +conscious artist, and not rather a writer who constructed in obedience +to an extraordinary dramatic instinct, as he composed mainly by +inspiration. And a brief explanation on this head will enable me to +allude to a few more points, chiefly of construction, which are not too +technical for a lecture. + +In speaking, for convenience, of devices and expedients, I did not +intend to imply that Shakespeare always deliberately aimed at the +effects which he produced. But _no_ artist always does this, and I see +no reason to doubt that Shakespeare often did it, or to suppose that his +method of constructing and composing differed, except in degree, from +that of the most 'conscious' of artists. The antithesis of art and +inspiration, though not meaningless, is often most misleading. +Inspiration is surely not incompatible with considerate workmanship. The +two may be severed, but they need not be so, and where a genuinely +poetic result is being produced they cannot be so. The glow of a first +conception must in some measure survive or rekindle itself in the work +of planning and executing; and what is called a technical expedient may +'come' to a man with as sudden a glory as a splendid image. Verse may be +easy and unpremeditated, as Milton says his was, and yet many a word in +it may be changed many a time, and the last change be more 'inspired' +than the original. The difference between poets in these matters is no +doubt considerable, and sometimes important, but it can only be a +difference of less and more. It is probable that Shakespeare often wrote +fluently, for Jonson (a better authority than Heminge and Condell) says +so; and for anything we can tell he may also have constructed with +unusual readiness. But we know that he revised and re-wrote (for +instance in _Love's Labour's Lost_ and _Romeo and Juliet_ and _Hamlet_); +it is almost impossible that he can have worked out the plots of his +best plays without much reflection and many experiments; and it appears +to me scarcely more possible to mistake the signs of deliberate care in +some of his famous speeches. If a 'conscious artist' means one who holds +his work away from him, scrutinises and judges it, and, if need be, +alters it and alters it till it comes as near satisfying him as he can +make it, I am sure that Shakespeare frequently employed such conscious +art. If it means, again, an artist who consciously aims at the effects +he produces, what ground have we for doubting that he frequently +employed such art, though probably less frequently than a good many +other poets? + +But perhaps the notion of a 'conscious artist' in drama is that of one +who studies the theory of the art, and even writes with an eye to its +'rules.' And we know it was long a favourite idea that Shakespeare was +totally ignorant of the 'rules.' Yet this is quite incredible. The +rules referred to, such as they were, were not buried in Aristotle's +Greek nor even hidden away in Italian treatises. He could find pretty +well all of them in a book so current and famous as Sidney's _Defence +of Poetry_. Even if we suppose that he refused to open this book +(which is most unlikely), how could he possibly remain ignorant of the +rules in a society of actors and dramatists and amateurs who must have +been incessantly talking about plays and play-writing, and some of +whom were ardent champions of the rules and full of contempt for the +lawlessness of the popular drama? Who can doubt that at the Mermaid +Shakespeare heard from Jonson's lips much more censure of his offences +against 'art' than Jonson ever confided to Drummond or to paper? And +is it not most probable that those battles between the two which +Fuller imagines, were waged often on the field of dramatic criticism? +If Shakespeare, then, broke some of the 'rules,' it was not from +ignorance. Probably he refused, on grounds of art itself, to trouble +himself with rules derived from forms of drama long extinct. And it is +not unlikely that he was little interested in theory as such, and more +than likely that he was impatient of pedantic distinctions between +'pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, +tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable or poem +unlimited.' But that would not prove that he never reflected on his +art, or could not explain, if he cared to, what _he_ thought would be +good general rules for the drama of his own time. He could give advice +about play-acting. Why should we suppose that he could not give advice +about play-making? + +Still Shakespeare, though in some considerable degree a 'conscious' +artist, frequently sins against art; and if his sins were not due to +ignorance or inspiration, they must be accounted for otherwise. Neither +can there be much doubt about their causes (for they have more than one +cause), as we shall see if we take some illustrations of the defects +themselves. + +Among these are not to be reckoned certain things which in dramas +written at the present time would rightly be counted defects. There are, +for example, in most Elizabethan plays peculiarities of construction +which would injure a play written for our stage but were perfectly +well-fitted for that very different stage,--a stage on which again some +of the best-constructed plays of our time would appear absurdly faulty. +Or take the charge of improbability. Shakespeare certainly has +improbabilities which are defects. They are most frequent in the winding +up of his comedies (and how many comedies are there in the world which +end satisfactorily?). But his improbabilities are rarely psychological, +and in some of his plays there occurs one kind of improbability which is +no defect, but simply a characteristic which has lost in our day much of +its former attraction. I mean that the story, in most of the comedies +and many of the tragedies of the Elizabethans, was _intended_ to be +strange and wonderful. These plays were tales of romance dramatised, and +they were meant in part to satisfy the same love of wonder to which the +romances appealed. It is no defect in the Arthurian legends, or the old +French romances, or many of the stories in the _Decameron_, that they +are improbable: it is a virtue. To criticise them as though they were of +the same species as a realistic novel, is, we should all say, merely +stupid. Is it anything else to criticise in the same way _Twelfth Night_ +or _As You Like It_? And so, even when the difference between comedy and +tragedy is allowed for, the improbability of the opening of _King Lear_, +so often censured, is no defect. It is not out of character, it is only +extremely unusual and strange. But it was meant to be so; like the +marriage of the black Othello with Desdemona, the Venetian senator's +daughter. + +To come then to real defects, (_a_) one may be found in places where +Shakespeare strings together a number of scenes, some very short, in +which the _dramatis personae_ are frequently changed; as though a +novelist were to tell his story in a succession of short chapters, in +which he flitted from one group of his characters to another. This +method shows itself here and there in the pure tragedies (_e.g._ in the +last Act of _Macbeth_), but it appears most decidedly where the +historical material was undramatic, as in the middle part of _Antony and +Cleopatra_. It was made possible by the absence of scenery, and +doubtless Shakespeare used it because it was the easiest way out of a +difficulty. But, considered abstractedly, it is a defective method, and, +even as used by Shakespeare, it sometimes reminds us of the merely +narrative arrangement common in plays before his time. + +(_b_) We may take next the introduction or excessive development of +matter neither required by the plot nor essential to the exhibition of +character: _e.g._ the references in _Hamlet_ to theatre-quarrels of the +day, and the length of the player's speech and also of Hamlet's +directions to him respecting the delivery of the lines to be inserted in +the 'Murder of Gonzago.' All this was probably of great interest at the +time when _Hamlet_ was first presented; most of it we should be very +sorry to miss; some of it seems to bring us close to Shakespeare +himself; but who can defend it from the point of view of constructive +art? + +(_c_) Again, we may look at Shakespeare's soliloquies. It will be agreed +that in listening to a soliloquy we ought never to feel that we are +being addressed. And in this respect, as in others, many of the +soliloquies are master-pieces. But certainly in some the purpose of +giving information lies bare, and in one or two the actor openly speaks +to the audience. Such faults are found chiefly in the early plays, +though there is a glaring instance at the end of Belarius's speech in +_Cymbeline_ (III. iii. 99 ff.), and even in the mature tragedies +something of this kind may be traced. Let anyone compare, for example, +Edmund's soliloquy in _King Lear_, I. ii., 'This is the excellent +foppery of the world,' with Edgar's in II. iii., and he will be +conscious that in the latter the purpose of giving information is +imperfectly disguised.[23] + +(_d_) It cannot be denied, further, that in many of Shakespeare's plays, +if not in all, there are inconsistencies and contradictions, and also +that questions are suggested to the reader which it is impossible for +him to answer with certainty. For instance, some of the indications of +the lapse of time between Othello's marriage and the events of the later +Acts flatly contradict one another; and it is impossible to make out +whether Hamlet was at Court or at the University when his father was +murdered. But it should be noticed that often what seems a defect of +this latter kind is not really a defect. For instance, the difficulty +about Hamlet's age (even if it cannot be resolved by the text alone) did +not exist for Shakespeare's audience. The moment Burbage entered it must +have been clear whether the hero was twenty or thirty. And in like +manner many questions of dramatic interpretation which trouble us could +never have arisen when the plays were first produced, for the actor +would be instructed by the author how to render any critical and +possibly ambiguous passage. (I have heard it remarked, and the remark I +believe is just, that Shakespeare seems to have relied on such +instructions less than most of his contemporaries; one fact out of +several which might be adduced to prove that he did not regard his plays +as mere stage-dramas of the moment.) + +(_e_) To turn to another field, the early critics were no doubt often +provokingly wrong when they censured the language of particular passages +in Shakespeare as obscure, inflated, tasteless, or 'pestered with +metaphors'; but they were surely right in the general statement that his +language often shows these faults. And this is a subject which later +criticism has never fairly faced and examined. + +(_f_) Once more, to say that Shakespeare makes all his serious +characters talk alike,[24] and that he constantly speaks through the +mouths of his _dramatis personae_ without regard to their individual +natures, would be to exaggerate absurdly; but it is true that in his +earlier plays these faults are traceable in some degree, and even in +_Hamlet_ there are striking passages where dramatic appropriateness is +sacrificed to some other object. When Laertes speaks the lines +beginning, + + For nature, crescent, does not grow alone + In thews and bulk, + +who can help feeling that Shakespeare is speaking rather than Laertes? +Or when the player-king discourses for more than twenty lines on the +instability of human purpose, and when King Claudius afterwards insists +to Laertes on the same subject at almost equal length, who does not see +that Shakespeare, thinking but little of dramatic fitness, wishes in +part simply to write poetry, and partly to impress on the audience +thoughts which will help them to understand, not the player-king nor yet +King Claudius, but Hamlet himself, who, on his side,--and here quite in +character--has already enlarged on the same topic in the most famous of +his soliloquies? + +(_g_) Lastly, like nearly all the dramatists of his day and of times +much earlier, Shakespeare was fond of 'gnomic' passages, and introduces +them probably not more freely than his readers like, but more freely +than, I suppose, a good play-wright now would care to do. These +passages, it may be observed, are frequently rhymed (_e.g._ _Othello_, +I. iii. 201 ff., II. i. 149 ff.). Sometimes they were printed in early +editions with inverted commas round them, as are in the First Quarto +Polonius's 'few precepts' to Laertes. + +If now we ask whence defects like these arose, we shall observe that +some of them are shared by the majority of Shakespeare's contemporaries, +and abound in the dramas immediately preceding his time. They are +characteristics of an art still undeveloped, and, no doubt, were not +perceived to be defects. But though it is quite probable that in regard +to one or two kinds of imperfection (such as the superabundance of +'gnomic' passages) Shakespeare himself erred thus ignorantly, it is very +unlikely that in most cases he did so, unless in the first years of his +career of authorship. And certainly he never can have thought it +artistic to leave inconsistencies, obscurities, or passages of bombast +in his work. Most of the defects in his writings must be due to +indifference or want of care. + +I do not say that all were so. In regard, for example, to his occasional +bombast and other errors of diction, it seems hardly doubtful that his +perception was sometimes at fault, and that, though he used the English +language like no one else, he had not that _sureness_ of taste in words +which has been shown by some much smaller writers. And it seems not +unlikely that here he suffered from his comparative want of +'learning,'--that is, of familiarity with the great writers of +antiquity. But nine-tenths of his defects are not, I believe, the errors +of an inspired genius, ignorant of art, but the sins of a great but +negligent artist. He was often, no doubt, over-worked and pressed for +time. He knew that the immense majority of his audience were incapable +of distinguishing between rough and finished work. He often felt the +degradation of having to live by pleasing them. Probably in hours of +depression he was quite indifferent to fame, and perhaps in another mood +the whole business of play-writing seemed to him a little thing. None of +these thoughts and feelings influenced him when his subject had caught +hold of him. To imagine that _then_ he 'winged his roving flight' for +'gain' or 'glory,' or wrote from any cause on earth but the necessity of +expression, with all its pains and raptures, is mere folly. He was +possessed: his mind must have been in a white heat: he worked, no doubt, +with the _furia_ of Michael Angelo. And if he did not succeed at +once--and how can even he have always done so?--he returned to the +matter again and again. Such things as the scenes of Duncan's murder or +Othello's temptation, such speeches as those of the Duke to Claudio and +of Claudio to his sister about death, were not composed in an hour and +tossed aside; and if they have defects, they have not what Shakespeare +thought defects. Nor is it possible that his astonishingly individual +conceptions of character can have been struck out at a heat: prolonged +and repeated thought must have gone to them. But of small +inconsistencies in the plot he was often quite careless. He seems to +have finished off some of his comedies with a hasty and even +contemptuous indifference, as if it mattered nothing how the people got +married, or even who married whom, so long as enough were married +somehow. And often, when he came to parts of his scheme that were +necessary but not interesting to him, he wrote with a slack hand, like a +craftsman of genius who knows that his natural gift and acquired skill +will turn out something more than good enough for his audience: wrote +probably fluently but certainly negligently, sometimes only half saying +what he meant, and sometimes saying the opposite, and now and then, when +passion was required, lapsing into bombast because he knew he must +heighten his style but would not take the trouble to inflame his +imagination. It may truly be said that what injures such passages is not +inspiration, but the want of it. But, as they are mostly passages where +no poet could expect to be inspired, it is even more true to say that +here Shakespeare lacked the conscience of the artist who is determined +to make everything as good as he can. Such poets as Milton, Pope, +Tennyson, habitually show this conscience. They left probably scarcely +anything that they felt they could improve. No one could dream of saying +that of Shakespeare. + +Hence comes what is perhaps the chief difficulty in interpreting his +works. Where his power or art is fully exerted it really does resemble +that of nature. It organises and vitalises its product from the centre +outward to the minutest markings on the surface, so that when you turn +upon it the most searching light you can command, when you dissect it +and apply to it the test of a microscope, still you find in it nothing +formless, general or vague, but everywhere structure, character, +individuality. In this his great things, which seem to come whenever +they are wanted, have no companions in literature except the few +greatest things in Dante; and it is a fatal error to allow his +carelessness elsewhere to make one doubt whether here one is not seeking +more than can be found. It is very possible to look for subtlety in the +wrong places in Shakespeare, but in the right places it is not possible +to find too much. But then this characteristic, which is one source of +his endless attraction, is also a source of perplexity. For in those +parts of his plays which show him neither in his most intense nor in his +most negligent mood, we are often unable to decide whether something +that seems inconsistent, indistinct, feeble, exaggerated, is really so, +or whether it was definitely meant to be as it is, and has an intention +which we ought to be able to divine; whether, for example, we have +before us some unusual trait in character, some abnormal movement of +mind, only surprising to us because we understand so very much less of +human nature than Shakespeare did, or whether he wanted to get his work +done and made a slip, or in using an old play adopted hastily something +that would not square with his own conception, or even refused to +trouble himself with minutiae which we notice only because we study him, +but which nobody ever notices in a stage performance. We know well +enough what Shakespeare is doing when at the end of _Measure for +Measure_ he marries Isabella to the Duke--and a scandalous proceeding it +is; but who can ever feel sure that the doubts which vex him as to some +not unimportant points in _Hamlet_ are due to his own want of eyesight +or to Shakespeare's want of care? + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 16: The famous critics of the Romantic Revival seem to have +paid very little attention to this subject. Mr. R.G. Moulton has written +an interesting book on _Shakespeare as a Dramatic Artist_ (1885). In +parts of my analysis I am much indebted to Gustav Freytag's _Technik des +Dramas_, a book which deserves to be much better known than it appears +to be to Englishmen interested in the drama. I may add, for the benefit +of classical scholars, that Freytag has a chapter on Sophocles. The +reader of his book will easily distinguish, if he cares to, the places +where I follow Freytag, those where I differ from him, and those where I +write in independence of him. I may add that in speaking of construction +I have thought it best to assume in my hearers no previous knowledge of +the subject; that I have not attempted to discuss how much of what is +said of Shakespeare would apply also to other dramatists; and that I +have illustrated from the tragedies generally, not only from the chosen +four.] + +[Footnote 17: This word throughout the lecture bears the sense it has +here, which, of course, is not its usual dramatic sense.] + +[Footnote 18: In the same way a comedy will consist of three parts, +showing the 'situation,' the 'complication' or 'entanglement,' and the +_denouement_ or 'solution.'] + +[Footnote 19: It is possible, of course, to open the tragedy with the +conflict already begun, but Shakespeare never does so.] + +[Footnote 20: When the subject comes from English history, and +especially when the play forms one of a series, some knowledge may be +assumed. So in _Richard III._ Even in _Richard II._ not a little +knowledge seems to be assumed, and this fact points to the existence of +a popular play on the earlier part of Richard's reign. Such a play +exists, though it is not clear that it is a genuine Elizabethan work. +See the _Jahrbuch d. deutschen Sh.-gesellschaft_ for 1899.] + +[Footnote 21: This is one of several reasons why many people enjoy +reading him, who, on the whole, dislike reading plays. A main cause of +this very general dislike is that the reader has not a lively enough +imagination to carry him with pleasure through the exposition, though in +the theatre, where his imagination is helped, he would experience little +difficulty.] + +[Footnote 22: The end of _Richard III._ is perhaps an exception.] + +[Footnote 23: I do not discuss the general question of the justification +of soliloquy, for it concerns not Shakespeare only, but practically all +dramatists down to quite recent times. I will only remark that neither +soliloquy nor the use of verse can be condemned on the mere ground that +they are 'unnatural.' No dramatic language is 'natural'; _all_ dramatic +language is idealised. So that the question as to soliloquy must be one +as to the degree of idealisation and the balance of advantages and +disadvantages. (Since this lecture was written I have read some remarks +on Shakespeare's soliloquies to much the same effect by E. Kilian in the +_Jahrbuch d. deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft_ for 1903.)] + +[Footnote 24: If by this we mean that these characters all speak what is +recognisably Shakespeare's style, of course it is true; but it is no +accusation. Nor does it follow that they all speak alike; and in fact +they are far from doing so.] + + + + +LECTURE III + +SHAKESPEARE'S TRAGIC PERIOD--HAMLET + + +1 + +Before we come to-day to _Hamlet_, the first of our four tragedies, a +few remarks must be made on their probable place in Shakespeare's +literary career. But I shall say no more than seems necessary for our +restricted purpose, and, therefore, for the most part shall merely be +stating widely accepted results of investigation, without going into the +evidence on which they rest.[25] + +Shakespeare's tragedies fall into two distinct groups, and these groups +are separated by a considerable interval. He wrote tragedy--pure, like +_Romeo and Juliet_; historical, like _Richard III._--in the early years +of his career of authorship, when he was also writing such comedies as +_Love's Labour's Lost_ and the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_. Then came a +time, lasting some half-dozen years, during which he composed the most +mature and humorous of his English History plays (the plays with +Falstaff in them), and the best of his romantic comedies (the plays with +Beatrice and Jaques and Viola in them). There are no tragedies belonging +to these half-dozen years, nor any dramas approaching tragedy. But now, +from about 1601 to about 1608, comes tragedy after tragedy--_Julius +Caesar_, _Hamlet_, _Othello_, _King Lear_, _Timon of Athens_, _Macbeth_, +_Antony and Cleopatra_ and _Coriolanus_; and their companions are plays +which cannot indeed be called tragedies, but certainly are not comedies +in the same sense as _As You Like It_ or the _Tempest_. These seven +years, accordingly, might, without much risk of misunderstanding, be +called Shakespeare's tragic period.[26] And after it he wrote no more +tragedies, but chiefly romances more serious and less sunny than _As You +Like It_, but not much less serene. + +The existence of this distinct tragic period, of a time when the +dramatist seems to have been occupied almost exclusively with deep and +painful problems, has naturally helped to suggest the idea that the +'man' also, in these years of middle age, from thirty-seven to +forty-four, was heavily burdened in spirit; that Shakespeare turned to +tragedy not merely for change, or because he felt it to be the greatest +form of drama and felt himself equal to it, but also because the world +had come to look dark and terrible to him; and even that the railings of +Thersites and the maledictions of Timon express his own contempt and +hatred for mankind. Discussion of this large and difficult subject, +however, is not necessary to the dramatic appreciation of any of his +works, and I shall say nothing of it here, but shall pass on at once to +draw attention to certain stages and changes which may be observed +within the tragic period. For this purpose too it is needless to raise +any question as to the respective chronological positions of _Othello_, +_King Lear_ and _Macbeth_. What is important is also generally admitted: +that _Julius Caesar_ and _Hamlet_ precede these plays, and that _Antony +and Cleopatra_ and _Coriolanus_ follow them.[27] + +If we consider the tragedies first on the side of their substance, we +find at once an obvious difference between the first two and the +remainder. Both Brutus and Hamlet are highly intellectual by nature and +reflective by habit. Both may even be called, in a popular sense, +philosophic; Brutus may be called so in a stricter sense. Each, being +also a 'good' man, shows accordingly, when placed in critical +circumstances, a sensitive and almost painful anxiety to do right. And +though they fail--of course in quite different ways--to deal +successfully with these circumstances, the failure in each case is +connected rather with their intellectual nature and reflective habit +than with any yielding to passion. Hence the name 'tragedy of thought,' +which Schlegel gave to _Hamlet_, may be given also, as in effect it has +been by Professor Dowden, to _Julius Caesar_. The later heroes, on the +other hand, Othello, Lear, Timon, Macbeth, Antony, Coriolanus, have, one +and all, passionate natures, and, speaking roughly, we may attribute the +tragic failure in each of these cases to passion. Partly for this +reason, the later plays are wilder and stormier than the first two. We +see a greater mass of human nature in commotion, and we see +Shakespeare's own powers exhibited on a larger scale. Finally, +examination would show that, in all these respects, the first tragedy, +_Julius Caesar_, is further removed from the later type than is the +second, _Hamlet_. + +These two earlier works are both distinguished from most of the +succeeding tragedies in another though a kindred respect. Moral evil is +not so intently scrutinised or so fully displayed in them. In _Julius +Caesar_, we may almost say, everybody means well. In _Hamlet_, though we +have a villain, he is a small one. The murder which gives rise to the +action lies outside the play, and the centre of attention within the +play lies in the hero's efforts to do his duty. It seems clear that +Shakespeare's interest, since the early days when under Marlowe's +influence he wrote _Richard III._, has not been directed to the more +extreme or terrible forms of evil. But in the tragedies that follow +_Hamlet_ the presence of this interest is equally clear. In Iago, in the +'bad' people of _King Lear_, even in Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, human +nature assumes shapes which inspire not mere sadness or repulsion but +horror and dismay. If in _Timon_ no monstrous cruelty is done, we still +watch ingratitude and selfishness so blank that they provoke a loathing +we never felt for Claudius; and in this play and _King Lear_ we can +fancy that we hear at times the _saeva indignatio_, if not the despair, +of Swift. This prevalence of abnormal or appalling forms of evil, side +by side with vehement passion, is another reason why the convulsion +depicted in these tragedies seems to come from a deeper source, and to +be vaster in extent, than the conflict in the two earlier plays. And +here again _Julius Caesar_ is further removed than _Hamlet_ from +_Othello_, _King Lear_, and _Macbeth_. + +But in regard to this second point of difference a reservation must be +made, on which I will speak a little more fully, because, unlike the +matter hitherto touched on, its necessity seems hardly to have been +recognised. _All_ of the later tragedies may be called tragedies of +passion, but not all of them display these extreme forms of evil. +Neither of the last two does so. Antony and Coriolanus are, from one +point of view, victims of passion; but the passion that ruins Antony +also exalts him, he touches the infinite in it; and the pride and +self-will of Coriolanus, though terrible in bulk, are scarcely so in +quality; there is nothing base in them, and the huge creature whom they +destroy is a noble, even a lovable, being. Nor does either of these +dramas, though the earlier depicts a corrupt civilisation, include even +among the minor characters anyone who can be called villainous or +horrible. Consider, finally, the impression left on us at the close of +each. It is remarkable that this impression, though very strong, can +scarcely be called purely tragic; or, if we call it so, at least the +feeling of reconciliation which mingles with the obviously tragic +emotions is here exceptionally well-marked. The death of Antony, it will +be remembered, comes before the opening of the Fifth Act. The death of +Cleopatra, which closes the play, is greeted by the reader with sympathy +and admiration, even with exultation at the thought that she has foiled +Octavius; and these feelings are heightened by the deaths of Charmian +and Iras, heroically faithful to their mistress, as Emilia was to hers. +In _Coriolanus_ the feeling of reconciliation is even stronger. The +whole interest towards the close has been concentrated on the question +whether the hero will persist in his revengeful design of storming and +burning his native city, or whether better feelings will at last +overpower his resentment and pride. He stands on the edge of a crime +beside which, at least in outward dreadfulness, the slaughter of an +individual looks insignificant. And when, at the sound of his mother's +voice and the sight of his wife and child, nature asserts itself and he +gives way, although we know he will lose his life, we care little for +that: he has saved his soul. Our relief, and our exultation in the power +of goodness, are so great that the actual catastrophe which follows and +mingles sadness with these feelings leaves them but little diminished, +and as we close the book we feel, it seems to me, more as we do at the +close of _Cymbeline_ than as we do at the close of _Othello_. In saying +this I do not in the least mean to criticise _Coriolanus_. It is a much +nobler play as it stands than it would have been if Shakespeare had made +the hero persist, and we had seen him amid the flaming ruins of Rome, +awaking suddenly to the enormity of his deed and taking vengeance on +himself; but that would surely have been an ending more strictly tragic +than the close of Shakespeare's play. Whether this close was simply due +to his unwillingness to contradict his historical authority on a point +of such magnitude we need not ask. In any case _Coriolanus_ is, in more +than an outward sense, the end of his tragic period. It marks the +transition to his latest works, in which the powers of repentance and +forgiveness charm to rest the tempest raised by error and guilt. + +If we turn now from the substance of the tragedies to their style and +versification, we find on the whole a corresponding difference between +the earlier and the later. The usual assignment of _Julius Caesar_, and +even of _Hamlet_, to the end of Shakespeare's Second Period--the period +of _Henry V._--is based mainly, we saw, on considerations of form. The +general style of the serious parts of the last plays from English +history is one of full, noble and comparatively equable eloquence. The +'honey-tongued' sweetness and beauty of Shakespeare's early writing, as +seen in _Romeo and Juliet_ or the _Midsummer-Night's Dream_, remain; the +ease and lucidity remain; but there is an accession of force and weight. +We find no great change from this style when we come to _Julius +Caesar_,[28] which may be taken to mark its culmination. At this point +in Shakespeare's literary development he reaches, if the phrase may be +pardoned, a limited perfection. Neither thought on the one side, nor +expression on the other, seems to have any tendency to outrun or contend +with its fellow. We receive an impression of easy mastery and complete +harmony, but not so strong an impression of inner power bursting into +outer life. Shakespeare's style is perhaps nowhere else so free from +defects, and yet almost every one of his subsequent plays contains +writing which is greater. To speak familiarly, we feel in _Julius +Caesar_ that, although not even Shakespeare could better the style he +has chosen, he has not let himself go. + +In reading _Hamlet_ we have no such feeling, and in many parts (for +there is in the writing of _Hamlet_ an unusual variety[29]) we are +conscious of a decided change. The style in these parts is more rapid +and vehement, less equable and less simple; and there is a change of the +same kind in the versification. But on the whole the _type_ is the same +as in _Julius Caesar_, and the resemblance of the two plays is decidedly +more marked than the difference. If Hamlet's soliloquies, considered +simply as compositions, show a great change from Jaques's speech, 'All +the world's a stage,' and even from the soliloquies of Brutus, yet +_Hamlet_ (for instance in the hero's interview with his mother) is like +_Julius Caesar_, and unlike the later tragedies, in the fulness of its +eloquence, and passages like the following belong quite definitely to +the style of the Second Period: + + _Mar._ It faded on the crowing of the cock. + Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes + Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, + The bird of dawning singeth all night long; + And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad; + The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, + No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, + So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. + + _Hor._ So have I heard and do in part believe it. + But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, + Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill. + +This bewitching music is heard again in Hamlet's farewell to Horatio: + + If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, + Absent thee from felicity awhile, + And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, + To tell my story. + +But after _Hamlet_ this music is heard no more. It is followed by a +music vaster and deeper, but not the same. + +The changes observable in _Hamlet_ are afterwards, and gradually, so +greatly developed that Shakespeare's style and versification at last +become almost new things. It is extremely difficult to illustrate this +briefly in a manner to which no just exception can be taken, for it is +almost impossible to find in two plays passages bearing a sufficiently +close resemblance to one another in occasion and sentiment. But I will +venture to put by the first of those quotations from _Hamlet_ this from +_Macbeth_: + + _Dun._ This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air + Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself + Unto our gentle senses. + + _Ban._ This guest of summer, + The temple-haunting martlet, does approve, + By his loved mansionry, that the heaven's breath + Smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze, + Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird + Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle; + Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed, + The air is delicate; + +and by the second quotation from _Hamlet_ this from _Antony and +Cleopatra_: + + The miserable change now at my end + Lament nor sorrow at; but please your thoughts + In feeding them with those my former fortunes + Wherein I lived, the greatest prince o' the world, + The noblest; and do now not basely die, + Not cowardly put off my helmet to + My countryman,--a Roman by a Roman + Valiantly vanquish'd. Now my spirit is going; + I can no more. + +It would be almost an impertinence to point out in detail how greatly +these two passages, and especially the second, differ in effect from +those in _Hamlet_, written perhaps five or six years earlier. The +versification, by the time we reach _Antony and Cleopatra_, has assumed +a new type; and although this change would appear comparatively slight +in a typical passage from _Othello_ or even from _King Lear_, its +approach through these plays to _Timon_ and _Macbeth_ can easily be +traced. It is accompanied by a similar change in diction and +construction. After _Hamlet_ the style, in the more emotional passages, +is heightened. It becomes grander, sometimes wilder, sometimes more +swelling, even tumid. It is also more concentrated, rapid, varied, and, +in construction, less regular, not seldom twisted or elliptical. It is, +therefore, not so easy and lucid, and in the more ordinary dialogue it +is sometimes involved and obscure, and from these and other causes +deficient in charm.[30] On the other hand, it is always full of life and +movement, and in great passages produces sudden, strange, electrifying +effects which are rarely found in earlier plays, and not so often even +in _Hamlet_. The more pervading effect of beauty gives place to what may +almost be called explosions of sublimity or pathos. + +There is room for differences of taste and preference as regards the +style and versification of the end of Shakespeare's Second Period, and +those of the later tragedies and last romances. But readers who miss in +the latter the peculiar enchantment of the earlier will not deny that +the changes in form are in entire harmony with the inward changes. If +they object to passages where, to exaggerate a little, the sense has +rather to be discerned beyond the words than found in them, and if they +do not wholly enjoy the movement of so typical a speech as this, + + Yes, like enough, high-battled Caesar will + Unstate his happiness, and be staged to the show, + Against a sworder! I see men's judgements are + A parcel of their fortunes; and things outward + Do draw the inward quality after them, + To suffer all alike. That he should dream, + Knowing all measures, the full Caesar will + Answer his emptiness! Caesar, thou hast subdued + His judgement too, + +they will admit that, in traversing the impatient throng of thoughts not +always completely embodied, their minds move through an astonishing +variety of ideas and experiences, and that a style less generally poetic +than that of _Hamlet_ is also a style more invariably dramatic. It may +be that, for the purposes of tragedy, the highest point was reached +during the progress of these changes, in the most critical passages of +_Othello_, _King Lear_ and _Macbeth_.[31] + + +2 + +Suppose you were to describe the plot of _Hamlet_ to a person quite +ignorant of the play, and suppose you were careful to tell your hearer +nothing about Hamlet's character, what impression would your sketch make +on him? Would he not exclaim: 'What a sensational story! Why, here are +some eight violent deaths, not to speak of adultery, a ghost, a mad +woman, and a fight in a grave! If I did not know that the play was +Shakespeare's, I should have thought it must have been one of those +early tragedies of blood and horror from which he is said to have +redeemed the stage'? And would he not then go on to ask: 'But why in the +world did not Hamlet obey the Ghost at once, and so save seven of those +eight lives?' + +This exclamation and this question both show the same thing, that the +whole story turns upon the peculiar character of the hero. For without +this character the story would appear sensational and horrible; and yet +the actual _Hamlet_ is very far from being so, and even has a less +terrible effect than _Othello_, _King Lear_ or _Macbeth_. And again, if +we had no knowledge of this character, the story would hardly be +intelligible; it would at any rate at once suggest that wondering +question about the conduct of the hero; while the story of any of the +other three tragedies would sound plain enough and would raise no such +question. It is further very probable that the main change made by +Shakespeare in the story as already represented on the stage, lay in a +new conception of Hamlet's character and so of the cause of his delay. +And, lastly, when we examine the tragedy, we observe two things which +illustrate the same point. First, we find by the side of the hero no +other figure of tragic proportions, no one like Lady Macbeth or Iago, no +one even like Cordelia or Desdemona; so that, in Hamlet's absence, the +remaining characters could not yield a Shakespearean tragedy at all. +And, secondly, we find among them two, Laertes and Fortinbras, who are +evidently designed to throw the character of the hero into relief. Even +in the situations there is a curious parallelism; for Fortinbras, like +Hamlet, is the son of a king, lately dead, and succeeded by his brother; +and Laertes, like Hamlet, has a father slain, and feels bound to avenge +him. And with this parallelism in situation there is a strong contrast +in character; for both Fortinbras and Laertes possess in abundance the +very quality which the hero seems to lack, so that, as we read, we are +tempted to exclaim that either of them would have accomplished Hamlet's +task in a day. Naturally, then, the tragedy of _Hamlet_ with Hamlet left +out has become the symbol of extreme absurdity; while the character +itself has probably exerted a greater fascination, and certainly has +been the subject of more discussion, than any other in the whole +literature of the world. + +Before, however, we approach the task of examining it, it is as well to +remind ourselves that the virtue of the play by no means wholly depends +on this most subtle creation. We are all aware of this, and if we were +not so the history of _Hamlet_, as a stage-play, might bring the fact +home to us. It is to-day the most popular of Shakespeare's tragedies on +our stage; and yet a large number, perhaps even the majority of the +spectators, though they may feel some mysterious attraction in the hero, +certainly do not question themselves about his character or the cause of +his delay, and would still find the play exceptionally effective, even +if he were an ordinary brave young man and the obstacles in his path +were purely external. And this has probably always been the case. +_Hamlet_ seems from the first to have been a favourite play; but until +late in the eighteenth century, I believe, scarcely a critic showed that +he perceived anything specially interesting in the character. Hanmer, in +1730, to be sure, remarks that 'there appears no reason at all in nature +why this young prince did not put the usurper to death as soon as +possible'; but it does not even cross his mind that this apparent +'absurdity' is odd and might possibly be due to some design on the part +of the poet. He simply explains the absurdity by observing that, if +Shakespeare had made the young man go 'naturally to work,' the play +would have come to an end at once! Johnson, in like manner, notices that +'Hamlet is, through the whole piece, rather an instrument than an +agent,' but it does not occur to him that this peculiar circumstance can +be anything but a defect in Shakespeare's management of the plot. +Seeing, they saw not. Henry Mackenzie, the author of _The Man of +Feeling_, was, it would seem, the first of our critics to feel the +'indescribable charm' of Hamlet, and to divine something of +Shakespeare's intention. 'We see a man,' he writes, 'who in other +circumstances would have exercised all the moral and social virtues, +placed in a situation in which even the amiable qualities of his mind +serve but to aggravate his distress and to perplex his conduct.'[32] How +significant is the fact (if it be the fact) that it was only when the +slowly rising sun of Romance began to flush the sky that the wonder, +beauty and pathos of this most marvellous of Shakespeare's creations +began to be visible! We do not know that they were perceived even in his +own day, and perhaps those are not wholly wrong who declare that this +creation, so far from being a characteristic product of the time, was a +vision of + + the prophetic soul + Of the wide world dreaming on things to come. + +But the dramatic splendour of the whole tragedy is another matter, and +must have been manifest not only in Shakespeare's day but even in +Hanmer's. + +It is indeed so obvious that I pass it by, and proceed at once to the +central question of Hamlet's character. And I believe time will be +saved, and a good deal of positive interpretation may be introduced, if, +without examining in detail any one theory, we first distinguish classes +or types of theory which appear to be in various ways and degrees +insufficient or mistaken. And we will confine our attention to sane +theories;--for on this subject, as on all questions relating to +Shakespeare, there are plenty of merely lunatic views: the view, for +example, that Hamlet, being a disguised woman in love with Horatio, +could hardly help seeming unkind to Ophelia; or the view that, being a +very clever and wicked young man who wanted to oust his innocent uncle +from the throne, he 'faked' the Ghost with this intent. + +But, before we come to our types of theory, it is necessary to touch on +an idea, not unfrequently met with, which would make it vain labour to +discuss or propose any theory at all. It is sometimes said that Hamlet's +character is not only intricate but unintelligible. Now this statement +might mean something quite unobjectionable and even perhaps true and +important. It might mean that the character cannot be _wholly_ +understood. As we saw, there may be questions which we cannot answer +with certainty now, because we have nothing but the text to guide us, +but which never arose for the spectators who saw _Hamlet_ acted in +Shakespeare's day; and we shall have to refer to such questions in these +lectures. Again, it may be held without any improbability that, from +carelessness or because he was engaged on this play for several years, +Shakespeare left inconsistencies in his exhibition of the character +which must prevent us from being certain of his ultimate meaning. Or, +possibly, we may be baffled because he has illustrated in it certain +strange facts of human nature, which he had noticed but of which we are +ignorant. But then all this would apply in some measure to other +characters in Shakespeare, and it is not this that is meant by the +statement that Hamlet is unintelligible. What is meant is that +Shakespeare _intended_ him to be so, because he himself was feeling +strongly, and wished his audience to feel strongly, what a mystery life +is, and how impossible it is for us to understand it. Now here, surely, +we have mere confusion of mind. The mysteriousness of life is one thing, +the psychological unintelligibility of a dramatic character is quite +another; and the second does not show the first, it shows only the +incapacity or folly of the dramatist. If it did show the first, it would +be very easy to surpass Shakespeare in producing a sense of mystery: we +should simply have to portray an absolutely nonsensical character. Of +course _Hamlet_ appeals powerfully to our sense of the mystery of life, +but so does _every_ good tragedy; and it does so not because the hero is +an enigma to us, but because, having a fair understanding of him, we +feel how strange it is that strength and weakness should be so mingled +in one soul, and that this soul should be doomed to such misery and +apparent failure. + +(1) To come, then, to our typical views, we may lay it down, first, that +no theory will hold water which finds the cause of Hamlet's delay +merely, or mainly, or even to any considerable extent, in external +difficulties. Nothing is easier than to spin a plausible theory of this +kind. What, it may be asked,[33] was Hamlet to do when the Ghost had +left him with its commission of vengeance? The King was surrounded not +merely by courtiers but by a Swiss body-guard: how was Hamlet to get at +him? Was he then to accuse him publicly of the murder? If he did, what +would happen? How would he prove the charge? All that he had to offer in +proof was--a ghost-story! Others, to be sure, had seen the Ghost, but no +one else had heard its revelations. Obviously, then, even if the court +had been honest, instead of subservient and corrupt, it would have voted +Hamlet mad, or worse, and would have shut him up out of harm's way. He +could not see what to do, therefore, and so he waited. Then came the +actors, and at once with admirable promptness he arranged for the +play-scene, hoping that the King would betray his guilt to the whole +court. Unfortunately the King did not. It is true that immediately +afterwards Hamlet got his chance; for he found the King defenceless on +his knees. But what Hamlet wanted was not a private revenge, to be +followed by his own imprisonment or execution; it was public justice. So +he spared the King; and, as he unluckily killed Polonius just +afterwards, he had to consent to be despatched to England. But, on the +voyage there, he discovered the King's commission, ordering the King of +England to put him immediately to death; and, with this in his pocket, +he made his way back to Denmark. For now, he saw, the proof of the +King's attempt to murder him would procure belief also for the story of +the murder of his father. His enemy, however, was too quick for him, and +his public arraignment of that enemy was prevented by his own death. + +A theory like this sounds very plausible--so long as you do not remember +the text. But no unsophisticated mind, fresh from the reading of +_Hamlet_, will accept it; and, as soon as we begin to probe it, fatal +objections arise in such numbers that I choose but a few, and indeed I +think the first of them is enough. + +(_a_) From beginning to end of the play, Hamlet never makes the +slightest reference to any external difficulty. How is it possible to +explain this fact in conformity with the theory? For what conceivable +reason should Shakespeare conceal from us so carefully the key to the +problem? + +(_b_) Not only does Hamlet fail to allude to such difficulties, but he +always assumes that he _can_ obey the Ghost,[34] and he once asserts +this in so many words ('Sith I have cause and will and strength and +means To do't,' IV. iv. 45). + +(_c_) Again, why does Shakespeare exhibit Laertes quite easily raising +the people against the King? Why but to show how much more easily +Hamlet, whom the people loved, could have done the same thing, if that +was the plan he preferred? + +(_d_) Again, Hamlet did _not_ plan the play-scene in the hope that the +King would betray his guilt to the court. He planned it, according to +his own account, in order to convince _himself_ by the King's agitation +that the Ghost had spoken the truth. This is perfectly clear from II. +ii. 625 ff. and from III. ii. 80 ff. Some readers are misled by the +words in the latter passage: + + if his occulted guilt + Do not itself unkennel in one speech, + It is a damned ghost that we have seen. + +The meaning obviously is, as the context shows, 'if his hidden guilt do +not betray itself _on occasion of_ one speech,' viz., the 'dozen or +sixteen lines' with which Hamlet has furnished the player, and of which +only six are delivered, because the King does not merely show his guilt +in his face (which was all Hamlet had hoped, III. ii. 90) but +rushes from the room. + +It may be as well to add that, although Hamlet's own account of his +reason for arranging the play-scene may be questioned, it is impossible +to suppose that, if his real design had been to provoke an open +confession of guilt, he could have been unconscious of this design. + +(_e_) Again, Hamlet never once talks, or shows a sign of thinking, of +the plan of bringing the King to public justice; he always talks of +using his 'sword' or his 'arm.' And this is so just as much after he has +returned to Denmark with the commission in his pocket as it was before +this event. When he has told Horatio the story of the voyage, he does +not say, 'Now I can convict him': he says, 'Now am I not justified in +using this arm?' + +This class of theory, then, we must simply reject. But it suggests two +remarks. It is of course quite probable that, when Hamlet was 'thinking +too precisely on the event,' he was considering, among other things, the +question how he could avenge his father without sacrificing his own life +or freedom. And assuredly, also, he was anxious that his act of +vengeance should not be misconstrued, and would never have been content +to leave a 'wounded name' behind him. His dying words prove that. + +(2) Assuming, now, that Hamlet's main difficulty--almost the whole of +his difficulty--was internal, I pass to views which, acknowledging this, +are still unsatisfactory because they isolate one element in his +character and situation and treat it as the whole. + +According to the first of these typical views, Hamlet was restrained by +conscience or a moral scruple; he could not satisfy himself that it was +right to avenge his father. + +This idea, like the first, can easily be made to look very plausible if +we vaguely imagine the circumstances without attending to the text. But +attention to the text is fatal to it. For, on the one hand, scarcely +anything can be produced in support of it, and, on the other hand, a +great deal can be produced in its disproof. To take the latter point +first, Hamlet, it is impossible to deny, habitually assumes, without any +questioning, that he _ought_ to avenge his father. Even when he doubts, +or thinks that he doubts, the honesty of the Ghost, he expresses no +doubt as to what his duty will be if the Ghost turns out honest: 'If he +but blench I know my course.' In the two soliloquies where he reviews +his position (II. ii., 'O what a rogue and peasant slave am I,' +and IV. iv., 'How all occasions do inform against me') he +reproaches himself bitterly for the neglect of his duty. When he +reflects on the possible causes of this neglect he never mentions among +them a moral scruple. When the Ghost appears in the Queen's chamber he +confesses, conscience-stricken, that, lapsed in time and passion, he has +let go by the acting of its command; but he does not plead that his +conscience stood in his way. The Ghost itself says that it comes to whet +his 'almost blunted purpose'; and conscience may unsettle a purpose but +does not blunt it. What natural explanation of all this can be given on +the conscience theory? + +And now what can be set against this evidence? One solitary passage.[35] +Quite late, after Hamlet has narrated to Horatio the events of his +voyage, he asks him (V. ii. 63): + + Does it not, thinks't thee, stand me now upon-- + He that hath kill'd my king and whored my mother, + Popp'd in between the election and my hopes, + Thrown out his angle for my proper life, + And with such cozenage--is't not perfect conscience + To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd + To let this canker of our nature come + In further evil? + +Here, certainly, is a question of conscience in the usual present sense +of the word; and, it may be said, does not this show that all along +Hamlet really has been deterred by moral scruples? But I ask first how, +in that case, the facts just adduced are to be explained: for they must +be explained, not ignored. Next, let the reader observe that even if +this passage did show that _one_ hindrance to Hamlet's action was his +conscience, it by no means follows that this was the sole or the chief +hindrance. And, thirdly, let him observe, and let him ask himself +whether the coincidence is a mere accident, that Hamlet is here almost +repeating the words he used in vain self-reproach some time before +(IV. iv. 56): + + How stand I then, + That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd, + Excitements of my reason and my blood, + And let all sleep? + +Is it not clear that he is speculating just as vainly now, and that this +question of conscience is but one of his many unconscious excuses for +delay? And, lastly, is it not so that Horatio takes it? He declines to +discuss that unreal question, and answers simply, + + It must be shortly known to him from England + What is the issue of the business there. + +In other words, 'Enough of this endless procrastination. What is wanted +is not reasons for the deed, but the deed itself.' What can be more +significant? + +Perhaps, however, it may be answered: 'Your explanation of this passage +may be correct, and the facts you have mentioned do seem to be fatal to +the theory of conscience in its usual form. But there is another and +subtler theory of conscience. According to it, Hamlet, so far as his +explicit consciousness went, was sure that he ought to obey the Ghost; +but in the depths of his nature, and unknown to himself, there was a +moral repulsion to the deed. The conventional moral ideas of his time, +which he shared with the Ghost, told him plainly that he ought to avenge +his father; but a deeper conscience in him, which was in advance of his +time, contended with these explicit conventional ideas. It is because +this deeper conscience remains below the surface that he fails to +recognise it, and fancies he is hindered by cowardice or sloth or +passion or what not; but it emerges into light in that speech to +Horatio. And it is just because he has this nobler moral nature in him +that we admire and love him.' + +Now I at once admit not only that this view is much more attractive and +more truly tragic than the ordinary conscience theory, but that it has +more verisimilitude. But I feel no doubt that it does not answer to +Shakespeare's meaning, and I will simply mention, out of many objections +to it, three which seem to be fatal. (_a_) If it answers to +Shakespeare's meaning, why in the world did he conceal that meaning +until the last Act? The facts adduced above seem to show beyond question +that, on the hypothesis, he did so. That he did so is surely next door +to incredible. In any case, it certainly requires an explanation, and +certainly has not received one. (_b_) Let us test the theory by +reference to a single important passage, that where Hamlet finds the +King at prayer and spares him. The reason Hamlet gives himself for +sparing the King is that, if he kills him now, he will send him to +heaven, whereas he desires to send him to hell. Now, this reason may be +an unconscious excuse, but is it believable that, if the real reason had +been the stirrings of his deeper conscience, _that_ could have masked +itself in the form of a desire to send his enemy's soul to hell? Is not +the idea quite ludicrous? (_c_) The theory requires us to suppose that, +when the Ghost enjoins Hamlet to avenge the murder of his father, it is +laying on him a duty which _we_ are to understand to be no duty but the +very reverse. And is not that supposition wholly contrary to the natural +impression which we all receive in reading the play? Surely it is clear +that, whatever we in the twentieth century may think about Hamlet's +duty, we are meant in the play to assume that he _ought_ to have obeyed +the Ghost. + +The conscience theory, then, in either of its forms we must reject. But +it may remind us of points worth noting. In the first place, it is +certainly true that Hamlet, in spite of some appearances to the +contrary, was, as Goethe said, of a most moral nature, and had a great +anxiety to do right. In this anxiety he resembles Brutus, and it is +stronger in him than in any of the later heroes. And, secondly, it is +highly probable that in his interminable broodings the kind of paralysis +with which he was stricken masked itself in the shape of conscientious +scruples as well as in many other shapes. And, finally, in his shrinking +from the deed there was probably, together with much else, something +which may be called a moral, though not a conscientious, repulsion: I +mean a repugnance to the idea of falling suddenly on a man who could not +defend himself. This, so far as we can see, was the only plan that +Hamlet ever contemplated. There is no positive evidence in the play that +he regarded it with the aversion that any brave and honourable man, one +must suppose, would feel for it; but, as Hamlet certainly was brave and +honourable, we may presume that he did so. + +(3) We come next to what may be called the sentimental view of Hamlet, a +view common both among his worshippers and among his defamers. Its germ +may perhaps be found in an unfortunate phrase of Goethe's (who of course +is not responsible for the whole view): 'a lovely, pure and most moral +nature, _without the strength of nerve which forms a hero_, sinks +beneath a burden which it cannot bear and must not cast away.' When this +idea is isolated, developed and popularised, we get the picture of a +graceful youth, sweet and sensitive, full of delicate sympathies and +yearning aspirations, shrinking from the touch of everything gross and +earthly; but frail and weak, a kind of Werther, with a face like +Shelley's and a voice like Mr. Tree's. And then we ask in tender pity, +how could such a man perform the terrible duty laid on him? + +How, indeed! And what a foolish Ghost even to suggest such a duty! But +this conception, though not without its basis in certain beautiful +traits of Hamlet's nature, is utterly untrue. It is too kind to Hamlet +on one side, and it is quite unjust to him on another. The 'conscience' +theory at any rate leaves Hamlet a great nature which you can admire and +even revere. But for the 'sentimental' Hamlet you can feel only pity not +unmingled with contempt. Whatever else he is, he is no _hero_. + +But consider the text. This shrinking, flower-like youth--how could he +possibly have done what we _see_ Hamlet do? What likeness to him is +there in the Hamlet who, summoned by the Ghost, bursts from his +terrified friends with the cry: + + Unhand me, gentlemen! + By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me; + +the Hamlet who scarcely once speaks to the King without an insult, or to +Polonius without a gibe; the Hamlet who storms at Ophelia and speaks +daggers to his mother; the Hamlet who, hearing a cry behind the arras, +whips out his sword in an instant and runs the eavesdropper through; the +Hamlet who sends his 'school-fellows' to their death and never troubles +his head about them more; the Hamlet who is the first man to board a +pirate ship, and who fights with Laertes in the grave; the Hamlet of the +catastrophe, an omnipotent fate, before whom all the court stands +helpless, who, as the truth breaks upon him, rushes on the King, drives +his foil right through his body,[36] then seizes the poisoned cup and +forces it violently between the wretched man's lips, and in the throes +of death has force and fire enough to wrest the cup from Horatio's hand +('By heaven, I'll have it!') lest he should drink and die? This man, the +Hamlet of the play, is a heroic, terrible figure. He would have been +formidable to Othello or Macbeth. If the sentimental Hamlet had crossed +him, he would have hurled him from his path with one sweep of his arm. + +This view, then, or any view that approaches it, is grossly unjust to +Hamlet, and turns tragedy into mere pathos. But, on the other side, it +is too kind to him. It ignores the hardness and cynicism which were +indeed no part of his nature, but yet, in this crisis of his life, are +indubitably present and painfully marked. His sternness, itself left out +of sight by this theory, is no defect; but he is much more than stern. +Polonius possibly deserved nothing better than the words addressed to +his corpse: + + Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell! + I took thee for thy better: take thy fortune: + Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger; + +yet this was Ophelia's father, and, whatever he deserved, it pains us, +for Hamlet's own sake, to hear the words: + + This man shall set me packing: + I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room. + +There is the same insensibility in Hamlet's language about the fate of +Rosencrantz and Guildenstern; and, observe, their deaths were not in the +least required by his purpose. Grant, again, that his cruelty to Ophelia +was partly due to misunderstanding, partly forced on him, partly +feigned; still one surely cannot altogether so account for it, and still +less can one so account for the disgusting and insulting grossness of +his language to her in the play-scene. I know this is said to be merely +an example of the custom of Shakespeare's time. But it is not so. It is +such language as you will find addressed to a woman by no other hero of +Shakespeare's, not even in that dreadful scene where Othello accuses +Desdemona. It is a great mistake to ignore these things, or to try to +soften the impression which they naturally make on one. That this +embitterment, callousness, grossness, brutality, should be induced on a +soul so pure and noble is profoundly tragic; and Shakespeare's business +was to show this tragedy, not to paint an ideally beautiful soul +unstained and undisturbed by the evil of the world and the anguish of +conscious failure.[37] + +(4) There remains, finally, that class of view which may be named after +Schlegel and Coleridge. According to this, _Hamlet_ is the tragedy of +reflection. The cause of the hero's delay is irresolution; and the cause +of this irresolution is excess of the reflective or speculative habit of +mind. He has a general intention to obey the Ghost, but 'the native hue +of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought.' He is +'thought-sick.' 'The whole,' says Schlegel, 'is intended to show how a +calculating consideration which aims at exhausting, so far as human +foresight can, all the relations and possible consequences of a deed, +cripples[38] the power of acting.... Hamlet is a hypocrite towards +himself; his far-fetched scruples are often mere pretexts to cover his +want of determination.... He has no firm belief in himself or in +anything else.... He loses himself in labyrinths of thought.' So +Coleridge finds in Hamlet 'an almost enormous intellectual activity and +a proportionate aversion to real action consequent upon it' (the +aversion, that is to say, is consequent on the activity). Professor +Dowden objects to this view, very justly, that it neglects the emotional +side of Hamlet's character, 'which is quite as important as the +intellectual'; but, with this supplement, he appears on the whole to +adopt it. Hamlet, he says, 'loses a sense of fact because with him each +object and event transforms and expands itself into an idea.... He +cannot steadily keep alive within himself a sense of the importance of +any positive, limited thing,--a deed, for example.' And Professor Dowden +explains this condition by reference to Hamlet's life. 'When the play +opens he has reached the age of thirty years ... and he has received +culture of every kind except the culture of active life. During the +reign of the strong-willed elder Hamlet there was no call to action for +his meditative son. He has slipped on into years of full manhood still a +haunter of the university, a student of philosophies, an amateur in art, +a ponderer on the things of life and death, who has never formed a +resolution or executed a deed' (_Shakspere, his Mind and Art_, 4th ed., +pp. 132, 133). + +On the whole, the Schlegel-Coleridge theory (with or without Professor +Dowden's modification and amplification) is the most widely received +view of Hamlet's character. And with it we come at last into close +contact with the text of the play. It not only answers, in some +fundamental respects, to the general impression produced by the drama, +but it can be supported by Hamlet's own words in his soliloquies--such +words, for example, as those about the native hue of resolution, or +those about the craven scruple of thinking too precisely on the event. +It is confirmed, also, by the contrast between Hamlet on the one side +and Laertes and Fortinbras on the other; and, further, by the occurrence +of those words of the King to Laertes (IV. vii. 119 f.), which, +if they are not in character, are all the more important as showing what +was in Shakespeare's mind at the time: + + that we would do + We should do when we would; for this 'would' changes, + And hath abatements and delays as many + As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents; + And then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh + That hurts by easing. + +And, lastly, even if the view itself does not suffice, the _description_ +given by its adherents of Hamlet's state of mind, as we see him in the +last four Acts, is, on the whole and so far as it goes, a true +description. The energy of resolve is dissipated in an endless brooding +on the deed required. When he acts, his action does not proceed from +this deliberation and analysis, but is sudden and impulsive, evoked by +an emergency in which he has no time to think. And most of the reasons +he assigns for his procrastination are evidently not the true reasons, +but unconscious excuses. + +Nevertheless this theory fails to satisfy. And it fails not merely in +this or that detail, but as a whole. We feel that its Hamlet does not +fully answer to our imaginative impression. He is not nearly so +inadequate to this impression as the sentimental Hamlet, but still we +feel he is inferior to Shakespeare's man and does him wrong. And when we +come to examine the theory we find that it is partial and leaves much +unexplained. I pass that by for the present, for we shall see, I +believe, that the theory is also positively misleading, and that in a +most important way. And of this I proceed to speak. + +Hamlet's irresolution, or his aversion to real action, is, according to +the theory, the _direct_ result of 'an almost enormous intellectual +activity' in the way of 'a calculating consideration which attempts to +exhaust all the relations and possible consequences of a deed.' And this +again proceeds from an original one-sidedness of nature, strengthened by +habit, and, perhaps, by years of speculative inaction. The theory +describes, therefore, a man in certain respects like Coleridge himself, +on one side a man of genius, on the other side, the side of will, +deplorably weak, always procrastinating and avoiding unpleasant duties, +and often reproaching himself in vain; a man, observe, who at _any_ time +and in _any_ circumstances would be unequal to the task assigned to +Hamlet. And thus, I must maintain, it degrades Hamlet and travesties the +play. For Hamlet, according to all the indications in the text, was not +naturally or normally such a man, but rather, I venture to affirm, a man +who at any _other_ time and in any _other_ circumstances than those +presented would have been perfectly equal to his task; and it is, in +fact, the very cruelty of his fate that the crisis of his life comes on +him at the one moment when he cannot meet it, and when his highest +gifts, instead of helping him, conspire to paralyse him. This aspect of +the tragedy the theory quite misses; and it does so because it +misconceives the cause of that irresolution which, on the whole, it +truly describes. For the cause was not directly or mainly an habitual +excess of reflectiveness. The direct cause was a state of mind quite +abnormal and induced by special circumstances,--a state of profound +melancholy. Now, Hamlet's reflectiveness doubtless played a certain part +in the _production_ of that melancholy, and was thus one indirect +contributory cause of his irresolution. And, again, the melancholy, once +established, displayed, as one of its _symptoms_, an excessive +reflection on the required deed. But excess of reflection was not, as +the theory makes it, the _direct_ cause of the irresolution at all; nor +was it the _only_ indirect cause; and in the Hamlet of the last four +Acts it is to be considered rather a symptom of his state than a cause +of it. + +These assertions may be too brief to be at once clear, but I hope they +will presently become so. + + +3 + +Let us first ask ourselves what we can gather from the play, immediately +or by inference, concerning Hamlet as he was just before his father's +death. And I begin by observing that the text does not bear out the idea +that he was one-sidedly reflective and indisposed to action. Nobody who +knew him seems to have noticed this weakness. Nobody regards him as a +mere scholar who has 'never formed a resolution or executed a deed.' In +a court which certainly would not much admire such a person he is the +observed of all observers. Though he has been disappointed of the throne +everyone shows him respect; and he is the favourite of the people, who +are not given to worship philosophers. Fortinbras, a sufficiently +practical man, considered that he was likely, had he been put on, to +have proved most royally. He has Hamlet borne by four captains 'like a +soldier' to his grave; and Ophelia says that Hamlet _was_ a soldier. If +he was fond of acting, an aesthetic pursuit, he was equally fond of +fencing, an athletic one: he practised it assiduously even in his worst +days.[39] So far as we can conjecture from what we see of him in those +bad days, he must normally have been charmingly frank, courteous and +kindly to everyone, of whatever rank, whom he liked or respected, but by +no means timid or deferential to others; indeed, one would gather that +he was rather the reverse, and also that he was apt to be decided and +even imperious if thwarted or interfered with. He must always have been +fearless,--in the play he appears insensible to fear of any ordinary +kind. And, finally, he must have been quick and impetuous in action; for +it is downright impossible that the man we see rushing after the Ghost, +killing Polonius, dealing with the King's commission on the ship, +boarding the pirate, leaping into the grave, executing his final +vengeance, could _ever_ have been shrinking or slow in an emergency. +Imagine Coleridge doing any of these things! + +If we consider all this, how can we accept the notion that Hamlet's was +a weak and one-sided character? 'Oh, but he spent ten or twelve years at +a University!' Well, even if he did, it is possible to do that without +becoming the victim of excessive thought. But the statement that he did +rests upon a most insecure foundation.[40] + +Where then are we to look for the seeds of danger? + +(1) Trying to reconstruct from the Hamlet of the play, one would not +judge that his temperament was melancholy in the present sense of the +word; there seems nothing to show that; but one would judge that by +temperament he was inclined to nervous instability, to rapid and +perhaps extreme changes of feeling and mood, and that he was disposed to +be, for the time, absorbed in the feeling or mood that possessed him, +whether it were joyous or depressed. This temperament the Elizabethans +would have called melancholic; and Hamlet seems to be an example of it, +as Lear is of a temperament mixedly choleric and sanguine. And the +doctrine of temperaments was so familiar in Shakespeare's time--as +Burton, and earlier prose-writers, and many of the dramatists show--that +Shakespeare may quite well have given this temperament to Hamlet +consciously and deliberately. Of melancholy in its developed form, a +habit, not a mere temperament, he often speaks. He more than once laughs +at the passing and half-fictitious melancholy of youth and love; in Don +John in _Much Ado_ he had sketched the sour and surly melancholy of +discontent; in Jaques a whimsical self-pleasing melancholy; in Antonio +in the _Merchant of Venice_ a quiet but deep melancholy, for which +neither the victim nor his friends can assign any cause.[41] He gives to +Hamlet a temperament which would not develop into melancholy unless +under some exceptional strain, but which still involved a danger. In the +play we see the danger realised, and find a melancholy quite unlike any +that Shakespeare had as yet depicted, because the temperament of Hamlet +is quite different. + +(2) Next, we cannot be mistaken in attributing to the Hamlet of earlier +days an exquisite sensibility, to which we may give the name 'moral,' if +that word is taken in the wide meaning it ought to bear. This, though +it suffers cruelly in later days, as we saw in criticising the +sentimental view of Hamlet, never deserts him; it makes all his +cynicism, grossness and hardness appear to us morbidities, and has an +inexpressibly attractive and pathetic effect. He had the soul of the +youthful poet as Shelley and Tennyson have described it, an unbounded +delight and faith in everything good and beautiful. We know this from +himself. The world for him was _herrlich wie am ersten Tag_--'this +goodly frame the earth, this most excellent canopy the air, this brave +o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire.' +And not nature only: 'What a piece of work is a man! how noble in +reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and +admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god!' +This is no commonplace to Hamlet; it is the language of a heart thrilled +with wonder and swelling into ecstasy. + +Doubtless it was with the same eager enthusiasm he turned to those +around him. Where else in Shakespeare is there anything like Hamlet's +adoration of his father? The words melt into music whenever he speaks of +him. And, if there are no signs of any such feeling towards his mother, +though many signs of love, it is characteristic that he evidently never +entertained a suspicion of anything unworthy in her,--characteristic, +and significant of his tendency to see only what is good unless he is +forced to see the reverse. For we find this tendency elsewhere, and find +it going so far that we must call it a disposition to idealise, to see +something better than what is there, or at least to ignore deficiencies. +He says to Laertes, 'I loved you ever,' and he describes Laertes as a +'very noble youth,' which he was far from being. In his first greeting +of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, where his old self revives, we trace +the same affectionateness and readiness to take men at their best. His +love for Ophelia, too, which seems strange to some, is surely the most +natural thing in the world. He saw her innocence, simplicity and +sweetness, and it was like him to ask no more; and it is noticeable that +Horatio, though entirely worthy of his friendship, is, like Ophelia, +intellectually not remarkable. To the very end, however clouded, this +generous disposition, this 'free and open nature,' this unsuspiciousness +survive. They cost him his life; for the King knew them, and was sure +that he was too 'generous and free from all contriving' to 'peruse the +foils.' To the very end, his soul, however sick and tortured it may be, +answers instantaneously when good and evil are presented to it, loving +the one and hating the other. He is called a sceptic who has no firm +belief in anything, but he is never sceptical about _them_. + +And the negative side of his idealism, the aversion to evil, is perhaps +even more developed in the hero of the tragedy than in the Hamlet of +earlier days. It is intensely characteristic. Nothing, I believe, is to +be found elsewhere in Shakespeare (unless in the rage of the +disillusioned idealist Timon) of quite the same kind as Hamlet's disgust +at his uncle's drunkenness, his loathing of his mother's sensuality, his +astonishment and horror at her shallowness, his contempt for everything +pretentious or false, his indifference to everything merely external. +This last characteristic appears in his choice of the friend of his +heart, and in a certain impatience of distinctions of rank or wealth. +When Horatio calls his father 'a goodly king,' he answers, surely with +an emphasis on 'man,' + + He was a man, take him for all in all, + I shall not look upon his like again. + +He will not listen to talk of Horatio being his 'servant.' When the +others speak of their 'duty' to him, he answers, 'Your love, as mine to +you.' He speaks to the actor precisely as he does to an honest courtier. +He is not in the least a revolutionary, but still, in effect, a king and +a beggar are all one to him. He cares for nothing but human worth, and +his pitilessness towards Polonius and Osric and his 'school-fellows' is +not wholly due to morbidity, but belongs in part to his original +character. + +Now, in Hamlet's moral sensibility there undoubtedly lay a danger. Any +great shock that life might inflict on it would be felt with extreme +intensity. Such a shock might even produce tragic results. And, in fact, +_Hamlet_ deserves the title 'tragedy of moral idealism' quite as much as +the title 'tragedy of reflection.' + +(3) With this temperament and this sensibility we find, lastly, in the +Hamlet of earlier days, as of later, intellectual genius. It is chiefly +this that makes him so different from all those about him, good and bad +alike, and hardly less different from most of Shakespeare's other +heroes. And this, though on the whole the most important trait in his +nature, is also so obvious and so famous that I need not dwell on it at +length. But against one prevalent misconception I must say a word of +warning. Hamlet's intellectual power is not a specific gift, like a +genius for music or mathematics or philosophy. It shows itself, +fitfully, in the affairs of life as unusual quickness of perception, +great agility in shifting the mental attitude, a striking rapidity and +fertility in resource; so that, when his natural belief in others does +not make him unwary, Hamlet easily sees through them and masters them, +and no one can be much less like the typical helpless dreamer. It shows +itself in conversation chiefly in the form of wit or humour; and, alike +in conversation and in soliloquy, it shows itself in the form of +imagination quite as much as in that of thought in the stricter sense. +Further, where it takes the latter shape, as it very often does, it is +not philosophic in the technical meaning of the word. There is really +nothing in the play to show that Hamlet ever was 'a student of +philosophies,' unless it be the famous lines which, comically enough, +exhibit this supposed victim of philosophy as its critic: + + There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, + Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.[42] + +His philosophy, if the word is to be used, was, like Shakespeare's own, +the immediate product of the wondering and meditating mind; and such +thoughts as that celebrated one, 'There is nothing either good or bad +but thinking makes it so,' surely needed no special training to produce +them. Or does Portia's remark, 'Nothing is good without respect,' +_i.e._, out of relation, prove that she had studied metaphysics? + +Still Hamlet had speculative genius without being a philosopher, just as +he had imaginative genius without being a poet. Doubtless in happier +days he was a close and constant observer of men and manners, noting his +results in those tables which he afterwards snatched from his breast to +make in wild irony his last note of all, that one may smile and smile +and be a villain. Again and again we remark that passion for +generalisation which so occupied him, for instance, in reflections +suggested by the King's drunkenness that he quite forgot what it was he +was waiting to meet upon the battlements. Doubtless, too, he was always +considering things, as Horatio thought, too curiously. There was a +necessity in his soul driving him to penetrate below the surface and to +question what others took for granted. That fixed habitual look which +the world wears for most men did not exist for him. He was for ever +unmaking his world and rebuilding it in thought, dissolving what to +others were solid facts, and discovering what to others were old truths. +There were no old truths for Hamlet. It is for Horatio a thing of course +that there's a divinity that shapes our ends, but for Hamlet it is a +discovery hardly won. And throughout this kingdom of the mind, where he +felt that man, who in action is only like an angel, is in apprehension +like a god, he moved (we must imagine) more than content, so that even +in his dark days he declares he could be bounded in a nutshell and yet +count himself a king of infinite space, were it not that he had bad +dreams. + +If now we ask whether any special danger lurked _here_, how shall we +answer? We must answer, it seems to me, 'Some danger, no doubt, but, +granted the ordinary chances of life, not much.' For, in the first +place, that idea which so many critics quietly take for granted--the +idea that the gift and the habit of meditative and speculative thought +tend to produce irresolution in the affairs of life--would be found by +no means easy to verify. Can you verify it, for example, in the lives of +the philosophers, or again in the lives of men whom you have personally +known to be addicted to such speculation? I cannot. Of course, +individual peculiarities being set apart, absorption in _any_ +intellectual interest, together with withdrawal from affairs, may make a +man slow and unskilful in affairs; and doubtless, individual +peculiarities being again set apart, a mere student is likely to be more +at a loss in a sudden and great practical emergency than a soldier or a +lawyer. But in all this there is no difference between a physicist, a +historian, and a philosopher; and again, slowness, want of skill, and +even helplessness are something totally different from the peculiar kind +of irresolution that Hamlet shows. The notion that speculative thinking +specially tends to produce _this_ is really a mere illusion. + +In the second place, even if this notion were true, it has appeared that +Hamlet did _not_ live the life of a mere student, much less of a mere +dreamer, and that his nature was by no means simply or even one-sidedly +intellectual, but was healthily active. Hence, granted the ordinary +chances of life, there would seem to be no great danger in his +intellectual tendency and his habit of speculation; and I would go +further and say that there was nothing in them, taken alone, to unfit +him even for the extraordinary call that was made upon him. In fact, if +the message of the Ghost had come to him within a week of his father's +death, I see no reason to doubt that he would have acted on it as +decisively as Othello himself, though probably after a longer and more +anxious deliberation. And therefore the Schlegel-Coleridge view (apart +from its descriptive value) seems to me fatally untrue, for it implies +that Hamlet's procrastination was the normal response of an +over-speculative nature confronted with a difficult practical problem. + +On the other hand, under conditions of a peculiar kind, Hamlet's +reflectiveness certainly might prove dangerous to him, and his genius +might even (to exaggerate a little) become his doom. Suppose that +violent shock to his moral being of which I spoke; and suppose that +under this shock, any possible action being denied to him, he began to +sink into melancholy; then, no doubt, his imaginative and generalising +habit of mind might extend the effects of this shock through his whole +being and mental world. And if, the state of melancholy being thus +deepened and fixed, a sudden demand for difficult and decisive action in +a matter connected with the melancholy arose, this state might well have +for one of its symptoms an endless and futile mental dissection of the +required deed. And, finally, the futility of this process, and the shame +of his delay, would further weaken him and enslave him to his melancholy +still more. Thus the speculative habit would be _one_ indirect cause of +the morbid state which hindered action; and it would also reappear in a +degenerate form as one of the _symptoms_ of this morbid state. + + * * * * * + +Now this is what actually happens in the play. Turn to the first words +Hamlet utters when he is alone; turn, that is to say, to the place where +the author is likely to indicate his meaning most plainly. What do you +hear? + + O, that this too too solid flesh would melt, + Thaw and resolve itself into a dew! + Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd + His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God! + How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, + Seem to me all the uses of this world! + Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden, + That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature + Possess it merely. + +Here are a sickness of life, and even a longing for death, so intense +that nothing stands between Hamlet and suicide except religious awe. And +what has caused them? The rest of the soliloquy so thrusts the answer +upon us that it might seem impossible to miss it. It was not his +father's death; that doubtless brought deep grief, but mere grief for +some one loved and lost does not make a noble spirit loathe the world as +a place full only of things rank and gross. It was not the vague +suspicion that we know Hamlet felt. Still less was it the loss of the +crown; for though the subserviency of the electors might well disgust +him, there is not a reference to the subject in the soliloquy, nor any +sign elsewhere that it greatly occupied his mind. It was the moral shock +of the sudden ghastly disclosure of his mother's true nature, falling on +him when his heart was aching with love, and his body doubtless was +weakened by sorrow. And it is essential, however disagreeable, to +realise the nature of this shock. It matters little here whether +Hamlet's age was twenty or thirty: in either case his mother was a +matron of mature years. All his life he had believed in her, we may be +sure, as such a son would. He had seen her not merely devoted to his +father, but hanging on him like a newly-wedded bride, hanging on him + + As if increase of appetite had grown + By what it fed on. + +He had seen her following his body 'like Niobe, all tears.' And then +within a month--'O God! a beast would have mourned longer'--she married +again, and married Hamlet's uncle, a man utterly contemptible and +loathsome in his eyes; married him in what to Hamlet was incestuous +wedlock;[43] married him not for any reason of state, nor even out of +old family affection, but in such a way that her son was forced to see +in her action not only an astounding shallowness of feeling but an +eruption of coarse sensuality, 'rank and gross,'[44] speeding post-haste +to its horrible delight. Is it possible to conceive an experience more +desolating to a man such as we have seen Hamlet to be; and is its result +anything but perfectly natural? It brings bewildered horror, then +loathing, then despair of human nature. His whole mind is poisoned. He +can never see Ophelia in the same light again: she is a woman, and his +mother is a woman: if she mentions the word 'brief' to him, the answer +drops from his lips like venom, 'as woman's love.' The last words of the +soliloquy, which is _wholly_ concerned with this subject, are, + + But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue! + +He can do nothing. He must lock in his heart, not any suspicion of his +uncle that moves obscurely there, but that horror and loathing; and if +his heart ever found relief, it was when those feelings, mingled with +the love that never died out in him, poured themselves forth in a flood +as he stood in his mother's chamber beside his father's +marriage-bed.[45] + +If we still wonder, and ask why the effect of this shock should be so +tremendous, let us observe that _now_ the conditions have arisen under +which Hamlet's highest endowments, his moral sensibility and his genius, +become his enemies. A nature morally blunter would have felt even so +dreadful a revelation less keenly. A slower and more limited and +positive mind might not have extended so widely through its world the +disgust and disbelief that have entered it. But Hamlet has the +imagination which, for evil as well as good, feels and sees all things +in one. Thought is the element of his life, and his thought is +infected. He cannot prevent himself from probing and lacerating the +wound in his soul. One idea, full of peril, holds him fast, and he cries +out in agony at it, but is impotent to free himself ('Must I remember?' +'Let me not think on't'). And when, with the fading of his passion, the +vividness of this idea abates, it does so only to leave behind a +boundless weariness and a sick longing for death. + +And this is the time which his fate chooses. In this hour of uttermost +weakness, this sinking of his whole being towards annihilation, there +comes on him, bursting the bounds of the natural world with a shock of +astonishment and terror, the revelation of his mother's adultery and his +father's murder, and, with this, the demand on him, in the name of +everything dearest and most sacred, to arise and act. And for a moment, +though his brain reels and totters,[46] his soul leaps up in passion to +answer this demand. But it comes too late. It does but strike home the +last rivet in the melancholy which holds him bound. + + The time is out of joint! O cursed spite + That ever I was born to set it right,-- + +so he mutters within an hour of the moment when he vowed to give his +life to the duty of revenge; and the rest of the story exhibits his vain +efforts to fulfil this duty, his unconscious self-excuses and unavailing +self-reproaches, and the tragic results of his delay. + + +4 + +'Melancholy,' I said, not dejection, nor yet insanity. That Hamlet was +not far from insanity is very probable. His adoption of the pretence of +madness may well have been due in part to fear of the reality; to an +instinct of self-preservation, a fore-feeling that the pretence would +enable him to give some utterance to the load that pressed on his heart +and brain, and a fear that he would be unable altogether to repress such +utterance. And if the pathologist calls his state melancholia, and even +proceeds to determine its species, I see nothing to object to in that; I +am grateful to him for emphasising the fact that Hamlet's melancholy was +no mere common depression of spirits; and I have no doubt that many +readers of the play would understand it better if they read an account +of melancholia in a work on mental diseases. If we like to use the word +'disease' loosely, Hamlet's condition may truly be called diseased. No +exertion of will could have dispelled it. Even if he had been able at +once to do the bidding of the Ghost he would doubtless have still +remained for some time under the cloud. It would be absurdly unjust to +call _Hamlet_ a study of melancholy, but it contains such a study. + +But this melancholy is something very different from insanity, in +anything like the usual meaning of that word. No doubt it might develop +into insanity. The longing for death might become an irresistible +impulse to self-destruction; the disorder of feeling and will might +extend to sense and intellect; delusions might arise; and the man might +become, as we say, incapable and irresponsible. But Hamlet's melancholy +is some way from this condition. It is a totally different thing from +the madness which he feigns; and he never, when alone or in company with +Horatio alone, exhibits the signs of that madness. Nor is the dramatic +use of this melancholy, again, open to the objections which would justly +be made to the portrayal of an insanity which brought the hero to a +tragic end. The man who suffers as Hamlet suffers--and thousands go +about their business suffering thus in greater or less degree--is +considered irresponsible neither by other people nor by himself: he is +only too keenly conscious of his responsibility. He is therefore, so +far, quite capable of being a tragic agent, which an insane person, at +any rate according to Shakespeare's practice, is not.[47] And, finally, +Hamlet's state is not one which a healthy mind is unable sufficiently to +imagine. It is probably not further from average experience, nor more +difficult to realise, than the great tragic passions of Othello, Antony +or Macbeth. + +Let me try to show now, briefly, how much this melancholy accounts for. + +It accounts for the main fact, Hamlet's inaction. For the _immediate_ +cause of that is simply that his habitual feeling is one of disgust at +life and everything in it, himself included,--a disgust which varies in +intensity, rising at times into a longing for death, sinking often into +weary apathy, but is never dispelled for more than brief intervals. Such +a state of feeling is inevitably adverse to _any_ kind of decided +action; the body is inert, the mind indifferent or worse; its response +is, 'it does not matter,' 'it is not worth while,' 'it is no good.' And +the action required of Hamlet is very exceptional. It is violent, +dangerous, difficult to accomplish perfectly, on one side repulsive to a +man of honour and sensitive feeling, on another side involved in a +certain mystery (here come in thus, in their subordinate place, various +causes of inaction assigned by various theories). These obstacles would +not suffice to prevent Hamlet from acting, if his state were normal; and +against them there operate, even in his morbid state, healthy and +positive feelings, love of his father, loathing of his uncle, desire of +revenge, desire to do duty. But the retarding motives acquire an +unnatural strength because they have an ally in something far stronger +than themselves, the melancholic disgust and apathy; while the healthy +motives, emerging with difficulty from the central mass of diseased +feeling, rapidly sink back into it and 'lose the name of action.' We +_see_ them doing so; and sometimes the process is quite simple, no +analytical reflection on the deed intervening between the outburst of +passion and the relapse into melancholy.[48] But this melancholy is +perfectly consistent also with that incessant dissection of the task +assigned, of which the Schlegel-Coleridge theory makes so much. For +those endless questions (as we may imagine them), 'Was I deceived by the +Ghost? How am I to do the deed? When? Where? What will be the +consequence of attempting it--success, my death, utter misunderstanding, +mere mischief to the State? Can it be right to do it, or noble to kill a +defenceless man? What is the good of doing it in such a world as +this?'--all this, and whatever else passed in a sickening round through +Hamlet's mind, was not the healthy and right deliberation of a man with +such a task, but otiose thinking hardly deserving the name of thought, +an unconscious weaving of pretexts for inaction, aimless tossings on a +sick bed, symptoms of melancholy which only increased it by deepening +self-contempt. + +Again, (_a_) this state accounts for Hamlet's energy as well as for his +lassitude, those quick decided actions of his being the outcome of a +nature normally far from passive, now suddenly stimulated, and producing +healthy impulses which work themselves out before they have time to +subside. (_b_) It accounts for the evidently keen satisfaction which +some of these actions give to him. He arranges the play-scene with +lively interest, and exults in its success, not really because it brings +him nearer to his goal, but partly because it has hurt his enemy and +partly because it has demonstrated his own skill (III. ii. +286-304). He looks forward almost with glee to countermining the King's +designs in sending him away (III. iv. 209), and looks back with +obvious satisfaction, even with pride, to the address and vigour he +displayed on the voyage (V. ii. 1-55). These were not _the_ +action on which his morbid self-feeling had centred; he feels in them +his old force, and escapes in them from his disgust. (_c_) It accounts +for the pleasure with which he meets old acquaintances, like his +'school-fellows' or the actors. The former observed (and we can observe) +in him a 'kind of joy' at first, though it is followed by 'much forcing +of his disposition' as he attempts to keep this joy and his courtesy +alive in spite of the misery which so soon returns upon him and the +suspicion he is forced to feel. (_d_) It accounts no less for the +painful features of his character as seen in the play, his almost savage +irritability on the one hand, and on the other his self-absorption, his +callousness, his insensibility to the fates of those whom he despises, +and to the feelings even of those whom he loves. These are frequent +symptoms of such melancholy, and (_e_) they sometimes alternate, as they +do in Hamlet, with bursts of transitory, almost hysterical, and quite +fruitless emotion. It is to these last (of which a part of the +soliloquy, 'O what a rogue,' gives a good example) that Hamlet alludes +when, to the Ghost, he speaks of himself as 'lapsed in _passion_,' and +it is doubtless partly his conscious weakness in regard to them that +inspires his praise of Horatio as a man who is not 'passion's +slave.'[49] + +Finally, Hamlet's melancholy accounts for two things which seem to be +explained by nothing else. The first of these is his apathy or +'lethargy.' We are bound to consider the evidence which the text +supplies of this, though it is usual to ignore it. When Hamlet mentions, +as one possible cause of his inaction, his 'thinking too precisely on +the event,' he mentions another, 'bestial oblivion'; and the thing +against which he inveighs in the greater part of that soliloquy +(IV. iv.) is not the excess or the misuse of reason (which for +him here and always is god-like), but this _bestial_ oblivion or +'_dullness_,' this 'letting all _sleep_,' this allowing of heaven-sent +reason to 'fust unused': + + What is a man, + If his chief good and market of his time + Be but to _sleep_ and feed? a _beast_, no more.[50] + +So, in the soliloquy in II. ii. he accuses himself of being 'a +_dull_ and muddy-mettled rascal,' who 'peaks [mopes] like John-a-dreams, +unpregnant of his cause,' dully indifferent to his cause.[51] So, when +the Ghost appears to him the second time, he accuses himself of being +tardy and lapsed in _time_; and the Ghost speaks of his purpose being +almost _blunted_, and bids him not to _forget_ (cf. 'oblivion'). And so, +what is emphasised in those undramatic but significant speeches of the +player-king and of Claudius is the mere dying away of purpose or of +love.[52] Surely what all this points to is not a condition of excessive +but useless mental activity (indeed there is, in reality, curiously +little about that in the text), but rather one of dull, apathetic, +brooding gloom, in which Hamlet, so far from analysing his duty, is not +thinking of it at all, but for the time literally _forgets_ it. It seems +to me we are driven to think of Hamlet _chiefly_ thus during the long +time which elapsed between the appearance of the Ghost and the events +presented in the Second Act. The Ghost, in fact, had more reason than we +suppose at first for leaving with Hamlet as his parting injunction the +command, 'Remember me,' and for greeting him, on re-appearing, with the +command, 'Do not forget.'[53] These little things in Shakespeare are not +accidents. + +The second trait which is fully explained only by Hamlet's melancholy is +his own inability to understand why he delays. This emerges in a marked +degree when an occasion like the player's emotion or the sight of +Fortinbras's army stings Hamlet into shame at his inaction. '_Why_,' he +asks himself in genuine bewilderment, 'do I linger? Can the cause be +cowardice? Can it be sloth? Can it be thinking too precisely of the +event? And does _that_ again mean cowardice? What is it that makes me +sit idle when I feel it is shameful to do so, and when I have _cause, +and will, and strength, and means_, to act?' A man irresolute merely +because he was considering a proposed action too minutely would not feel +this bewilderment. A man might feel it whose conscience secretly +condemned the act which his explicit consciousness approved; but we have +seen that there is no sufficient evidence to justify us in conceiving +Hamlet thus. These are the questions of a man stimulated for the moment +to shake off the weight of his melancholy, and, because for the moment +he is free from it, unable to understand the paralysing pressure which +it exerts at other times. + +I have dwelt thus at length on Hamlet's melancholy because, from the +psychological point of view, it is the centre of the tragedy, and to +omit it from consideration or to underrate its intensity is to make +Shakespeare's story unintelligible. But the psychological point of view +is not equivalent to the tragic; and, having once given its due weight +to the fact of Hamlet's melancholy, we may freely admit, or rather may +be anxious to insist, that this pathological condition would excite but +little, if any, tragic interest if it were not the condition of a nature +distinguished by that speculative genius on which the Schlegel-Coleridge +type of theory lays stress. Such theories misinterpret the connection +between that genius and Hamlet's failure, but still it is this +connection which gives to his story its peculiar fascination and makes +it appear (if the phrase may be allowed) as the symbol of a tragic +mystery inherent in human nature. Wherever this mystery touches us, +wherever we are forced to feel the wonder and awe of man's godlike +'apprehension' and his 'thoughts that wander through eternity,' and at +the same time are forced to see him powerless in his petty sphere of +action, and powerless (it would appear) from the very divinity of his +thought, we remember Hamlet. And this is the reason why, in the great +ideal movement which began towards the close of the eighteenth century, +this tragedy acquired a position unique among Shakespeare's dramas, and +shared only by Goethe's _Faust_. It was not that _Hamlet_ is +Shakespeare's greatest tragedy or most perfect work of art; it was that +_Hamlet_ most brings home to us at once the sense of the soul's +infinity, and the sense of the doom which not only circumscribes that +infinity but appears to be its offspring. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 25: It may be convenient to some readers for the purposes of +this book to have by them a list of Shakespeare's plays, arranged in +periods. No such list, of course, can command general assent, but the +following (which does not throughout represent my own views) would +perhaps meet with as little objection from scholars as any other. For +some purposes the Third and Fourth Periods are better considered to be +one. Within each period the so-called Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies +are respectively grouped together; and for this reason, as well as for +others, the order within each period does not profess to be +chronological (_e.g._ it is not implied that the _Comedy of Errors_ +preceded _1 Henry VI._ or _Titus Andronicus_). Where Shakespeare's +authorship of any considerable part of a play is questioned, widely or +by specially good authority, the name of the play is printed in italics. + +_First Period_ (to 1595?).--Comedy of Errors, Love's Labour's Lost, Two +Gentlemen of Verona, Midsummer-Night's Dream; _1 Henry VI._, _2 Henry +VI._, _3 Henry VI._, Richard III., Richard II.; _Titus Andronicus_, +Romeo and Juliet. + +_Second Period_ (to 1602?).--Merchant of Venice, All's Well (better in +Third Period?), _Taming of the Shrew_, Much Ado, As You Like it, Merry +Wives, Twelfth Night; King John, 1 Henry IV., 2 Henry IV., Henry V.; +Julius Caesar, Hamlet. + +_Third Period_ (to 1608?).--Troilus and Cressida, Measure for Measure; +Othello, King Lear, _Timon of Athens_, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, +Coriolanus. + +_Fourth Period._--_Pericles_, Cymbeline, Winter's Tale, Tempest, _Two +Noble Kinsmen_, _Henry VIII._] + +[Footnote 26: The reader will observe that this 'tragic period' would +not exactly coincide with the 'Third Period' of the division given in +the last note. For _Julius Caesar_ and _Hamlet_ fall in the Second +Period, not the Third; and I may add that, as _Pericles_ was entered at +Stationers' Hall in 1608 and published in 1609, it ought strictly to be +put in the Third Period--not the Fourth. The truth is that _Julius +Caesar_ and _Hamlet_ are given to the Second Period mainly on the ground +of style; while a Fourth Period is admitted, not mainly on that ground +(for there is no great difference here between _Antony_ and _Coriolanus_ +on the one side and _Cymbeline_ and the _Tempest_ on the other), but +because of a difference in substance and spirit. If a Fourth Period were +admitted on grounds of form, it ought to begin with _Antony and +Cleopatra_.] + +[Footnote 27: I should go perhaps too far if I said that it is generally +admitted that _Timon of Athens_ also precedes the two Roman tragedies; +but its precedence seems to me so nearly certain that I assume it in +what follows.] + +[Footnote 28: That play, however, is distinguished, I think, by a +deliberate endeavour after a dignified and unadorned simplicity,--a +Roman simplicity perhaps.] + +[Footnote 29: It is quite probable that this may arise in part from the +fact, which seems hardly doubtful, that the tragedy was revised, and in +places re-written, some little time after its first composition.] + +[Footnote 30: This, if we confine ourselves to the tragedies, is, I +think, especially the case in _King Lear_ and _Timon_.] + +[Footnote 31: The first, at any rate, of these three plays is, of +course, much nearer to _Hamlet_, especially in versification, than to +_Antony and Cleopatra_, in which Shakespeare's final style first shows +itself practically complete. It has been impossible, in the brief +treatment of this subject, to say what is required of the individual +plays.] + +[Footnote 32: _The Mirror_, 18th April, 1780, quoted by Furness, +_Variorum Hamlet_, ii. 148. In the above remarks I have relied mainly on +Furness's collection of extracts from early critics.] + +[Footnote 33: I do not profess to reproduce any one theory, and, still +less, to do justice to the ablest exponent of this kind of view, Werder +(_Vorlesungen ueber Hamlet_, 1875), who by no means regards Hamlet's +difficulties as _merely_ external.] + +[Footnote 34: I give one instance. When he spares the King, he speaks of +killing him when he is drunk asleep, when he is in his rage, when he is +awake in bed, when he is gaming, as if there were in none of these cases +the least obstacle (III. iii. 89 ff.).] + +[Footnote 35: It is surprising to find quoted, in support of the +conscience view, the line 'Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,' +and to observe the total misinterpretation of the soliloquy _To be or +not to be_, from which the line comes. In this soliloquy Hamlet is not +thinking of the duty laid upon him at all. He is debating the question +of suicide. No one oppressed by the ills of life, he says, would +continue to bear them if it were not for speculation about his possible +fortune in another life. And then, generalising, he says (what applies +to himself, no doubt, though he shows no consciousness of the fact) that +such speculation or reflection makes men hesitate and shrink like +cowards from great actions and enterprises. 'Conscience' does not mean +moral sense or scrupulosity, but this reflection on the _consequences_ +of action. It is the same thing as the 'craven scruple of thinking too +precisely on the event' of the speech in IV. iv. As to this use +of 'conscience,' see Schmidt, _s.v._ and the parallels there given. The +_Oxford Dictionary_ also gives many examples of similar uses of +'conscience,' though it unfortunately lends its authority to the +misinterpretation criticised.] + +[Footnote 36: The King does not die of the _poison_ on the foil, like +Laertes and Hamlet. They were wounded before he was, but they die after +him.] + +[Footnote 37: I may add here a word on one small matter. It is +constantly asserted that Hamlet wept over the body of Polonius. Now, if +he did, it would make no difference to my point in the paragraph above; +but there is no warrant in the text for the assertion. It is based on +some words of the Queen (IV. i. 24), in answer to the King's +question, 'Where is he gone?': + + To draw apart the body he hath killed: + O'er whom his very madness, like some ore + Among a mineral of metals base, + Shows itself pure; he weeps for what is done. + +But the Queen, as was pointed out by Doering, is trying to screen her +son. She has already made the false statement that when Hamlet, crying, +'A rat! a rat!', ran his rapier through the arras, it was because he +heard _something stir_ there, whereas we know that what he heard was a +man's voice crying, 'What ho! help, help, help!' And in this scene she +has come straight from the interview with her son, terribly agitated, +shaken with 'sighs' and 'profound heaves,' in the night (line 30). Now +we know what Hamlet said to the body, and of the body, in that +interview; and there is assuredly no sound of tears in the voice that +said those things and others. The only sign of relenting is in the words +(III. iv. 171): + + For this same lord, + I do repent: but heaven hath pleased it so, + To punish me with this and this with me, + That I must be their scourge and minister. + +His mother's statement, therefore, is almost certainly untrue, though it +may be to her credit. (It is just conceivable that Hamlet wept at +III. iv. 130, and that the Queen supposed he was weeping for +Polonius.) + +Perhaps, however, he may have wept over Polonius's body afterwards? +Well, in the _next_ scene (IV. ii.) we see him _alone_ with the +body, and are therefore likely to witness his genuine feelings. And his +first words are, 'Safely stowed'!] + +[Footnote 38: Not 'must cripple,' as the English translation has it.] + +[Footnote 39: He says so to Horatio, whom he has no motive for deceiving +(V. ii. 218). His contrary statement (II. ii. 308) is made to +Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.] + +[Footnote 40: See Note B.] + +[Footnote 41: The critics have laboured to find a cause, but it seems to +me Shakespeare simply meant to portray a pathological condition; and a +very touching picture he draws. Antonio's sadness, which he describes in +the opening lines of the play, would never drive him to suicide, but it +makes him indifferent to the issue of the trial, as all his speeches in +the trial-scene show.] + +[Footnote 42: Of course 'your' does not mean Horatio's philosophy in +particular. 'Your' is used as the Gravedigger uses it when he says that +'your water is a sore decayer of your ... dead body.'] + +[Footnote 43: This aspect of the matter leaves _us_ comparatively +unaffected, but Shakespeare evidently means it to be of importance. The +Ghost speaks of it twice, and Hamlet thrice (once in his last furious +words to the King). If, as we must suppose, the marriage was universally +admitted to be incestuous, the corrupt acquiescence of the court and the +electors to the crown would naturally have a strong effect on Hamlet's +mind.] + +[Footnote 44: It is most significant that the metaphor of this soliloquy +reappears in Hamlet's adjuration to his mother (III. iv. 150): + + Repent what's past; avoid what is to come; + And do not spread the compost on the weeds + To make them ranker.] + +[Footnote 45: If the reader will now look at the only speech of Hamlet's +that precedes the soliloquy, and is more than one line in length--the +speech beginning 'Seems, madam! nay, it _is_'--he will understand what, +surely, when first we come to it, sounds very strange and almost +boastful. It is not, in effect, about Hamlet himself at all; it is about +his mother (I do not mean that it is intentionally and consciously so; +and still less that she understood it so).] + +[Footnote 46: See Note D.] + +[Footnote 47: See p. 13.] + +[Footnote 48: _E.g._ in the transition, referred to above, from +desire for vengeance into the wish never to have been born; in +the soliloquy, 'O what a rogue'; in the scene at Ophelia's grave. +The Schlegel-Coleridge theory does not account for the psychological +movement in these passages.] + +[Footnote 49: Hamlet's violence at Ophelia's grave, though probably +intentionally exaggerated, is another example of this want of +self-control. The Queen's description of him (V. i. 307), + + This is mere madness; + And thus awhile the fit will work on him; + Anon, as patient as the female dove, + When that her golden couplets are disclosed, + His silence will sit drooping. + +may be true to life, though it is evidently prompted by anxiety to +excuse his violence on the ground of his insanity. On this passage see +further Note G.] + +[Footnote 50: Throughout, I italicise to show the connection of ideas.] + +[Footnote 51: Cf. _Measure for Measure_, IV. iv. 23, 'This deed + ... makes me unpregnant and dull to all proceedings.'] + +[Footnote 52: III. ii. 196 ff., IV. vii. 111 ff.: +_e.g._, + + Purpose is but the slave to _memory_, + Of violent birth but poor validity.] + +[Footnote 53: So, before, he had said to him: + + And duller should'st thou be than the fat weed + That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf, + Would'st thou not stir in this. + +On Hamlet's soliloquy after the Ghost's disappearance see Note D.] + + + + +LECTURE IV + +HAMLET + + +The only way, if there is any way, in which a conception of Hamlet's +character could be proved true, would be to show that it, and it alone, +explains all the relevant facts presented by the text of the drama. To +attempt such a demonstration here would obviously be impossible, even if +I felt certain of the interpretation of all the facts. But I propose now +to follow rapidly the course of the action in so far as it specially +illustrates the character, reserving for separate consideration one +important but particularly doubtful point. + + +1 + +We left Hamlet, at the close of the First Act, when he had just received +his charge from the spirit of his father; and his condition was vividly +depicted in the fact that, within an hour of receiving this charge, he +had relapsed into that weariness of life or longing for death which is +the immediate cause of his later inaction. When next we meet him, at the +opening of the Second Act, a considerable time has elapsed, apparently +as much as two months.[54] The ambassadors sent to the King of Norway +(I. ii. 27) are just returning. Laertes, whom we saw leaving Elsinore +(I. iii.), has been in Paris long enough to be in want of fresh +supplies. Ophelia has obeyed her father's command (given in I. iii.), +and has refused to receive Hamlet's visits or letters. What has Hamlet +done? He has put on an 'antic disposition' and established a reputation +for lunacy, with the result that his mother has become deeply anxious +about him, and with the further result that the King, who was formerly +so entirely at ease regarding him that he wished him to stay on at +Court, is now extremely uneasy and very desirous to discover the cause +of his 'transformation.' Hence Rosencrantz and Guildenstern have been +sent for, to cheer him by their company and to worm his secret out of +him; and they are just about to arrive. Beyond exciting thus the +apprehensions of his enemy Hamlet has done absolutely nothing; and, as +we have seen, we must imagine him during this long period sunk for the +most part in 'bestial oblivion' or fruitless broodings, and falling +deeper and deeper into the slough of despond. + +Now he takes a further step. He suddenly appears unannounced in +Ophelia's chamber; and his appearance and behaviour are such as to +suggest both to Ophelia and to her father that his brain is turned by +disappointment in love. How far this step was due to the design of +creating a false impression as to the origin of his lunacy, how far to +other causes, is a difficult question; but such a design seems certainly +present. It succeeds, however, only in part; for, although Polonius is +fully convinced, the King is not so, and it is therefore arranged that +the two shall secretly witness a meeting between Ophelia and Hamlet. +Meanwhile Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive, and at the King's request +begin their attempts, easily foiled by Hamlet, to pluck out the heart of +his mystery. Then the players come to Court, and for a little while one +of Hamlet's old interests revives, and he is almost happy. But only for +a little while. The emotion shown by the player in reciting the speech +which tells of Hecuba's grief for her slaughtered husband awakes into +burning life the slumbering sense of duty and shame. He must act. With +the extreme rapidity which always distinguishes him in his healthier +moments, he conceives and arranges the plan of having the 'Murder of +Gonzago' played before the King and Queen, with the addition of a speech +written by himself for the occasion. Then, longing to be alone, he +abruptly dismisses his guests, and pours out a passion of self-reproach +for his delay, asks himself in bewilderment what can be its cause, +lashes himself into a fury of hatred against his foe, checks himself in +disgust at his futile emotion, and quiets his conscience for the moment +by trying to convince himself that he has doubts about the Ghost, and by +assuring himself that, if the King's behaviour at the play-scene shows +but a sign of guilt, he 'knows his course.' + +Nothing, surely, can be clearer than the meaning of this famous +soliloquy. The doubt which appears at its close, instead of being the +natural conclusion of the preceding thoughts, is totally inconsistent +with them. For Hamlet's self-reproaches, his curses on his enemy, and +his perplexity about his own inaction, one and all imply his faith in +the identity and truthfulness of the Ghost. Evidently this sudden doubt, +of which there has not been the slightest trace before, is no genuine +doubt; it is an unconscious fiction, an excuse for his delay--and for +its continuance. + +A night passes, and the day that follows it brings the crisis. First +takes place that interview from which the King is to learn whether +disappointed love is really the cause of his nephew's lunacy. Hamlet is +sent for; poor Ophelia is told to walk up and down, reading her +prayer-book; Polonius and the King conceal themselves behind the arras. +And Hamlet enters, so deeply absorbed in thought that for some time he +supposes himself to be alone. What is he thinking of? 'The Murder of +Gonzago,' which is to be played in a few hours, and on which everything +depends? Not at all. He is meditating on suicide; and he finds that what +stands in the way of it, and counterbalances its infinite attraction, is +not any thought of a sacred unaccomplished duty, but the doubt, quite +irrelevant to that issue, whether it is not ignoble in the mind to end +its misery, and, still more, whether death _would_ end it. Hamlet, that +is to say, is here, in effect, precisely where he was at the time of his +first soliloquy ('O that this too too solid flesh would melt') two +months ago, before ever he heard of his father's murder.[55] His +reflections have no reference to this particular moment; they represent +that habitual weariness of life with which his passing outbursts of +emotion or energy are contrasted. What can be more significant than the +fact that he is sunk in these reflections on the very day which is to +determine for him the truthfulness of the Ghost? And how is it possible +for us to hope that, if that truthfulness should be established, Hamlet +will be any nearer to his revenge?[56] + +His interview with Ophelia follows; and its result shows that his delay +is becoming most dangerous to himself. The King is satisfied that, +whatever else may be the hidden cause of Hamlet's madness, it is not +love. He is by no means certain even that Hamlet is mad at all. He has +heard that infuriated threat, 'I say, we will have no more marriages; +those that are married, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as +they are.' He is thoroughly alarmed. He at any rate will not delay. On +the spot he determines to send Hamlet to England. But, as Polonius is +present, we do not learn at once the meaning of this purpose. + +Evening comes. The approach of the play-scene raises Hamlet's spirits. +He is in his element. He feels that he is doing _something_ towards his +end, striking a stroke, but a stroke of intellect. In his instructions +to the actor on the delivery of the inserted speech, and again in his +conversation with Horatio just before the entry of the Court, we see the +true Hamlet, the Hamlet of the days before his father's death. But how +characteristic it is that he appears quite as anxious that his speech +should not be ranted as that Horatio should observe its effect upon the +King! This trait appears again even at that thrilling moment when the +actor is just going to deliver the speech. Hamlet sees him beginning to +frown and glare like the conventional stage-murderer, and calls to him +impatiently, 'Leave thy damnable faces and begin!'[57] + +Hamlet's device proves a triumph far more complete than he had dared to +expect. He had thought the King might 'blench,' but he does much more. +When only six of the 'dozen or sixteen lines' have been spoken he starts +to his feet and rushes from the hall, followed by the whole dismayed +Court. In the elation of success--an elation at first almost +hysterical--Hamlet treats Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who are sent to +him, with undisguised contempt. Left to himself, he declares that now he +could + + drink hot blood, + And do such bitter business as the day + Would quake to look on. + +He has been sent for by his mother, and is going to her chamber; and so +vehement and revengeful is his mood that he actually fancies himself in +danger of using daggers to her as well as speaking them.[58] + +In this mood, on his way to his mother's chamber, he comes upon the +King, alone, kneeling, conscience-stricken and attempting to pray. His +enemy is delivered into his hands. + + Now might I do it pat, now he is praying: + And now I'll do it: and so he goes to heaven: + And so am I revenged.[59] That would be scanned. + +He scans it; and the sword that he drew at the words, 'And now I'll do +it,' is thrust back into its sheath. If he killed the villain now he +would send his soul to heaven; and he would fain kill soul as well as +body. + +That this again is an unconscious excuse for delay is now pretty +generally agreed, and it is needless to describe again the state of mind +which, on the view explained in our last lecture, is the real cause of +Hamlet's failure here. The first five words he utters, 'Now might I do +it,' show that he has no effective _desire_ to 'do it'; and in the +little sentences that follow, and the long pauses between them, the +endeavour at a resolution, and the sickening return of melancholic +paralysis, however difficult a task they set to the actor, are plain +enough to a reader. And any reader who may retain a doubt should observe +the fact that, when the Ghost reappears, Hamlet does not think of +justifying his delay by the plea that he was waiting for a more perfect +vengeance. But in one point the great majority of critics, I think, go +astray. The feeling of intense hatred which Hamlet expresses is not the +cause of his sparing the King, and in his heart he knows this; but it +does not at all follow that this feeling is unreal. All the evidence +afforded by the play goes to show that it is perfectly genuine, and I +see no reason whatever to doubt that Hamlet would have been very sorry +to send his father's murderer to heaven, nor much to doubt that he would +have been glad to send him to perdition. The reason for refusing to +accept his own version of his motive in sparing Claudius is not that his +sentiments are horrible, but that elsewhere, and also in the opening of +his speech here, we can see that his reluctance to act is due to other +causes. + +The incident of the sparing of the King is contrived with extraordinary +dramatic insight. On the one side we feel that the opportunity was +perfect. Hamlet could not possibly any longer tell himself that he had +no certainty as to his uncle's guilt. And the external conditions were +most favourable; for the King's remarkable behaviour at the play-scene +would have supplied a damning confirmation of the story Hamlet had to +tell about the Ghost. Even now, probably, in a Court so corrupt as that +of Elsinore, he could not with perfect security have begun by charging +the King with the murder; but he could quite safely have killed him +first and given his justification afterwards, especially as he would +certainly have had on his side the people, who loved him and despised +Claudius. On the other hand, Shakespeare has taken care to give this +perfect opportunity so repulsive a character that we can hardly bring +ourselves to wish that the hero should accept it. One of his minor +difficulties, we have seen, probably was that he seemed to be required +to attack a defenceless man; and here this difficulty is at its maximum. + +This incident is, again, the turning-point of the tragedy. So far, +Hamlet's delay, though it is endangering his freedom and his life, has +done no irreparable harm; but his failure here is the cause of all the +disasters that follow. In sparing the King, he sacrifices Polonius, +Ophelia, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Laertes, the Queen and himself. +This central significance of the passage is dramatically indicated in +the following scene by the reappearance of the Ghost and the repetition +of its charge. + +Polonius is the first to fall. The old courtier, whose vanity would not +allow him to confess that his diagnosis of Hamlet's lunacy was mistaken, +had suggested that, after the theatricals, the Queen should endeavour in +a private interview with her son to penetrate the mystery, while he +himself would repeat his favourite part of eaves-dropper (III. i. 184 +ff.). It has now become quite imperative that the Prince should be +brought to disclose his secret; for his choice of the 'Murder of +Gonzago,' and perhaps his conduct during the performance, have shown a +spirit of exaggerated hostility against the King which has excited +general alarm. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern discourse to Claudius on the +extreme importance of his preserving his invaluable life, as though +Hamlet's insanity had now clearly shown itself to be homicidal.[60] +When, then, at the opening of the interview between Hamlet and his +mother, the son, instead of listening to her remonstrances, roughly +assumes the offensive, she becomes alarmed; and when, on her attempting +to leave the room, he takes her by the arm and forces her to sit down, +she is terrified, cries out, 'Thou wilt not murder me?' and screams for +help. Polonius, behind the arras, echoes her call; and in a moment +Hamlet, hoping the concealed person is the King, runs the old man +through the body. + +Evidently this act is intended to stand in sharp contrast with Hamlet's +sparing of his enemy. The King would have been just as defenceless +behind the arras as he had been on his knees; but here Hamlet is already +excited and in action, and the chance comes to him so suddenly that he +has no time to 'scan' it. It is a minor consideration, but still for the +dramatist not unimportant, that the audience would wholly sympathise +with Hamlet's attempt here, as directed against an enemy who is lurking +to entrap him, instead of being engaged in a business which perhaps to +the bulk of the audience then, as now, seemed to have a 'relish of +salvation in't.' + +We notice in Hamlet, at the opening of this interview, something of the +excited levity which followed the _denouement_ of the play-scene. The +death of Polonius sobers him; and in the remainder of the interview he +shows, together with some traces of his morbid state, the peculiar +beauty and nobility of his nature. His chief desire is not by any means +to ensure his mother's silent acquiescence in his design of revenge; it +is to save her soul. And while the rough work of vengeance is repugnant +to him, he is at home in this higher work. Here that fatal feeling, 'it +is no matter,' never shows itself. No father-confessor could be more +selflessly set upon his end of redeeming a fellow-creature from +degradation, more stern or pitiless in denouncing the sin, or more eager +to welcome the first token of repentance. There is something infinitely +beautiful in that sudden sunshine of faith and love which breaks out +when, at the Queen's surrender, + + O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain, + +he answers, + + O throw away the worser part of it, + And live the purer with the other half. + +The truth is that, though Hamlet hates his uncle and acknowledges the +duty of vengeance, his whole heart is never in this feeling or this +task; but his whole heart is in his horror at his mother's fall and in +his longing to raise her. The former of these feelings was the +inspiration of his first soliloquy; it combines with the second to form +the inspiration of his eloquence here. And Shakespeare never wrote more +eloquently than here. + +I have already alluded to the significance of the reappearance of the +Ghost in this scene; but why does Shakespeare choose for the particular +moment of its reappearance the middle of a speech in which Hamlet is +raving against his uncle? There seems to be more than one reason. In the +first place, Hamlet has already attained his object of stirring shame +and contrition in his mother's breast, and is now yielding to the old +temptation of unpacking his heart with words, and exhausting in useless +emotion the force which should be stored up in his will. And, next, in +doing this he is agonising his mother to no purpose, and in despite of +her piteous and repeated appeals for mercy. But the Ghost, when it gave +him his charge, had expressly warned him to spare her; and here again +the dead husband shows the same tender regard for his weak unfaithful +wife. The object of his return is to repeat his charge: + + Do not forget: this visitation + Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose; + +but, having uttered this reminder, he immediately bids the son to help +the mother and 'step between her and her fighting soul.' + +And, whether intentionally or not, another purpose is served by +Shakespeare's choice of this particular moment. It is a moment when the +state of Hamlet's mind is such that we cannot suppose the Ghost to be +meant for an hallucination; and it is of great importance here that the +spectator or reader should not suppose any such thing. He is further +guarded by the fact that the Ghost proves, so to speak, his identity by +showing the same traits as were visible on his first appearance--the +same insistence on the duty of remembering, and the same concern for the +Queen. And the result is that we construe the Ghost's interpretation of +Hamlet's delay ('almost blunted purpose') as the truth, the dramatist's +own interpretation. Let me add that probably no one in Shakespeare's +audience had any doubt of his meaning here. The idea of later critics +and readers that the Ghost is an hallucination is due partly to failure +to follow the indications just noticed, but partly also to two mistakes, +the substitution of our present intellectual atmosphere for the +Elizabethan, and the notion that, because the Queen does not see and +hear the Ghost, it is meant to be unreal. But a ghost, in Shakespeare's +day, was able for any sufficient reason to confine its manifestation to +a single person in a company; and here the sufficient reason, that of +sparing the Queen, is obvious.[61] + +At the close of this scene it appears that Hamlet has somehow learned of +the King's design of sending him to England in charge of his two +'school-fellows.' He has no doubt that this design covers some +villainous plot against himself, but neither does he doubt that he will +succeed in defeating it; and, as we saw, he looks forward with pleasure +to this conflict of wits. The idea of refusing to go appears not to +occur to him. Perhaps (for here we are left to conjecture) he feels that +he could not refuse unless at the same time he openly accused the King +of his father's murder (a course which he seems at no time to +contemplate); for by the slaughter of Polonius he has supplied his enemy +with the best possible excuse for getting him out of the country. +Besides, he has so effectually warned this enemy that, after the death +of Polonius is discovered, he is kept under guard (IV. iii. 14). He +consents, then, to go. But on his way to the shore he meets the army of +Fortinbras on its march to Poland; and the sight of these men going +cheerfully to risk death 'for an egg-shell,' and 'making mouths at the +invisible event,' strikes him with shame as he remembers how he, with so +much greater cause for action, 'lets all sleep;' and he breaks out into +the soliloquy, 'How all occasions do inform against me!' + +This great speech, in itself not inferior to the famous 'To be or not to +be,' is absent not only from the First Quarto but from the Folio. It is +therefore probable that, at any rate by the time when the Folio appeared +(1623), it had become customary to omit it in theatrical representation; +and this is still the custom. But, while no doubt it is dramatically the +least indispensable of the soliloquies, it has a direct dramatic value, +and a great value for the interpretation of Hamlet's character. It shows +that Hamlet, though he is leaving Denmark, has not relinquished the idea +of obeying the Ghost. It exhibits very strikingly his inability to +understand why he has delayed so long. It contains that assertion which +so many critics forget, that he has 'cause and will and strength and +means to do it.' On the other hand--and this was perhaps the principal +purpose of the speech--it convinces us that he has learnt little or +nothing from his delay, or from his failure to seize the opportunity +presented to him after the play-scene. For, we find, both the motive and +the gist of the speech are precisely the same as those of the soliloquy +at the end of the Second Act ('O what a rogue'). There too he was +stirred to shame when he saw a passionate emotion awakened by a cause +which, compared with his, was a mere egg-shell. There too he stood +bewildered at the sight of his own dulness, and was almost ready to +believe--what was justly incredible to him--that it was the mask of mere +cowardice. There too he determined to delay no longer: if the King +should but blench, he knew his course. Yet this determination led to +nothing then; and why, we ask ourselves in despair, should the bloody +thoughts he now resolves to cherish ever pass beyond the realm of +thought? + +Between this scene (IV. iv.) and the remainder of the play we must again +suppose an interval, though not a very long one. When the action +recommences, the death of Polonius has led to the insanity of Ophelia +and the secret return of Laertes from France. The young man comes back +breathing slaughter. For the King, afraid to put Hamlet on his trial (a +course likely to raise the question of his own behaviour at the play, +and perhaps to provoke an open accusation),[62] has attempted to hush up +the circumstances of Polonius's death, and has given him a hurried and +inglorious burial. The fury of Laertes, therefore, is directed in the +first instance against the King: and the ease with which he raises the +people, like the King's fear of a judicial enquiry, shows us how purely +internal were the obstacles which the hero had to overcome. This +impression is intensified by the broad contrast between Hamlet and +Laertes, who rushes headlong to his revenge, and is determined to have +it though allegiance, conscience, grace and damnation stand in his way +(IV. v. 130). But the King, though he has been hard put to it, is now in +his element and feels safe. Knowing that he will very soon hear of +Hamlet's execution in England, he tells Laertes that his father died by +Hamlet's hand, and expresses his willingness to let the friends of +Laertes judge whether he himself has any responsibility for the deed. +And when, to his astonishment and dismay, news comes that Hamlet has +returned to Denmark, he acts with admirable promptitude and address, +turns Laertes round his finger, and arranges with him for the murder of +their common enemy. If there were any risk of the young man's resolution +faltering, it is removed by the death of Ophelia. And now the King has +but one anxiety,--to prevent the young men from meeting before the +fencing-match. For who can tell what Hamlet might say in his defence, or +how enchanting his tongue might prove?[63] + +Hamlet's return to Denmark is due partly to his own action, partly to +accident. On the voyage he secretly possesses himself of the royal +commission, and substitutes for it another, which he himself writes and +seals, and in which the King of England is ordered to put to death, not +Hamlet, but Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Then the ship is attacked by a +pirate, which, apparently, finds its intended prize too strong for it, +and makes off. But as Hamlet 'in the grapple,' eager for fighting, has +boarded the assailant, he is carried off in it, and by promises induces +the pirates to put him ashore in Denmark. + +In what spirit does he return? Unquestionably, I think, we can observe a +certain change, though it is not great. First, we notice here and there +what seems to be a consciousness of power, due probably to his success +in counter-mining Claudius and blowing the courtiers to the moon, and to +his vigorous action in the sea-fight. But I doubt if this sense of power +is more marked than it was in the scenes following the success of the +'Murder of Gonzago.' Secondly, we nowhere find any direct expression of +that weariness of life and that longing for death which were so marked +in the first soliloquy and in the speech 'To be or not to be.' This may +be a mere accident, and it must be remembered that in the Fifth Act we +have no soliloquy. But in the earlier Acts the feelings referred to do +not appear _merely_ in soliloquy, and I incline to think that +Shakespeare means to show in the Hamlet of the Fifth Act a slight +thinning of the dark cloud of melancholy, and means us to feel it tragic +that this change comes too late. And, in the third place, there is a +trait about which doubt is impossible,--a sense in Hamlet that he is in +the hands of Providence. This had, indeed, already shown itself at the +death of Polonius,[64] and perhaps at Hamlet's farewell to the King,[65] +but the idea seems now to be constantly present in his mind. 'There's a +divinity that shapes our ends,' he declares to Horatio in speaking of +the fighting in his heart that would not let him sleep, and of his +rashness in groping his way to the courtiers to find their commission. +How was he able, Horatio asks, to seal the substituted commission? + + Why, even in that was heaven ordinant, + +Hamlet answers; he had his father's signet in his purse. And though he +has a presentiment of evil about the fencing-match he refuses to yield +to it: 'we defy augury: there is special providence in the fall of a +sparrow ... the readiness is all.' + +Though these passages strike us more when put together thus than when +they come upon us at intervals in reading the play, they have a marked +effect on our feeling about Hamlet's character and still more about the +events of the action. But I find it impossible to believe, with some +critics, that they indicate any material change in his general +condition, or the formation of any effective resolution to fulfil the +appointed duty. On the contrary, they seem to express that kind of +religious resignation which, however beautiful in one aspect, really +deserves the name of fatalism rather than that of faith in Providence, +because it is not united to any determination to do what is believed to +be the will of Providence. In place of this determination, the Hamlet of +the Fifth Act shows a kind of sad or indifferent self-abandonment, as if +he secretly despaired of forcing himself to action, and were ready to +leave his duty to some other power than his own. _This_ is really the +main change which appears in him after his return to Denmark, and which +had begun to show itself before he went,--this, and not a determination +to act, nor even an anxiety to do so. + +For when he returns he stands in a most perilous position. On one side +of him is the King, whose safety depends on his death, and who has done +his best to murder him; on the other, Laertes, whose father and sister +he has sent to their graves, and of whose behaviour and probable +attitude he must surely be informed by Horatio. What is required of him, +therefore, if he is not to perish with his duty undone, is the utmost +wariness and the swiftest resolution. Yet it is not too much to say +that, except when Horatio forces the matter on his attention, he shows +no consciousness of this position. He muses in the graveyard on the +nothingness of life and fame, and the base uses to which our dust +returns, whether it be a court-jester's or a world-conqueror's. He +learns that the open grave over which he muses has been dug for the +woman he loved; and he suffers one terrible pang, from which he gains +relief in frenzied words and frenzied action,--action which must needs +intensify, if that were possible, the fury of the man whom he has, +however unwittingly, so cruelly injured. Yet he appears absolutely +unconscious that he has injured Laertes at all, and asks him: + + What is the reason that you use me thus? + +And as the sharpness of the first pang passes, the old weary misery +returns, and he might almost say to Ophelia, as he does to her brother: + + I loved you ever: but it is no matter. + +'It is no matter': _nothing_ matters. + +The last scene opens. He narrates to Horatio the events of the voyage +and his uncle's attempt to murder him. But the conclusion of the story +is no plan of action, but the old fatal question, 'Ought I not to +act?'[66] And, while he asks it, his enemies have acted. Osric enters +with an invitation to him to take part in a fencing-match with Laertes. +This match--he is expressly told so--has been arranged by his deadly +enemy the King; and his antagonist is a man whose hands but a few hours +ago were at his throat, and whose voice he had heard shouting 'The devil +take thy soul!' But he does not think of that. To fence is to show a +courtesy, and to himself it is a relief,--action, and not the one +hateful action. There is something noble in his carelessness, and also +in his refusal to attend to the presentiment which he suddenly feels +(and of which he says, not only 'the readiness is all,' but also 'it is +no matter'). Something noble; and yet, when a sacred duty is still +undone, ought one to be so ready to die? With the same carelessness, and +with that trustfulness which makes us love him, but which is here so +fatally misplaced, he picks up the first foil that comes to his hand, +asks indifferently, 'These foils have all a length?' and begins. And +Fate descends upon his enemies, and his mother, and himself. + +But he is not left in utter defeat. Not only is his task at last +accomplished, but Shakespeare seems to have determined that his hero +should exhibit in his latest hour all the glorious power and all the +nobility and sweetness of his nature. Of the first, the power, I spoke +before,[67] but there is a wonderful beauty in the revelation of the +second. His body already labouring in the pangs of death, his mind soars +above them. He forgives Laertes; he remembers his wretched mother and +bids her adieu, ignorant that she has preceded him. We hear now no word +of lamentation or self-reproach. He has will, and just time, to think, +not of the past or of what might have been, but of the future; to forbid +his friend's death in words more pathetic in their sadness than even his +agony of spirit had been; and to take care, so far as in him lies, for +the welfare of the State which he himself should have guided. Then in +spite of shipwreck he reaches the haven of silence where he would be. +What else could his world-wearied flesh desire? + +But _we_ desire more; and we receive it. As those mysterious words, 'The +rest is silence,' die upon Hamlet's lips, Horatio answers: + + Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince, + And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. + +Why did Shakespeare here, so much against his custom, introduce this +reference to another life? Did he remember that Hamlet is the only one +of his tragic heroes whom he has not allowed us to see in the days when +this life smiled on him? Did he feel that, while for the others we might +be content to imagine after life's fitful fever nothing more than +release and silence, we must ask more for one whose 'godlike reason' and +passionate love of goodness have only gleamed upon us through the heavy +clouds of melancholy, and yet have left us murmuring, as we bow our +heads, 'This was the noblest spirit of them all'? + + +2 + +How many things still remain to say of Hamlet! Before I touch on his +relation to Ophelia, I will choose but two. Neither of them, compared +with the matters so far considered, is of great consequence, but both +are interesting, and the first seems to have quite escaped observation. + +(1) Most people have, beside their more essential traits of character, +little peculiarities which, for their intimates, form an indissoluble +part of their personality. In comedy, and in other humorous works of +fiction, such peculiarities often figure prominently, but they rarely do +so, I think, in tragedy. Shakespeare, however, seems to have given one +such idiosyncrasy to Hamlet. + +It is a trick of speech, a habit of repetition. And these are simple +examples of it from the first soliloquy: + + O _God! God!_ + How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable + Seem to me all the uses of this world! + _Fie_ on't! ah _fie!_ + +Now I ask your patience. You will say: 'There is nothing individual +here. Everybody repeats words thus. And the tendency, in particular, to +use such repetitions in moments of great emotion is well-known, and +frequently illustrated in literature--for example, in David's cry of +lament for Absalom.' + +This is perfectly true, and plenty of examples could be drawn from +Shakespeare himself. But what we find in Hamlet's case is, I believe, +_not_ common. In the first place, this repetition is a _habit_ with him. +Here are some more instances: 'Thrift, thrift, Horatio'; 'Indeed, +indeed, sirs, but this troubles me'; 'Come, deal justly with me: come, +come'; 'Wormwood, wormwood!' I do not profess to have made an exhaustive +search, but I am much mistaken if this _habit_ is to be found in any +other serious character of Shakespeare.[68] + +And, in the second place--and here I appeal with confidence to lovers of +Hamlet--some of these repetitions strike us as intensely characteristic. +Some even of those already quoted strike one thus, and still more do the +following: + + (_a_) _Horatio._ It would have much amazed you. + _Hamlet._ Very like, very like. Stay'd it long? + + (_b_) _Polonius._ What do you read, my lord? + _Hamlet._ Words, words, words. + + (_c_) _Polonius._ My honourable lord, I will most humbly take + my leave of you. + _Hamlet._ You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I + will more willingly part withal: except my + life, except my life, except my life. + + (_d_) _Ophelia._ Good my lord, + How does your honour for this many a day? + _Hamlet._ I humbly thank you, well, well, well. + +Is there anything that Hamlet says or does in the whole play more +unmistakably individual than these replies?[69] + +(2) Hamlet, everyone has noticed, is fond of quibbles and word-play, and +of 'conceits' and turns of thought such as are common in the poets whom +Johnson called Metaphysical. Sometimes, no doubt, he plays with words +and ideas chiefly in order to mystify, thwart and annoy. To some extent, +again, as we may see from the conversation where Rosencrantz and +Guildenstern first present themselves (II. ii. 227), he is merely +following the fashion of the young courtiers about him, just as in his +love-letter to Ophelia[70] he uses for the most part the fantastic +language of Court Euphuism. Nevertheless in this trait there is +something very characteristic. We should be greatly surprised to find it +marked in Othello or Lear or Timon, in Macbeth or Antony or Coriolanus; +and, in fact, we find it in them hardly at all. One reason of this may +perhaps be that these characters are all later creations than Hamlet, +and that Shakespeare's own fondness for this kind of play, like the +fondness of the theatrical audience for it, diminished with time. But +the main reason is surely that this tendency, as we see it in Hamlet, +betokens a nimbleness and flexibility of mind which is characteristic of +him and not of the later less many-sided heroes. Macbeth, for instance, +has an imagination quite as sensitive as Hamlet's to certain +impressions, but he has none of Hamlet's delight in freaks and twists of +thought, or of his tendency to perceive and play with resemblances in +the most diverse objects and ideas. Though Romeo shows this tendency, +the only tragic hero who approaches Hamlet here is Richard II., who +indeed in several ways recalls the emasculated Hamlet of some critics, +and may, like the real Hamlet, have owed his existence in part to +Shakespeare's personal familiarity with the weaknesses and dangers of an +imaginative temperament. + +That Shakespeare meant this trait to be characteristic of Hamlet is +beyond question. The very first line the hero speaks contains a play on +words: + + A little more than kin and less than kind. + +The fact is significant, though the pun itself is not specially +characteristic. Much more so, and indeed absolutely individual, are the +uses of word-play in moments of extreme excitement. Remember the awe and +terror of the scene where the Ghost beckons Hamlet to leave his friends +and follow him into the darkness, and then consider this dialogue: + + _Hamlet._ It waves me still. + Go on; I'll follow thee. + + _Marcellus._ You shall not go, my lord. + + _Hamlet._ Hold off your hands. + + _Horatio._ Be ruled; you shall not go. + + _Hamlet._ My fate cries out, + And makes each petty artery in this body + As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve. + Still am I called. Unhand me, gentlemen. + _By heaven I'll make a ghost of him that lets me._ + +Would any other character in Shakespeare have used those words? And, +again, where is Hamlet more Hamlet than when he accompanies with a pun +the furious action by which he compels his enemy to drink the 'poison +tempered by himself'? + + Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damn'd Dane, + Drink off this potion. Is thy union here? + Follow my mother. + +The 'union' was the pearl which Claudius professed to throw into the +cup, and in place of which (as Hamlet supposes) he dropped poison in. +But the 'union' is also that incestuous marriage which must not be +broken by his remaining alive now that his partner is dead. What rage +there is in the words, and what a strange lightning of the mind! + +Much of Hamlet's play with words and ideas is imaginatively humorous. +That of Richard II. is fanciful, but rarely, if ever, humorous. Antony +has touches of humour, and Richard III. has more; but Hamlet, we may +safely assert, is the only one of the tragic heroes who can be called a +humorist, his humour being first cousin to that speculative tendency +which keeps his mental world in perpetual movement. Some of his quips +are, of course, poor enough, and many are not distinctive. Those of his +retorts which strike one as perfectly individual do so, I think, chiefly +because they suddenly reveal the misery and bitterness below the +surface; as when, to Rosencrantz's message from his mother, 'She desires +to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed,' he answers, 'We +shall obey, were she ten times our mother'; or as when he replies to +Polonius's invitation, 'Will you walk out of the air, my lord?' with +words that suddenly turn one cold, 'Into my grave.' Otherwise, what we +justly call Hamlet's characteristic humour is not his exclusive +property, but appears in passages spoken by persons as different as +Mercutio, Falstaff and Rosalind. The truth probably is that it was the +kind of humour most natural to Shakespeare himself, and that here, as in +some other traits of the poet's greatest creation, we come into close +contact with Shakespeare the man. + + +3 + +The actor who plays the part of Hamlet must make up his mind as to the +interpretation of every word and deed of the character. Even if at some +point he feels no certainty as to which of two interpretations is right, +he must still choose one or the other. The mere critic is not obliged to +do this. Where he remains in doubt he may say so, and, if the matter is +of importance, he ought to say so. + +This is the position in which I find myself in regard to Hamlet's love +for Ophelia. I am unable to arrive at a conviction as to the meaning of +some of his words and deeds, and I question whether from the mere text +of the play a sure interpretation of them can be drawn. For this reason +I have reserved the subject for separate treatment, and have, so far as +possible, kept it out of the general discussion of Hamlet's character. + +On two points no reasonable doubt can, I think, be felt. (1) Hamlet was +at one time sincerely and ardently in love with Ophelia. For she herself +says that he had importuned her with love in honourable fashion, and had +given countenance to his speech with almost all the holy vows of heaven +(I. iii. 110 f.). (2) When, at Ophelia's grave, he declared, + + I loved Ophelia; forty thousand brothers + Could not, with all their quantity of love, + Make up my sum, + +he must have spoken sincerely; and, further, we may take it for granted +that he used the past tense, 'loved,' merely because Ophelia was dead, +and not to imply that he had once loved her but no longer did so. + +So much being assumed, we come to what is doubtful, and I will begin by +stating what is probably the most popular view. According to this view, +Hamlet's love for Ophelia never changed. On the revelation made by the +Ghost, however, he felt that he must put aside all thoughts of it; and +it also seemed to him necessary to convince Ophelia, as well as others, +that he was insane, and so to destroy her hopes of any happy issue to +their love. This was the purpose of his appearance in her chamber, +though he was probably influenced also by a longing to see her and bid +her a silent farewell, and possibly by a faint hope that he might safely +entrust his secret to her. If he entertained any such hope his study of +her face dispelled it; and thereafter, as in the Nunnery-scene (III. i.) +and again at the play-scene, he not only feigned madness, but, to +convince her that he had quite lost his love for her, he also addressed +her in bitter and insulting language. In all this he was acting a part +intensely painful to himself; the very violence of his language in the +Nunnery-scene arose from this pain; and so the actor should make him +show, in that scene, occasional signs of a tenderness which with all his +efforts he cannot wholly conceal. Finally, over her grave the truth +bursts from him in the declaration quoted just now, though it is still +impossible for him to explain to others why he who loved her so +profoundly was forced to wring her heart. + +Now this theory, if the view of Hamlet's character which I have taken is +anywhere near the truth, is certainly wrong at one point, viz., in so +far as it supposes that Hamlet's bitterness to Ophelia was a _mere_ +pretence forced on him by his design of feigning to be insane; and I +proceed to call attention to certain facts and considerations, of which +the theory seems to take no account. + +1. How is it that in his first soliloquy Hamlet makes no reference +whatever to Ophelia? + +2. How is it that in his second soliloquy, on the departure of the +Ghost, he again says nothing about her? When the lover is feeling that +he must make a complete break with his past, why does it not occur to +him at once that he must give up his hopes of happiness in love? + +3. Hamlet does not, as the popular theory supposes, break with Ophelia +directly after the Ghost appears to him; on the contrary, he tries to +see her and sends letters to her (II. i. 109). What really happens is +that Ophelia suddenly repels his visits and letters. Now, _we_ know that +she is simply obeying her father's order; but how would her action +appear to Hamlet, already sick at heart because of his mother's +frailty,[71] and now finding that, the moment fortune has turned against +him, the woman who had welcomed his love turns against him too? Even if +he divined (as his insults to Polonius suggest) that her father was +concerned in this change, would he not still, in that morbid condition +of mind, certainly suspect her of being less simple than she had +appeared to him?[72] Even if he remained free from _this_ suspicion, and +merely thought her deplorably weak, would he not probably feel anger +against _her_, an anger like that of the hero of _Locksley Hall_ against +his Amy? + +4. When Hamlet made his way into Ophelia's room, why did he go in the +garb, the conventionally recognised garb, of the distracted _lover_? If +it was necessary to convince Ophelia of his insanity, how was it +necessary to convince her that disappointment in _love_ was the cause of +his insanity? His _main_ object in the visit appears to have been to +convince _others_, through her, that his insanity was not due to any +mysterious unknown cause, but to this disappointment, and so to allay +the suspicions of the King. But if his feeling for her had been simply +that of love, however unhappy, and had not been in any degree that of +suspicion or resentment, would he have adopted a plan which must involve +her in so much suffering?[73] + +5. In what way are Hamlet's insults to Ophelia at the play-scene +necessary either to his purpose of convincing her of his insanity or to +his purpose of revenge? And, even if he did regard them as somehow means +to these ends, is it conceivable that he would have uttered them, if his +feeling for her were one of hopeless but unmingled love? + +6. How is it that neither when he kills Polonius, nor afterwards, does +he appear to reflect that he has killed Ophelia's father, or what the +effect on Ophelia is likely to be? + +7. We have seen that there is no reference to Ophelia in the soliloquies +of the First Act. Neither is there the faintest allusion to her in any +one of the soliloquies of the subsequent Acts, unless possibly in the +words (III. i. 72) 'the pangs of despised love.'[74] If the popular +theory is true, is not this an astounding fact? + +8. Considering this fact, is there no significance in the further fact +(which, by itself, would present no difficulty) that in speaking to +Horatio Hamlet never alludes to Ophelia, and that at his death he says +nothing of her? + +9. If the popular theory is true, how is it that neither in the +Nunnery-scene nor at the play-scene does Shakespeare insert anything to +make the truth plain? Four words like Othello's 'O hardness to +dissemble' would have sufficed. + +These considerations, coupled with others as to Hamlet's state of mind, +seem to point to two conclusions. They suggest, first, that Hamlet's +love, though never lost, was, after Ophelia's apparent rejection of him, +mingled with suspicion and resentment, and that his treatment of her was +due in part to this cause. And I find it impossible to resist this +conclusion. But the question how much of his harshness is meant to be +real, and how much assumed, seems to me impossible in some places to +answer. For example, his behaviour at the play-scene seems to me to show +an intention to hurt and insult; but in the Nunnery-scene (which cannot +be discussed briefly) he is evidently acting a part and suffering +acutely, while at the same time his invective, however exaggerated, +seems to spring from real feelings; and what is pretence, and what +sincerity, appears to me an insoluble problem. Something depends here on +the further question whether or no Hamlet suspects or detects the +presence of listeners; but, in the absence of an authentic stage +tradition, this question too seems to be unanswerable. + +But something further seems to follow from the considerations adduced. +Hamlet's love, they seem to show, was not only mingled with bitterness, +it was also, like all his healthy feelings, weakened and deadened by his +melancholy.[75] It was far from being extinguished; probably it was +_one_ of the causes which drove him to force his way to Ophelia; +whenever he saw Ophelia, it awoke and, the circumstances being what they +were, tormented him. But it was not an absorbing passion; it did not +habitually occupy his thoughts; and when he declared that it was such a +love as forty thousand brothers could not equal, he spoke sincerely +indeed but not truly. What he said was true, if I may put it thus, of +the inner healthy self which doubtless in time would have fully +reasserted itself; but it was only partly true of the Hamlet whom we see +in the play. And the morbid influence of his melancholy on his love is +the cause of those strange facts, that he never alludes to her in his +soliloquies, and that he appears not to realise how the death of her +father must affect her. + +The facts seem almost to force this idea on us. That it is less +'romantic' than the popular view is no argument against it. And +psychologically it is quite sound, for a frequent symptom of such +melancholy as Hamlet's is a more or less complete paralysis, or even +perversion, of the emotion of love. And yet, while feeling no doubt that +up to a certain point it is true, I confess I am not satisfied that the +explanation of Hamlet's silence regarding Ophelia lies in it. And the +reason of this uncertainty is that scarcely any spectators or readers of +_Hamlet_ notice this silence at all; that I never noticed it myself till +I began to try to solve the problem of Hamlet's relation to Ophelia; and +that even now, when I read the play through without pausing to consider +particular questions, it scarcely strikes me. Now Shakespeare wrote +primarily for the theatre and not for students, and therefore great +weight should be attached to the immediate impressions made by his +works. And so it seems at least possible that the explanation of +Hamlet's silence may be that Shakespeare, having already a very +difficult task to perform in the soliloquies--that of showing the state +of mind which caused Hamlet to delay his vengeance--did not choose to +make his task more difficult by introducing matter which would not only +add to the complexity of the subject but might, from its 'sentimental' +interest, distract attention from the main point; while, from his +theatrical experience, he knew that the audience would not observe how +unnatural it was that a man deeply in love, and forced not only to +renounce but to wound the woman he loved, should not think of her when +he was alone. But, as this explanation is no more completely convincing +to me than the other, I am driven to suspend judgment, and also to +suspect that the text admits of no sure interpretation. [This paragraph +states my view imperfectly.] + +This result may seem to imply a serious accusation against Shakespeare. +But it must be remembered that if we could see a contemporary +representation of _Hamlet_, our doubts would probably disappear. The +actor, instructed by the author, would make it clear to us by looks, +tones, gestures, and by-play how far Hamlet's feigned harshness to +Ophelia was mingled with real bitterness, and again how far his +melancholy had deadened his love. + + +4 + +As we have seen, all the persons in _Hamlet_ except the hero are minor +characters, who fail to rise to the tragic level. They are not less +interesting on that account, but the hero has occupied us so long that I +shall refer only to those in regard to whom Shakespeare's intention +appears to be not seldom misunderstood or overlooked. + +It may seem strange that Ophelia should be one of these; and yet +Shakespearean literature and the experience of teachers show that there +is much difference of opinion regarding her, and in particular that a +large number of readers feel a kind of personal irritation against her. +They seem unable to forgive her for not having been a heroine, and they +fancy her much weaker than she was. They think she ought to have been +able to help Hamlet to fulfil his task. And they betray, it appears to +me, the strangest misconceptions as to what she actually did. + +Now it was essential to Shakespeare's purpose that too great an interest +should not be aroused in the love-story; essential, therefore, that +Ophelia should be merely one of the subordinate characters; and +necessary, accordingly, that she should not be the equal, in spirit, +power or intelligence, of his famous heroines. If she had been an +Imogen, a Cordelia, even a Portia or a Juliet, the story must have taken +another shape. Hamlet would either have been stimulated to do his duty, +or (which is more likely) he would have gone mad, or (which is +likeliest) he would have killed himself in despair. Ophelia, therefore, +was made a character who could not help Hamlet, and for whom on the +other hand he would not naturally feel a passion so vehement or profound +as to interfere with the main motive of the play.[76] And in the love +and the fate of Ophelia herself there was introduced an element, not of +deep tragedy but of pathetic beauty, which makes the analysis of her +character seem almost a desecration. + +Ophelia is plainly quite young and inexperienced. She has lost her +mother, and has only a father and a brother, affectionate but worldly, +to take care of her. Everyone in the drama who has any heart is drawn to +her. To the persons in the play, as to the readers of it, she brings the +thought of flowers. 'Rose of May' Laertes names her. + + Lay her in the earth, + And from her fair and unpolluted flesh + May violets spring! + +--so he prays at her burial. 'Sweets to the sweet' the Queen murmurs, as +she scatters flowers on the grave; and the flowers which Ophelia herself +gathered--those which she gave to others, and those which floated about +her in the brook--glimmer in the picture of the mind. Her affection for +her brother is shown in two or three delicate strokes. Her love for her +father is deep, though mingled with fear. For Hamlet she has, some say, +no deep love--and perhaps she is so near childhood that old affections +have still the strongest hold; but certainly she has given to Hamlet all +the love of which her nature is as yet capable. Beyond these three +beloved ones she seems to have eyes and ears for no one. The Queen is +fond of her, but there is no sign of her returning the Queen's +affection. Her existence is wrapped up in these three. + +On this childlike nature and on Ophelia's inexperience everything +depends. The knowledge that 'there's tricks in the world' has reached +her only as a vague report. Her father and brother are jealously anxious +for her because of her ignorance and innocence; and we resent their +anxiety chiefly because we know Hamlet better than they. Her whole +character is that of simple unselfish affection. Naturally she is +incapable of understanding Hamlet's mind, though she can feel its +beauty. Naturally, too, she obeys her father when she is forbidden to +receive Hamlet's visits and letters. If we remember not what _we_ know +but what _she_ knows of her lover and her father; if we remember that +she had not, like Juliet, confessed her love; and if we remember that +she was much below her suitor in station, her compliance surely must +seem perfectly natural, apart from the fact that the standard of +obedience to a father was in Shakespeare's day higher than in ours. + +'But she does more than obey,' we are told; 'she runs off frightened to +report to her father Hamlet's strange visit and behaviour; she shows to +her father one of Hamlet's letters, and tells him[77] the whole story of +the courtship; and she joins in a plot to win Hamlet's secret from him.' +One must remember, however, that she had never read the tragedy. +Consider for a moment how matters looked to _her_. She knows nothing +about the Ghost and its disclosures. She has undergone for some time the +pain of repelling her lover and appearing to have turned against him. +She sees him, or hears of him, sinking daily into deeper gloom, and so +transformed from what he was that he is considered to be out of his +mind. She hears the question constantly discussed what the cause of this +sad change can be; and her heart tells her--how can it fail to tell +her?--that her unkindness is the chief cause. Suddenly Hamlet forces his +way into her chamber; and his appearance and his behaviour are those of +a man crazed with love. She is frightened--why not? She is not Lady +Macbeth. Rosalind would have been frightened. Which of her censors would +be wholly unmoved if his room were invaded by a lunatic? She is +frightened, then; frightened, if you will, like a child. Yes, but, +observe, her one idea is to help Hamlet. She goes, therefore, at once to +her father. To whom else should she go? Her brother is away. Her father, +whom she saw with her own eyes and not with Shakespeare's, is kind, and +the wisest of men, and concerned about Hamlet's state. Her father finds, +in her report, the solution of the mystery: Hamlet is mad because she +has repulsed him. Why should she not tell her father the whole story and +give him an old letter which may help to convince the King and the +Queen? Nay, why should she not allow herself to be used as a 'decoy' to +settle the question why Hamlet is mad? It is all-important that it +should be settled, in order that he may be cured; all her seniors are +simply and solely anxious for his welfare; and, if her unkindness _is_ +the cause of his sad state, they will permit her to restore him by +kindness (III. i. 40). Was she to refuse to play a part just because it +would be painful to her to do so? I find in her joining the 'plot' (as +it is absurdly called) a sign not of weakness, but of unselfishness and +strength. + +'But she practised deception; she even told a lie. Hamlet asked her +where her father was, and she said he was at home, when he was really +listening behind a curtain.' Poor Ophelia! It is considered angelic in +Desdemona to say untruly that she killed herself, but most immoral or +pusillanimous in Ophelia to tell _her_ lie. I will not discuss these +casuistical problems; but, if ever an angry lunatic asks me a question +which I cannot answer truly without great danger to him and to one of my +relations, I hope that grace may be given me to imitate Ophelia. +Seriously, at such a terrible moment was it weak, was it not rather +heroic, in a simple girl not to lose her presence of mind and not to +flinch, but to go through her task for Hamlet's sake and her father's? +And, finally, is it really a thing to be taken as matter of course, and +no matter for admiration, in this girl that, from beginning to end, and +after a storm of utterly unjust reproach, not a thought of resentment +should even cross her mind? + +Still, we are told, it was ridiculously weak in her to lose her reason. +And here again her critics seem hardly to realise the situation, hardly +to put themselves in the place of a girl whose lover, estranged from +her, goes mad and kills her father. They seem to forget also that +Ophelia must have believed that these frightful calamities were not mere +calamities, but followed from _her_ action in repelling her lover. Nor +do they realise the utter loneliness that must have fallen on her. Of +the three persons who were all the world to her, her father has been +killed, Hamlet has been sent out of the country insane, and her brother +is abroad. Horatio, when her mind gives way, tries to befriend her, but +there is no sign of any previous relation between them, or of Hamlet's +having commended her to his friend's care. What support she can gain +from the Queen we can guess from the Queen's character, and from the +fact that, when Ophelia is most helpless, the Queen shrinks from the +very sight of her (IV. v. 1). She was left, thus, absolutely alone, and +if she looked for her brother's return (as she did, IV. v. 70), she +might reflect that it would mean danger to Hamlet. + +Whether this idea occurred to her we cannot tell. In any case it was +well for her that her mind gave way before Laertes reached Elsinore; and +pathetic as Ophelia's madness is, it is also, we feel, the kindest +stroke that now could fall on her. It is evident, I think, that this was +the effect Shakespeare intended to produce. In her madness Ophelia +continues sweet and lovable. + + Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself, + She turns to favour and to prettiness. + +In her wanderings we hear from time to time an undertone of the deepest +sorrow, but never the agonised cry of fear or horror which makes madness +dreadful or shocking.[78] And the picture of her death, if our eyes grow +dim in watching it, is still purely beautiful. Coleridge was true to +Shakespeare when he wrote of 'the affecting death of Ophelia,--who in +the beginning lay like a little projection of land into a lake or +stream, covered with spray-flowers quietly reflected in the quiet +waters, but at length is undermined or loosened, and becomes a fairy +isle, and after a brief vagrancy sinks almost without an eddy.'[79] + + +5 + +I reluctantly pass by Polonius, Laertes and the beautiful character of +Horatio, to say something in conclusion of the Queen and the King. + +The answers to two questions asked about the Queen are, it seems to me, +practically certain, (1) She did not merely marry a second time with +indecent haste; she was false to her husband while he lived. This is +surely the most natural interpretation of the words of the Ghost (I. v. +41 f.), coming, as they do, before his account of the murder. And +against this testimony what force has the objection that the queen in +the 'Murder of Gonzago' is not represented as an adulteress? Hamlet's +mark in arranging the play-scene was not his mother, whom besides he had +been expressly ordered to spare (I. v. 84 f.). + +(2) On the other hand, she was _not_ privy to the murder of her husband, +either before the deed or after it. There is no sign of her being so, +and there are clear signs that she was not. The representation of the +murder in the play-scene does not move her; and when her husband starts +from his throne, she innocently asks him, 'How fares my lord?' In the +interview with Hamlet, when her son says of his slaughter of Polonius, + + 'A bloody deed!' Almost as bad, good mother, + As kill a king and marry with his brother, + +the astonishment of her repetition 'As kill a king!' is evidently +genuine; and, if it had not been so, she would never have had the +hardihood to exclaim: + + What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue + In noise so rude against me? + +Further, it is most significant that when she and the King speak +together alone, nothing that is said by her or to her implies her +knowledge of the secret. + +The Queen was not a bad-hearted woman, not at all the woman to think +little of murder. But she had a soft animal nature, and was very dull +and very shallow. She loved to be happy, like a sheep in the sun; and, +to do her justice, it pleased her to see others happy, like more sheep +in the sun. She never saw that drunkenness is disgusting till Hamlet +told her so; and, though she knew that he considered her marriage +'o'er-hasty' (II. ii. 57), she was untroubled by any shame at the +feelings which had led to it. It was pleasant to sit upon her throne and +see smiling faces round her, and foolish and unkind in Hamlet to persist +in grieving for his father instead of marrying Ophelia and making +everything comfortable. She was fond of Ophelia and genuinely attached +to her son (though willing to see her lover exclude him from the +throne); and, no doubt, she considered equality of rank a mere trifle +compared with the claims of love. The belief at the bottom of her heart +was that the world is a place constructed simply that people may be +happy in it in a good-humoured sensual fashion. + +Her only chance was to be made unhappy. When affliction comes to her, +the good in her nature struggles to the surface through the heavy mass +of sloth. Like other faulty characters in Shakespeare's tragedies, she +dies a better woman than she had lived. When Hamlet shows her what she +has done she feels genuine remorse. It is true, Hamlet fears it will not +last, and so at the end of the interview (III. iv. 180 ff.) he adds a +warning that, if she betrays him, she will ruin herself as well.[80] It +is true too that there is no sign of her obeying Hamlet in breaking off +her most intimate connection with the King. Still she does feel remorse; +and she loves her son, and does not betray him. She gives her husband a +false account of Polonius's death, and is silent about the appearance of +the Ghost. She becomes miserable; + + To her sick soul, as sin's true nature is, + Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss. + +She shows spirit when Laertes raises the mob, and one respects her for +standing up for her husband when she can do nothing to help her son. If +she had sense to realise Hamlet's purpose, or the probability of the +King's taking some desperate step to foil it, she must have suffered +torture in those days. But perhaps she was too dull. + +The last we see of her, at the fencing-match, is most characteristic. +She is perfectly serene. Things have slipped back into their groove, and +she has no apprehensions. She is, however, disturbed and full of +sympathy for her son, who is out of condition and pants and perspires. +These are afflictions she can thoroughly feel for, though they are even +more common than the death of a father. But then she meets her death +because she cannot resist the wish to please her son by drinking to his +success. And more: when she falls dying, and the King tries to make out +that she is merely swooning at the sight of blood, she collects her +energies to deny it and to warn Hamlet: + + No, no, the drink, the drink,--O my dear Hamlet,-- + The drink, the drink! I am poison'd. [_Dies._ + +Was ever any other writer at once so pitiless and so just as +Shakespeare? Did ever any other mingle the grotesque and the pathetic +with a realism so daring and yet so true to 'the modesty of nature'? + + * * * * * + +King Claudius rarely gets from the reader the attention he deserves. But +he is very interesting, both psychologically and dramatically. On the +one hand, he is not without respectable qualities. As a king he is +courteous and never undignified; he performs his ceremonial duties +efficiently; and he takes good care of the national interests. He +nowhere shows cowardice, and when Laertes and the mob force their way +into the palace, he confronts a dangerous situation with coolness and +address. His love for his ill-gotten wife seems to be quite genuine, and +there is no ground for suspecting him of having used her as a mere means +to the crown.[81] His conscience, though ineffective, is far from being +dead. In spite of its reproaches he plots new crimes to ensure the prize +of the old one; but still it makes him unhappy (III. i. 49 f., III. iii. +35 f.). Nor is he cruel or malevolent. + +On the other hand, he is no tragic character. He had a small nature. If +Hamlet may be trusted, he was a man of mean appearance--a mildewed ear, +a toad, a bat; and he was also bloated by excess in drinking. People +made mouths at him in contempt while his brother lived; and though, when +he came to the throne, they spent large sums in buying his portrait, he +evidently put little reliance on their loyalty. He was no villain of +force, who thought of winning his brother's crown by a bold and open +stroke, but a cut-purse who stole the diadem from a shelf and put it in +his pocket. He had the inclination of natures physically weak and +morally small towards intrigue and crooked dealing. His instinctive +predilection was for poison: this was the means he used in his first +murder, and he at once recurred to it when he had failed to get Hamlet +executed by deputy. Though in danger he showed no cowardice, his first +thought was always for himself. + + I like him not, nor stands it safe with _us_ + To let his madness range, + +--these are the first words we hear him speak after the play-scene. His +first comment on the death of Polonius is, + + It had been so with _us_ had we been there; + +and his second is, + + Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answered? + It will be laid to _us_. + +He was not, however, stupid, but rather quick-witted and adroit. He won +the Queen partly indeed by presents (how pitifully characteristic of +her!), but also by 'witch-craft of his wit' or intellect. He seems to +have been soft-spoken, ingratiating in manner, and given to smiling on +the person he addressed ('that one may smile, and smile, and be a +villain'). We see this in his speech to Laertes about the young man's +desire to return to Paris (I. ii. 42 f.). Hamlet scarcely ever speaks to +him without an insult, but he never shows resentment, hardly even +annoyance. He makes use of Laertes with great dexterity. He had +evidently found that a clear head, a general complaisance, a willingness +to bend and oblige where he could not overawe, would lead him to his +objects,--that he could trick men and manage them. Unfortunately he +imagined he could trick something more than men. + +This error, together with a decided trait of temperament, leads him to +his ruin. He has a sanguine disposition. When first we see him, all has +fallen out to his wishes, and he confidently looks forward to a happy +life. He believes his secret to be absolutely safe, and he is quite +ready to be kind to Hamlet, in whose melancholy he sees only excess of +grief. He has no desire to see him leave the court; he promises him his +voice for the succession (I. ii. 108, III. ii. 355); he will be a father +to him. Before long, indeed, he becomes very uneasy, and then more and +more alarmed; but when, much later, he has contrived Hamlet's death in +England, he has still no suspicion that he need not hope for happiness: + + till I know 'tis done, + Howe'er my haps, my _joys_ were ne'er begun. + +Nay, his very last words show that he goes to death unchanged: + + Oh yet defend me, friends, I am but hurt [=wounded], + +he cries, although in half a minute he is dead. That his crime has +failed, and that it could do nothing else, never once comes home to him. +He thinks he can over-reach Heaven. When he is praying for pardon, he is +all the while perfectly determined to keep his crown; and he knows it. +More--it is one of the grimmest things in Shakespeare, but he puts such +things so quietly that we are apt to miss them--when the King is praying +for pardon for his first murder he has just made his final arrangements +for a second, the murder of Hamlet. But he does not allude to that fact +in his prayer. If Hamlet had really wished to kill him at a moment that +had no relish of salvation in it, he had no need to wait.[82] So we are +inclined to say; and yet it was not so. For this was the crisis for +Claudius as well as Hamlet. He had better have died at once, before he +had added to his guilt a share in the responsibility for all the woe and +death that followed. And so, we may allow ourselves to say, here also +Hamlet's indiscretion served him well. The power that shaped his end +shaped the King's no less. + +For--to return in conclusion to the action of the play--in all that +happens or is done we seem to apprehend some vaster power. We do not +define it, or even name it, or perhaps even say to ourselves that it is +there; but our imagination is haunted by the sense of it, as it works +its way through the deeds or the delays of men to its inevitable end. +And most of all do we feel this in regard to Hamlet and the King. For +these two, the one by his shrinking from his appointed task, and the +other by efforts growing ever more feverish to rid himself of his enemy, +seem to be bent on avoiding each other. But they cannot. Through devious +paths, the very paths they take in order to escape, something is pushing +them silently step by step towards one another, until they meet and it +puts the sword into Hamlet's hand. He himself must die, for he needed +this compulsion before he could fulfil the demand of destiny; but he +_must_ fulfil it. And the King too, turn and twist as he may, must reach +the appointed goal, and is only hastening to it by the windings which +seem to lead elsewhere. Concentration on the character of the hero is +apt to withdraw our attention from this aspect of the drama; but in no +other tragedy of Shakespeare's, not even in _Macbeth_, is this aspect so +impressive.[83] + +I mention _Macbeth_ for a further reason. In _Macbeth_ and _Hamlet_ not +only is the feeling of a supreme power or destiny peculiarly marked, but +it has also at times a peculiar tone, which may be called, in a sense, +religious. I cannot make my meaning clear without using language too +definite to describe truly the imaginative impression produced; but it +is roughly true that, while we do not imagine the supreme power as a +divine being who avenges crime, or as a providence which supernaturally +interferes, our sense of it is influenced by the fact that Shakespeare +uses current religious ideas here much more decidedly than in _Othello_ +or _King Lear_. The horror in Macbeth's soul is more than once +represented as desperation at the thought that he is eternally 'lost'; +the same idea appears in the attempt of Claudius at repentance; and as +_Hamlet_ nears its close the 'religious' tone of the tragedy is deepened +in two ways. In the first place, 'accident' is introduced into the plot +in its barest and least dramatic form, when Hamlet is brought back to +Denmark by the chance of the meeting with the pirate ship. This incident +has been therefore severely criticised as a lame expedient,[84] but it +appears probable that the 'accident' is meant to impress the imagination +as the very reverse of accidental, and with many readers it certainly +does so. And that this was the intention is made the more likely by a +second fact, the fact that in connection with the events of the voyage +Shakespeare introduces that feeling, on Hamlet's part, of his being in +the hands of Providence. The repeated expressions of this feeling are +not, I have maintained, a sign that Hamlet has now formed a fixed +resolution to do his duty forthwith; but their effect is to strengthen +in the spectator the feeling that, whatever may become of Hamlet, and +whether he wills it or not, his task will surely be accomplished, +because it is the purpose of a power against which both he and his enemy +are impotent, and which makes of them the instruments of its own will. + +Observing this, we may remember another significant point of resemblance +between _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_, the appearance in each play of a +Ghost,--a figure which seems quite in place in either, whereas it would +seem utterly out of place in _Othello_ or _King Lear_. Much might be +said of the Ghost in _Hamlet_, but I confine myself to the matter which +we are now considering. What is the effect of the appearance of the +Ghost? And, in particular, why does Shakespeare make this Ghost so +_majestical_ a phantom, giving it that measured and solemn utterance, +and that air of impersonal abstraction which forbids, for example, all +expression of affection for Hamlet and checks in Hamlet the outburst of +pity for his father? Whatever the intention may have been, the result is +that the Ghost affects imagination not simply as the apparition of a +dead king who desires the accomplishment of _his_ purposes, but also as +the representative of that hidden ultimate power, the messenger of +divine justice set upon the expiation of offences which it appeared +impossible for man to discover and avenge, a reminder or a symbol of the +connexion of the limited world of ordinary experience with the vaster +life of which it is but a partial appearance. And as, at the beginning +of the play, we have this intimation, conveyed through the medium of the +received religious idea of a soul come from purgatory, so at the end, +conveyed through the similar idea of a soul carried by angels to its +rest, we have an intimation of the same character, and a reminder that +the apparent failure of Hamlet's life is not the ultimate truth +concerning him. + +If these various peculiarities of the tragedy are considered, it will be +agreed that, while _Hamlet_ certainly cannot be called in the specific +sense a 'religious drama,' there is in it nevertheless both a freer use +of popular religious ideas, and a more decided, though always +imaginative, intimation of a supreme power concerned in human evil and +good, than can be found in any other of Shakespeare's tragedies. And +this is probably one of the causes of the special popularity of this +play, just as _Macbeth_, the tragedy which in these respects most nearly +approaches it, has also the place next to it in general esteem. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 54: In the First Act (I. ii. 138) Hamlet says that his father +has been dead not quite two months. In the Third Act (III. ii. 135) +Ophelia says King Hamlet has been dead 'twice two months.' The events of +the Third Act are separated from those of the Second by one night (II. +ii. 565).] + +[Footnote 55: The only difference is that in the 'To be or not to be' +soliloquy there is no reference to the idea that suicide is forbidden by +'the Everlasting.' Even this, however, seems to have been present in the +original form of the speech, for the version in the First Quarto has a +line about our being 'borne before an everlasting Judge.'] + +[Footnote 56: The present position of the 'To be or not to be' +soliloquy, and of the interview with Ophelia, appears to have been due +to an after-thought of Shakespeare's; for in the First Quarto they +precede, instead of following, the arrival of the players, and +consequently the arrangement for the play-scene. This is a notable +instance of the truth that 'inspiration' is by no means confined to a +poet's first conceptions.] + +[Footnote 57: Cf. again the scene at Ophelia's grave, where a strong +strain of aesthetic disgust is traceable in Hamlet's 'towering passion' +with Laertes: 'Nay, an thou'lt mouth, I'll rant as well as thou' (V. i. +306).] + +[Footnote 58: + + O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever + The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom: + +Nero, who put to death his mother who had poisoned her husband. This +passage is surely remarkable. And so are the later words (III. iv. 28): + + A bloody deed! almost as bad, good mother, + As kill a king, and marry with his brother. + +Are we to understand that at this time he really suspected her of +complicity in the murder? We must remember that the Ghost had not told +him she was innocent of that.] + +[Footnote 59: I am inclined to think that the note of interrogation put +after 'revenged' in a late Quarto is right.] + +[Footnote 60: III. iii. 1-26. The state of affairs at Court at this +time, though I have not seen it noticed by critics, seems to me +puzzling. It is quite clear from III. ii. 310 ff., from the passage just +cited, and from IV. vii. 1-5 and 30 ff., that everyone sees in the +play-scene a gross and menacing insult to the King. Yet no one shows any +sign of perceiving in it also an accusation of murder. Surely that is +strange. Are we perhaps meant to understand that they do perceive this, +but out of subservience choose to ignore the fact? If that were +Shakespeare's meaning, the actors could easily indicate it by their +looks. And if it were so, any sympathy we may feel for Rosencrantz and +Guildenstern in their fate would be much diminished. But the mere text +does not suffice to decide either this question or the question whether +the two courtiers were aware of the contents of the commission they bore +to England.] + +[Footnote 61: This passage in _Hamlet_ seems to have been in Heywood's +mind when, in _The Second Part of the Iron Age_ (Pearson's reprint, vol. +iii., p. 423), he makes the Ghost of Agamemnon appear in order to +satisfy the doubts of Orestes as to his mother's guilt. No reader could +possibly think that this Ghost was meant to be an hallucination; yet +Clytemnestra cannot see it. The Ghost of King Hamlet, I may add, goes +further than that of Agamemnon, for he is audible, as well as visible, +to the privileged person.] + +[Footnote 62: I think it is clear that it is this fear which stands in +the way of the obvious plan of bringing Hamlet to trial and getting him +shut up or executed. It is much safer to hurry him off to his doom in +England before he can say anything about the murder which he has somehow +discovered. Perhaps the Queen's resistance, and probably Hamlet's great +popularity with the people, are additional reasons. (It should be +observed that as early as III. i. 194 we hear of the idea of 'confining' +Hamlet as an alternative to sending him to England.)] + +[Footnote 63: I am inferring from IV. vii., 129, 130, and the last words +of the scene.] + +[Footnote 64: III. iv. 172: + + For this same lord, + I do repent: but heaven hath pleased it so, + To punish me with this and this with me, + That I must be their scourge and minister: + +_i.e._ the scourge and minister of 'heaven,' which has a plural sense +elsewhere also in Shakespeare.] + +[Footnote 65: IV. iii. 48: + + _Ham._ For England! + + _King._ Ay, Hamlet. + + _Ham._ Good. + + _King._ So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes. + + _Ham._ I see a cherub that sees them.] + +[Footnote 66: On this passage see p. 98. Hamlet's reply to Horatio's +warning sounds, no doubt, determined; but so did 'I know my course.' And +is it not significant that, having given it, he abruptly changes the +subject?] + +[Footnote 67: P. 102.] + +[Footnote 68: It should be observed also that many of Hamlet's +repetitions can hardly be said to occur at moments of great emotion, +like Cordelia's 'And so I am, I am,' and 'No cause, no cause.' + +Of course, a habit of repetition quite as marked as Hamlet's may be +found in comic persons, _e.g._ Justice Shallow in _2 Henry IV._] + +[Footnote 69: Perhaps it is from noticing this trait that I find +something characteristic too in this coincidence of phrase: 'Alas, poor +ghost!' (I. v. 4), 'Alas, poor Yorick!' (V. i. 202).] + +[Footnote 70: This letter, of course, was written before the time when +the action of the drama begins, for we know that Ophelia, after her +father's commands in I. iii., received no more letters (II. i. 109).] + +[Footnote 71: 'Frailty, thy name is woman!' he had exclaimed in the +first soliloquy. Cf. what he says of his mother's act (III. iv. 40): + + Such an act + That blurs the grace and blush of modesty, + Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose + From the fair forehead of an innocent love + And sets a blister there.] + +[Footnote 72: There are signs that Hamlet was haunted by the horrible +idea that he had been deceived in Ophelia as he had been in his mother; +that she was shallow and artificial, and even that what had seemed +simple and affectionate love might really have been something very +different. The grossness of his language at the play-scene, and some +lines in the Nunnery-scene, suggest this; and, considering the state of +his mind, there is nothing unnatural in his suffering from such a +suspicion. I do not suggest that he _believed_ in it, and in the +Nunnery-scene it is clear that his healthy perception of her innocence +is in conflict with it. + +He seems to have divined that Polonius suspected him of dishonourable +intentions towards Ophelia; and there are also traces of the idea that +Polonius had been quite ready to let his daughter run the risk as long +as Hamlet was prosperous. But it is dangerous, of course, to lay stress +on inferences drawn from his conversations with Polonius.] + +[Footnote 73: Many readers and critics imagine that Hamlet went straight +to Ophelia's room after his interview with the Ghost. But we have just +seen that on the contrary he tried to visit her and was repelled, and it +is absolutely certain that a long interval separates the events of I. v. +and II. i. They think also, of course, that Hamlet's visit to Ophelia +was the first announcement of his madness. But the text flatly +contradicts that idea also. Hamlet has for some time appeared totally +changed (II. ii. 1-10); the King is very uneasy at his 'transformation,' +and has sent for his school-fellows in order to discover its cause. +Polonius now, after Ophelia has told him of the interview, comes to +announce his discovery, not of Hamlet's madness, but of its cause (II. +ii. 49). That, it would seem, was the effect Hamlet aimed at in his +interview. I may add that Ophelia's description of his intent +examination of her face suggests doubt rather as to her 'honesty' or +sincerity than as to her strength of mind. I cannot believe that he ever +dreamed of confiding his secret to her.] + +[Footnote 74: If this _is_ an allusion to his own love, the adjective +'despised' is significant. But I doubt the allusion. The other +calamities mentioned by Hamlet, 'the oppressor's wrong, the proud man's +contumely, the law's delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns that +patient merit of the unworthy takes,' are not at all specially his own.] + +[Footnote 75: It should be noticed that it was not apparently of long +standing. See the words 'of late' in I. iii. 91, 99.] + +[Footnote 76: This, I think, may be said on almost any sane view of +Hamlet's love.] + +[Footnote 77: Polonius says so, and it _may_ be true.] + +[Footnote 78: I have heard an actress in this part utter such a cry as +is described above, but there is absolutely nothing in the text to +justify her rendering. Even the exclamation 'O, ho!' found in the +Quartos at IV. v. 33, but omitted in the Folios and by almost all modern +editors, coming as it does after the stanza, 'He is dead and gone, +lady,' evidently expresses grief, not terror.] + +[Footnote 79: In the remarks above I have not attempted, of course, a +complete view of the character, which has often been well described; but +I cannot forbear a reference to one point which I do not remember to +have seen noticed. In the Nunnery-scene Ophelia's first words +pathetically betray her own feeling: + + Good my lord, + How does your honour _for this many a day_? + +She then offers to return Hamlet's presents. This has not been suggested +to her by her father: it is her own thought. And the next lines, in +which she refers to the sweet words which accompanied those gifts, and +to the unkindness which has succeeded that kindness, imply a reproach. +So again do those most touching little speeches: + + _Hamlet._ ... I did love you once. + + _Ophelia._ Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. + + _Hamlet._ You should not have believed me ... I loved you not. + + _Ophelia._ I was the more deceived. + +Now the obvious surface fact was not that Hamlet had forsaken her, but +that _she_ had repulsed _him_; and here, with his usual unobtrusive +subtlety, Shakespeare shows how Ophelia, even though she may have +accepted from her elders the theory that her unkindness has driven +Hamlet mad, knows within herself that she is forsaken, and cannot +repress the timid attempt to win her lover back by showing that her own +heart is unchanged. + +I will add one note. There are critics who, after all the help given +them in different ways by Goethe and Coleridge and Mrs. Jameson, still +shake their heads over Ophelia's song, 'To-morrow is Saint Valentine's +day.' Probably they are incurable, but they may be asked to consider +that Shakespeare makes Desdemona, 'as chaste as ice, as pure as snow,' +sing an old song containing the line, + + If I court moe women, you'll couch with moe men.] + +[Footnote 80: _I.e._ the King will kill _her_ to make all sure.] + +[Footnote 81: I do not rely so much on his own statement to Laertes (IV. +vii. 12 f.) as on the absence of contrary indications, on his tone in +speaking to her, and on such signs as his mention of her in soliloquy +(III. iii. 55).] + +[Footnote 82: This also is quietly indicated. Hamlet spares the King, he +says, because if the King is killed praying he will _go to heaven_. On +Hamlet's departure, the King rises from his knees, and mutters: + + My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: + Words without thoughts _never to heaven go_.] + +[Footnote 83: I am indebted to Werder in this paragraph.] + +[Footnote 84: The attempt to explain this meeting as pre-arranged by +Hamlet is scarcely worth mention.] + + + + +LECTURE V + +OTHELLO + + +There is practically no doubt that _Othello_ was the tragedy written +next after _Hamlet_. Such external evidence as we possess points to this +conclusion, and it is confirmed by similarities of style, diction and +versification, and also by the fact that ideas and phrases of the +earlier play are echoed in the later.[85] There is, further (not to +speak of one curious point, to be considered when we come to Iago), a +certain resemblance in the subjects. The heroes of the two plays are +doubtless extremely unlike, so unlike that each could have dealt without +much difficulty with the situation which proved fatal to the other; but +still each is a man exceptionally noble and trustful, and each endures +the shock of a terrible disillusionment. This theme is treated by +Shakespeare for the first time in _Hamlet_, for the second in _Othello_. +It recurs with modifications in _King Lear_, and it probably formed the +attraction which drew Shakespeare to refashion in part another writer's +tragedy of _Timon_. These four dramas may so far be grouped together in +distinction from the remaining tragedies. + +But in point of substance, and, in certain respects, in point of style, +the unlikeness of _Othello_ to _Hamlet_ is much greater than the +likeness, and the later play belongs decidedly to one group with its +successors. We have seen that, like them, it is a tragedy of passion, a +description inapplicable to _Julius Caesar_ or _Hamlet_. And with this +change goes another, an enlargement in the stature of the hero. There is +in most of the later heroes something colossal, something which reminds +us of Michael Angelo's figures. They are not merely exceptional men, +they are huge men; as it were, survivors of the heroic age living in a +later and smaller world. We do not receive this impression from Romeo or +Brutus or Hamlet, nor did it lie in Shakespeare's design to allow more +than touches of this trait to Julius Caesar himself; but it is strongly +marked in Lear and Coriolanus, and quite distinct in Macbeth and even in +Antony. Othello is the first of these men, a being essentially large and +grand, towering above his fellows, holding a volume of force which in +repose ensures preeminence without an effort, and in commotion reminds +us rather of the fury of the elements than of the tumult of common human +passion. + + +1 + +What is the peculiarity of _Othello_? What is the distinctive impression +that it leaves? Of all Shakespeare's tragedies, I would answer, not even +excepting _King Lear_, _Othello_ is the most painfully exciting and the +most terrible. From the moment when the temptation of the hero begins, +the reader's heart and mind are held in a vice, experiencing the +extremes of pity and fear, sympathy and repulsion, sickening hope and +dreadful expectation. Evil is displayed before him, not indeed with the +profusion found in _King Lear_, but forming, as it were, the soul of a +single character, and united with an intellectual superiority so great +that he watches its advance fascinated and appalled. He sees it, in +itself almost irresistible, aided at every step by fortunate accidents +and the innocent mistakes of its victims. He seems to breathe an +atmosphere as fateful as that of _King Lear_, but more confined and +oppressive, the darkness not of night but of a close-shut murderous +room. His imagination is excited to intense activity, but it is the +activity of concentration rather than dilation. + +I will not dwell now on aspects of the play which modify this +impression, and I reserve for later discussion one of its principal +sources, the character of Iago. But if we glance at some of its other +sources, we shall find at the same time certain distinguishing +characteristics of _Othello_. + +(1) One of these has been already mentioned in our discussion of +Shakespeare's technique. _Othello_ is not only the most masterly of the +tragedies in point of construction, but its method of construction is +unusual. And this method, by which the conflict begins late, and +advances without appreciable pause and with accelerating speed to the +catastrophe, is a main cause of the painful tension just described. To +this may be added that, after the conflict has begun, there is very +little relief by way of the ridiculous. Henceforward at any rate Iago's +humour never raises a smile. The clown is a poor one; we hardly attend +to him and quickly forget him; I believe most readers of Shakespeare, if +asked whether there is a clown in _Othello_, would answer No. + +(2) In the second place, there is no subject more exciting than sexual +jealousy rising to the pitch of passion; and there can hardly be any +spectacle at once so engrossing and so painful as that of a great nature +suffering the torment of this passion, and driven by it to a crime which +is also a hideous blunder. Such a passion as ambition, however terrible +its results, is not itself ignoble; if we separate it in thought from +the conditions which make it guilty, it does not appear despicable; it +is not a kind of suffering, its nature is active; and therefore we can +watch its course without shrinking. But jealousy, and especially sexual +jealousy, brings with it a sense of shame and humiliation. For this +reason it is generally hidden; if we perceive it we ourselves are +ashamed and turn our eyes away; and when it is not hidden it commonly +stirs contempt as well as pity. Nor is this all. Such jealousy as +Othello's converts human nature into chaos, and liberates the beast in +man; and it does this in relation to one of the most intense and also +the most ideal of human feelings. What spectacle can be more painful +than that of this feeling turned into a tortured mixture of longing and +loathing, the 'golden purity' of passion split by poison into fragments, +the animal in man forcing itself into his consciousness in naked +grossness, and he writhing before it but powerless to deny it entrance, +gasping inarticulate images of pollution, and finding relief only in a +bestial thirst for blood? This is what we have to witness in one who was +indeed 'great of heart' and no less pure and tender than he was great. +And this, with what it leads to, the blow to Desdemona, and the scene +where she is treated as the inmate of a brothel, a scene far more +painful than the murder scene, is another cause of the special effect of +this tragedy.[86] + +(3) The mere mention of these scenes will remind us painfully of a third +cause; and perhaps it is the most potent of all. I mean the suffering of +Desdemona. This is, unless I mistake, the most nearly intolerable +spectacle that Shakespeare offers us. For one thing, it is _mere_ +suffering; and, _ceteris paribus_, that is much worse to witness than +suffering that issues in action. Desdemona is helplessly passive. She +can do nothing whatever. She cannot retaliate even in speech; no, not +even in silent feeling. And the chief reason of her helplessness only +makes the sight of her suffering more exquisitely painful. She is +helpless because her nature is infinitely sweet and her love absolute. I +would not challenge Mr. Swinburne's statement that we _pity_ Othello +even more than Desdemona; but we watch Desdemona with more unmitigated +distress. We are never wholly uninfluenced by the feeling that Othello +is a man contending with another man; but Desdemona's suffering is like +that of the most loving of dumb creatures tortured without cause by the +being he adores. + +(4) Turning from the hero and heroine to the third principal character, +we observe (what has often been pointed out) that the action and +catastrophe of _Othello_ depend largely on intrigue. We must not say +more than this. We must not call the play a tragedy of intrigue as +distinguished from a tragedy of character. Iago's plot is Iago's +character in action; and it is built on his knowledge of Othello's +character, and could not otherwise have succeeded. Still it remains true +that an elaborate plot was necessary to elicit the catastrophe; for +Othello was no Leontes, and his was the last nature to engender such +jealousy from itself. Accordingly Iago's intrigue occupies a position in +the drama for which no parallel can be found in the other tragedies; the +only approach, and that a distant one, being the intrigue of Edmund in +the secondary plot of _King Lear_. Now in any novel or play, even if the +persons rouse little interest and are never in serious danger, a +skilfully-worked intrigue will excite eager attention and suspense. And +where, as in _Othello_, the persons inspire the keenest sympathy and +antipathy, and life and death depend on the intrigue, it becomes the +source of a tension in which pain almost overpowers pleasure. Nowhere +else in Shakespeare do we hold our breath in such anxiety and for so +long a time as in the later Acts of _Othello_. + +(5) One result of the prominence of the element of intrigue is that +_Othello_ is less unlike a story of private life than any other of the +great tragedies. And this impression is strengthened in further ways. In +the other great tragedies the action is placed in a distant period, so +that its general significance is perceived through a thin veil which +separates the persons from ourselves and our own world. But _Othello_ is +a drama of modern life; when it first appeared it was a drama almost of +contemporary life, for the date of the Turkish attack on Cyprus is 1570. +The characters come close to us, and the application of the drama to +ourselves (if the phrase may be pardoned) is more immediate than it can +be in _Hamlet_ or _Lear_. Besides this, their fortunes affect us as +those of private individuals more than is possible in any of the later +tragedies with the exception of _Timon_. I have not forgotten the +Senate, nor Othello's position, nor his service to the State;[87] but +his deed and his death have not that influence on the interests of a +nation or an empire which serves to idealise, and to remove far from our +own sphere, the stories of Hamlet and Macbeth, of Coriolanus and Antony. +Indeed he is already superseded at Cyprus when his fate is consummated, +and as we leave him no vision rises on us, as in other tragedies, of +peace descending on a distracted land. + +(6) The peculiarities so far considered combine with others to produce +those feelings of oppression, of confinement to a comparatively narrow +world, and of dark fatality, which haunt us in reading _Othello_. In +_Macbeth_ the fate which works itself out alike in the external conflict +and in the hero's soul, is obviously hostile to evil; and the +imagination is dilated both by the consciousness of its presence and by +the appearance of supernatural agencies. These, as we have seen, produce +in _Hamlet_ a somewhat similar effect, which is increased by the hero's +acceptance of the accidents as a providential shaping of his end. _King +Lear_ is undoubtedly the tragedy which comes nearest to _Othello_ in the +impression of darkness and fatefulness, and in the absence of direct +indications of any guiding power.[88] But in _King Lear_, apart from +other differences to be considered later, the conflict assumes +proportions so vast that the imagination seems, as in _Paradise Lost_, +to traverse spaces wider than the earth. In reading _Othello_ the mind +is not thus distended. It is more bound down to the spectacle of noble +beings caught in toils from which there is no escape; while the +prominence of the intrigue diminishes the sense of the dependence of the +catastrophe on character, and the part played by accident[89] in this +catastrophe accentuates the feeling of fate. This influence of accident +is keenly felt in _King Lear_ only once, and at the very end of the +play. In _Othello_, after the temptation has begun, it is incessant and +terrible. The skill of Iago was extraordinary, but so was his good +fortune. Again and again a chance word from Desdemona, a chance meeting +of Othello and Cassio, a question which starts to our lips and which +anyone but Othello would have asked, would have destroyed Iago's plot +and ended his life. In their stead, Desdemona drops her handkerchief at +the moment most favourable to him,[90] Cassio blunders into the presence +of Othello only to find him in a swoon, Bianca arrives precisely when +she is wanted to complete Othello's deception and incense his anger into +fury. All this and much more seems to us quite natural, so potent is the +art of the dramatist; but it confounds us with a feeling, such as we +experience in the _Oedipus Tyrannus_, that for these star-crossed +mortals--both [Greek: dysdaimones]--there is no escape from fate, and +even with a feeling, absent from that play, that fate has taken sides +with villainy.[91] It is not surprising, therefore, that _Othello_ +should affect us as _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_ never do, and as _King Lear_ +does only in slighter measure. On the contrary, it is marvellous that, +before the tragedy is over, Shakespeare should have succeeded in toning +down this impression into harmony with others more solemn and serene. + +But has he wholly succeeded? Or is there a justification for the fact--a +fact it certainly is--that some readers, while acknowledging, of course, +the immense power of _Othello_, and even admitting that it is +dramatically perhaps Shakespeare's greatest triumph, still regard it +with a certain distaste, or, at any rate, hardly allow it a place in +their minds beside _Hamlet_, _King Lear_ and _Macbeth_? + +The distaste to which I refer is due chiefly to two causes. First, to +many readers in our time, men as well as women, the subject of sexual +jealousy, treated with Elizabethan fulness and frankness, is not merely +painful but so repulsive that not even the intense tragic emotions which +the story generates can overcome this repulsion. But, while it is easy +to understand a dislike of _Othello_ thus caused, it does not seem +necessary to discuss it, for it may fairly be called personal or +subjective. It would become more than this, and would amount to a +criticism of the play, only if those who feel it maintained that the +fulness and frankness which are disagreeable to them are also needless +from a dramatic point of view, or betray a design of appealing to +unpoetic feelings in the audience. But I do not think that this is +maintained, or that such a view would be plausible. + +To some readers, again, parts of _Othello_ appear shocking or even +horrible. They think--if I may formulate their objection--that in these +parts Shakespeare has sinned against the canons of art, by representing +on the stage a violence or brutality the effect of which is +unnecessarily painful and rather sensational than tragic. The passages +which thus give offence are probably those already referred to,--that +where Othello strikes Desdemona (IV. i. 251), that where he affects to +treat her as an inmate of a house of ill-fame (IV. ii.), and finally the +scene of her death. + +The issues thus raised ought not to be ignored or impatiently dismissed, +but they cannot be decided, it seems to me, by argument. All we can +profitably do is to consider narrowly our experience, and to ask +ourselves this question: If we feel these objections, do we feel them +when we are reading the play with all our force, or only when we are +reading it in a half-hearted manner? For, however matters may stand in +the former case, in the latter case evidently the fault is ours and not +Shakespeare's. And if we try the question thus, I believe we shall find +that on the whole the fault is ours. The first, and least important, of +the three passages--that of the blow--seems to me the most doubtful. I +confess that, do what I will, I cannot reconcile myself with it. It +seems certain that the blow is by no means a tap on the shoulder with a +roll of paper, as some actors, feeling the repulsiveness of the passage, +have made it. It must occur, too, on the open stage. And there is not, I +think, a sufficiently overwhelming tragic feeling in the passage to make +it bearable. But in the other two scenes the case is different. There, +it seems to me, if we fully imagine the inward tragedy in the souls of +the persons as we read, the more obvious and almost physical sensations +of pain or horror do not appear in their own likeness, and only serve to +intensify the tragic feelings in which they are absorbed. Whether this +would be so in the murder-scene if Desdemona had to be imagined as +dragged about the open stage (as in some modern performances) may be +doubtful; but there is absolutely no warrant in the text for imagining +this, and it is also quite clear that the bed where she is stifled was +within the curtains,[92] and so, presumably, in part concealed. + +Here, then, _Othello_ does not appear to be, unless perhaps at one +point,[93] open to criticism, though it has more passages than the other +three tragedies where, if imagination is not fully exerted, it is +shocked or else sensationally excited. If nevertheless we feel it to +occupy a place in our minds a little lower than the other three (and I +believe this feeling, though not general, is not rare), the reason lies +not here but in another characteristic, to which I have already +referred,--the comparative confinement of the imaginative atmosphere. +_Othello_ has not equally with the other three the power of dilating the +imagination by vague suggestions of huge universal powers working in the +world of individual fate and passion. It is, in a sense, less +'symbolic.' We seem to be aware in it of a certain limitation, a partial +suppression of that element in Shakespeare's mind which unites him with +the mystical poets and with the great musicians and philosophers. In one +or two of his plays, notably in _Troilus and Cressida_, we are almost +painfully conscious of this suppression; we feel an intense intellectual +activity, but at the same time a certain coldness and hardness, as +though some power in his soul, at once the highest and the sweetest, +were for a time in abeyance. In other plays, notably in the _Tempest_, +we are constantly aware of the presence of this power; and in such cases +we seem to be peculiarly near to Shakespeare himself. Now this is so in +_Hamlet_ and _King Lear_, and, in a slighter degree, in _Macbeth_; but +it is much less so in _Othello_. I do not mean that in _Othello_ the +suppression is marked, or that, as in _Troilus and Cressida_, it strikes +us as due to some unpleasant mood; it seems rather to follow simply from +the design of a play on a contemporary and wholly mundane subject. Still +it makes a difference of the kind I have attempted to indicate, and it +leaves an impression that in _Othello_ we are not in contact with the +whole of Shakespeare. And it is perhaps significant in this respect that +the hero himself strikes us as having, probably, less of the poet's +personality in him than many characters far inferior both as dramatic +creations and as men. + + +2 + +The character of Othello is comparatively simple, but, as I have dwelt +on the prominence of intrigue and accident in the play, it is desirable +to show how essentially the success of Iago's plot is connected with +this character. Othello's description of himself as + + one not easily jealous, but, being wrought, + Perplexed in the extreme, + +is perfectly just. His tragedy lies in this--that his whole nature was +indisposed to jealousy, and yet was such that he was unusually open to +deception, and, if once wrought to passion, likely to act with little +reflection, with no delay, and in the most decisive manner conceivable. + +Let me first set aside a mistaken view. I do not mean the ridiculous +notion that Othello was jealous by temperament, but the idea, which has +some little plausibility, that the play is primarily a study of a noble +barbarian, who has become a Christian and has imbibed some of the +civilisation of his employers, but who retains beneath the surface the +savage passions of his Moorish blood and also the suspiciousness +regarding female chastity common among Oriental peoples, and that the +last three Acts depict the outburst of these original feelings through +the thin crust of Venetian culture. It would take too long to discuss +this idea,[94] and it would perhaps be useless to do so, for all +arguments against it must end in an appeal to the reader's understanding +of Shakespeare. If he thinks it is like Shakespeare to look at things in +this manner; that he had a historical mind and occupied himself with +problems of 'Culturgeschichte'; that he laboured to make his Romans +perfectly Roman, to give a correct view of the Britons in the days of +Lear or Cymbeline, to portray in Hamlet a stage of the moral +consciousness not yet reached by the people around him, the reader will +also think this interpretation of _Othello_ probable. To me it appears +hopelessly un-Shakespearean. I could as easily believe that Chaucer +meant the Wife of Bath for a study of the peculiarities of +Somersetshire. I do not mean that Othello's race is a matter of no +account. It has, as we shall presently see, its importance in the play. +It makes a difference to our idea of him; it makes a difference to the +action and catastrophe. But in regard to the essentials of his character +it is not important; and if anyone had told Shakespeare that no +Englishman would have acted like the Moor, and had congratulated him on +the accuracy of his racial psychology, I am sure he would have laughed. + +Othello is, in one sense of the word, by far the most romantic figure +among Shakespeare's heroes; and he is so partly from the strange life of +war and adventure which he has lived from childhood. He does not belong +to our world, and he seems to enter it we know not whence--almost as if +from wonderland. There is something mysterious in his descent from men +of royal siege; in his wanderings in vast deserts and among marvellous +peoples; in his tales of magic handkerchiefs and prophetic Sibyls; in +the sudden vague glimpses we get of numberless battles and sieges in +which he has played the hero and has borne a charmed life; even in +chance references to his baptism, his being sold to slavery, his sojourn +in Aleppo. + +And he is not merely a romantic figure; his own nature is romantic. He +has not, indeed, the meditative or speculative imagination of Hamlet; +but in the strictest sense of the word he is more poetic than Hamlet. +Indeed, if one recalls Othello's most famous speeches--those that begin, +'Her father loved me,' 'O now for ever,' 'Never, Iago,' 'Had it pleased +Heaven,' 'It is the cause,' 'Behold, I have a weapon,' 'Soft you, a word +or two before you go'--and if one places side by side with these +speeches an equal number by any other hero, one will not doubt that +Othello is the greatest poet of them all. There is the same poetry in +his casual phrases--like 'These nine moons wasted,' 'Keep up your bright +swords, for the dew will rust them,' 'You chaste stars,' 'It is a sword +of Spain, the ice-brook's temper,' 'It is the very error of the +moon'--and in those brief expressions of intense feeling which ever +since have been taken as the absolute expression, like + + If it were now to die, + 'Twere now to be most happy; for, I fear, + My soul hath her content so absolute + That not another comfort like to this + Succeeds in unknown fate, + +or + + If she be false, O then Heaven mocks itself. + I'll not believe it; + +or + + No, my heart is turned to stone; I strike it, and it hurts my hand, + +or + + But yet the pity of it, Iago! O Iago, the pity of it, Iago! + +or + + O thou weed, + Who art so lovely fair and smell'st so sweet + That the sense aches at thee, would thou hadst ne'er been born. + +And this imagination, we feel, has accompanied his whole life. He has +watched with a poet's eye the Arabian trees dropping their med'cinable +gum, and the Indian throwing away his chance-found pearl; and has gazed +in a fascinated dream at the Pontic sea rushing, never to return, to the +Propontic and the Hellespont; and has felt as no other man ever felt +(for he speaks of it as none other ever did) the poetry of the pride, +pomp, and circumstance of glorious war. + +So he comes before us, dark and grand, with a light upon him from the +sun where he was born; but no longer young, and now grave, +self-controlled, steeled by the experience of countless perils, +hardships and vicissitudes, at once simple and stately in bearing and in +speech, a great man naturally modest but fully conscious of his worth, +proud of his services to the state, unawed by dignitaries and unelated +by honours, secure, it would seem, against all dangers from without and +all rebellion from within. And he comes to have his life crowned with +the final glory of love, a love as strange, adventurous and romantic as +any passage of his eventful history, filling his heart with tenderness +and his imagination with ecstasy. For there is no love, not that of +Romeo in his youth, more steeped in imagination than Othello's. + +The sources of danger in this character are revealed but too clearly by +the story. In the first place, Othello's mind, for all its poetry, is +very simple. He is not observant. His nature tends outward. He is quite +free from introspection, and is not given to reflection. Emotion excites +his imagination, but it confuses and dulls his intellect. On this side +he is the very opposite of Hamlet, with whom, however, he shares a great +openness and trustfulness of nature. In addition, he has little +experience of the corrupt products of civilised life, and is ignorant of +European women. + +In the second place, for all his dignity and massive calm (and he has +greater dignity than any other of Shakespeare's men), he is by nature +full of the most vehement passion. Shakespeare emphasises his +self-control, not only by the wonderful pictures of the First Act, but +by references to the past. Lodovico, amazed at his violence, exclaims: + + Is this the noble Moor whom our full Senate + Call all in all sufficient? Is this the nature + Whom passion could not shake? whose solid virtue + The shot of accident nor dart of chance + Could neither graze nor pierce? + +Iago, who has here no motive for lying, asks: + + Can he be angry? I have seen the cannon + When it hath blown his ranks into the air, + And, like the devil, from his very arm + Puffed his own brother--and can he be angry?[95] + +This, and other aspects of his character, are best exhibited by a single +line--one of Shakespeare's miracles--the words by which Othello silences +in a moment the night-brawl between his attendants and those of +Brabantio: + + Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them. + +And the same self-control is strikingly shown where Othello endeavours +to elicit some explanation of the fight between Cassio and Montano. +Here, however, there occur ominous words, which make us feel how +necessary was this self-control, and make us admire it the more: + + Now, by heaven, + My blood begins my safer guides to rule, + And passion, having my best judgment collied, + Assays to lead the way. + +We remember these words later, when the sun of reason is 'collied,' +blackened and blotted out in total eclipse. + +Lastly, Othello's nature is all of one piece. His trust, where he +trusts, is absolute. Hesitation is almost impossible to him. He is +extremely self-reliant, and decides and acts instantaneously. If stirred +to indignation, as 'in Aleppo once,' he answers with one lightning +stroke. Love, if he loves, must be to him the heaven where either he +must live or bear no life. If such a passion as jealousy seizes him, it +will swell into a well-nigh incontrollable flood. He will press for +immediate conviction or immediate relief. Convinced, he will act with +the authority of a judge and the swiftness of a man in mortal pain. +Undeceived, he will do like execution on himself. + +This character is so noble, Othello's feelings and actions follow so +inevitably from it and from the forces brought to bear on it, and his +sufferings are so heart-rending, that he stirs, I believe, in most +readers a passion of mingled love and pity which they feel for no other +hero in Shakespeare, and to which not even Mr. Swinburne can do more +than justice. Yet there are some critics and not a few readers who +cherish a grudge against him. They do not merely think that in the later +stages of his temptation he showed a certain obtuseness, and that, to +speak pedantically, he acted with unjustifiable precipitance and +violence; no one, I suppose, denies that. But, even when they admit that +he was not of a jealous temper, they consider that he _was_ 'easily +jealous'; they seem to think that it was inexcusable in him to feel any +suspicion of his wife at all; and they blame him for never suspecting +Iago or asking him for evidence. I refer to this attitude of mind +chiefly in order to draw attention to certain points in the story. It +comes partly from mere inattention (for Othello did suspect Iago and did +ask him for evidence); partly from a misconstruction of the text which +makes Othello appear jealous long before he really is so;[96] and partly +from failure to realise certain essential facts. I will begin with +these. + +(1) Othello, we have seen, was trustful, and thorough in his trust. He +put entire confidence in the honesty of Iago, who had not only been his +companion in arms, but, as he believed, had just proved his faithfulness +in the matter of the marriage. This confidence was misplaced, and we +happen to know it; but it was no sign of stupidity in Othello. For his +opinion of Iago was the opinion of practically everyone who knew him: +and that opinion was that Iago was before all things 'honest,' his very +faults being those of excess in honesty. This being so, even if Othello +had not been trustful and simple, it would have been quite unnatural in +him to be unmoved by the warnings of so honest a friend, warnings +offered with extreme reluctance and manifestly from a sense of a +friend's duty.[97] _Any_ husband would have been troubled by them. + +(2) Iago does not bring these warnings to a husband who had lived with a +wife for months and years and knew her like his sister or his +bosom-friend. Nor is there any ground in Othello's character for +supposing that, if he had been such a man, he would have felt and acted +as he does in the play. But he was newly married; in the circumstances +he cannot have known much of Desdemona before his marriage; and further +he was conscious of being under the spell of a feeling which can give +glory to the truth but can also give it to a dream. + +(3) This consciousness in any imaginative man is enough, in such +circumstances, to destroy his confidence in his powers of perception. In +Othello's case, after a long and most artful preparation, there now +comes, to reinforce its effect, the suggestions that he is not an +Italian, not even a European; that he is totally ignorant of the +thoughts and the customary morality of Venetian women;[98] that he had +himself seen in Desdemona's deception of her father how perfect an +actress she could be. As he listens in horror, for a moment at least the +past is revealed to him in a new and dreadful light, and the ground +seems to sink under his feet. These suggestions are followed by a +tentative but hideous and humiliating insinuation of what his honest and +much-experienced friend fears may be the true explanation of Desdemona's +rejection of acceptable suitors, and of her strange, and naturally +temporary, preference for a black man. Here Iago goes too far. He sees +something in Othello's face that frightens him, and he breaks off. Nor +does this idea take any hold of Othello's mind. But it is not surprising +that his utter powerlessness to repel it on the ground of knowledge of +his wife, or even of that instinctive interpretation of character which +is possible between persons of the same race,[99] should complete his +misery, so that he feels he can bear no more, and abruptly dismisses his +friend (III. iii. 238). + +Now I repeat that _any_ man situated as Othello was would have been +disturbed by Iago's communications, and I add that many men would have +been made wildly jealous. But up to this point, where Iago is dismissed, +Othello, I must maintain, does not show jealousy. His confidence is +shaken, he is confused and deeply troubled, he feels even horror; but he +is not yet jealous in the proper sense of that word. In his soliloquy +(III. iii. 258 ff.) the beginning of this passion may be traced; but it +is only after an interval of solitude, when he has had time to dwell on +the idea presented to him, and especially after statements of fact, not +mere general grounds of suspicion, are offered, that the passion lays +hold of him. Even then, however, and indeed to the very end, he is quite +unlike the essentially jealous man, quite unlike Leontes. No doubt the +thought of another man's possessing the woman he loves is intolerable to +him; no doubt the sense of insult and the impulse of revenge are at +times most violent; and these are the feelings of jealousy proper. But +these are not the chief or the deepest source of Othello's suffering. It +is the wreck of his faith and his love. It is the feeling, + + If she be false, oh then Heaven mocks itself; + +the feeling, + + O Iago, the pity of it, Iago! + +the feeling, + + But there where I have garner'd up my heart, + Where either I must live, or bear no life; + The fountain from the which my current runs, + Or else dries up--to be discarded thence.... + +You will find nothing like this in Leontes. + +Up to this point, it appears to me, there is not a syllable to be said +against Othello. But the play is a tragedy, and from this point we may +abandon the ungrateful and undramatic task of awarding praise and blame. +When Othello, after a brief interval, re-enters (III. iii. 330), we see +at once that the poison has been at work and 'burns like the mines of +sulphur.' + + Look where he comes! Not poppy, nor mandragora, + Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world, + Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep + Which thou owedst yesterday. + +He is 'on the rack,' in an agony so unbearable that he cannot endure the +sight of Iago. Anticipating the probability that Iago has spared him the +whole truth, he feels that in that case his life is over and his +'occupation gone' with all its glories. But he has not abandoned hope. +The bare possibility that his friend is deliberately deceiving +him--though such a deception would be a thing so monstrously wicked that +he can hardly conceive it credible--is a kind of hope. He furiously +demands proof, ocular proof. And when he is compelled to see that he is +demanding an impossibility he still demands evidence. He forces it from +the unwilling witness, and hears the maddening tale of Cassio's dream. +It is enough. And if it were not enough, has he not sometimes seen a +handkerchief spotted with strawberries in his wife's hand? Yes, it was +his first gift to her. + + I know not that; but such a handkerchief-- + I am sure it was your wife's--did I to-day + See Cassio wipe his beard with. + +'If it be that,' he answers--but what need to test the fact? The +'madness of revenge' is in his blood, and hesitation is a thing he never +knew. He passes judgment, and controls himself only to make his sentence +a solemn vow. + +The Othello of the Fourth Act is Othello in his fall. His fall is never +complete, but he is much changed. Towards the close of the +Temptation-scene he becomes at times most terrible, but his grandeur +remains almost undiminished. Even in the following scene (III. iv.), +where he goes to test Desdemona in the matter of the handkerchief, and +receives a fatal confirmation of her guilt, our sympathy with him is +hardly touched by any feeling of humiliation. But in the Fourth Act +'Chaos has come.' A slight interval of time may be admitted here. It is +but slight; for it was necessary for Iago to hurry on, and terribly +dangerous to leave a chance for a meeting of Cassio with Othello; and +his insight into Othello's nature taught him that his plan was to +deliver blow on blow, and never to allow his victim to recover from the +confusion of the first shock. Still there is a slight interval; and when +Othello reappears we see at a glance that he is a changed man. He is +physically exhausted, and his mind is dazed.[100] He sees everything +blurred through a mist of blood and tears. He has actually forgotten the +incident of the handkerchief, and has to be reminded of it. When Iago, +perceiving that he can now risk almost any lie, tells him that Cassio +has confessed his guilt, Othello, the hero who has seemed to us only +second to Coriolanus in physical power, trembles all over; he mutters +disjointed words; a blackness suddenly intervenes between his eyes and +the world; he takes it for the shuddering testimony of nature to the +horror he has just heard,[101] and he falls senseless to the ground. +When he recovers it is to watch Cassio, as he imagines, laughing over +his shame. It is an imposition so gross, and should have been one so +perilous, that Iago would never have ventured it before. But he is safe +now. The sight only adds to the confusion of intellect the madness of +rage; and a ravenous thirst for revenge, contending with motions of +infinite longing and regret, conquers them. The delay till night-fall is +torture to him. His self-control has wholly deserted him, and he strikes +his wife in the presence of the Venetian envoy. He is so lost to all +sense of reality that he never asks himself what will follow the deaths +of Cassio and his wife. An ineradicable instinct of justice, rather than +any last quiver of hope, leads him to question Emilia; but nothing could +convince him now, and there follows the dreadful scene of accusation; +and then, to allow us the relief of burning hatred and burning tears, +the interview of Desdemona with Iago, and that last talk of hers with +Emilia, and her last song. + +But before the end there is again a change. The supposed death of Cassio +(V. i.) satiates the thirst for vengeance. The Othello who enters the +bed-chamber with the words, + + It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul, + +is not the man of the Fourth Act. The deed he is bound to do is no +murder, but a sacrifice. He is to save Desdemona from herself, not in +hate but in honour; in honour, and also in love. His anger has passed; a +boundless sorrow has taken its place; and + + this sorrow's heavenly: + It strikes where it doth love. + +Even when, at the sight of her apparent obduracy, and at the hearing of +words which by a crowning fatality can only reconvince him of her guilt, +these feelings give way to others, it is to righteous indignation they +give way, not to rage; and, terribly painful as this scene is, there is +almost nothing here to diminish the admiration and love which heighten +pity.[102] And pity itself vanishes, and love and admiration alone +remain, in the majestic dignity and sovereign ascendancy of the close. +Chaos has come and gone; and the Othello of the Council-chamber and the +quay of Cyprus has returned, or a greater and nobler Othello still. As +he speaks those final words in which all the glory and agony of his +life--long ago in India and Arabia and Aleppo, and afterwards in Venice, +and now in Cyprus--seem to pass before us, like the pictures that flash +before the eyes of a drowning man, a triumphant scorn for the fetters of +the flesh and the littleness of all the lives that must survive him +sweeps our grief away, and when he dies upon a kiss the most painful of +all tragedies leaves us for the moment free from pain, and exulting in +the power of 'love and man's unconquerable mind.' + + +3 + +The words just quoted come from Wordsworth's sonnet to Toussaint +l'Ouverture. Toussaint was a Negro; and there is a question, which, +though of little consequence, is not without dramatic interest, whether +Shakespeare imagined Othello as a Negro or as a Moor. Now I will not say +that Shakespeare imagined him as a Negro and not as a Moor, for that +might imply that he distinguished Negroes and Moors precisely as we do; +but what appears to me nearly certain is that he imagined Othello as a +black man, and not as a light-brown one. + +In the first place, we must remember that the brown or bronze to which +we are now accustomed in the Othellos of our theatres is a recent +innovation. Down to Edmund Kean's time, so far as is known, Othello was +always quite black. This stage-tradition goes back to the Restoration, +and it almost settles our question. For it is impossible that the colour +of the original Othello should have been forgotten so soon after +Shakespeare's time, and most improbable that it should have been changed +from brown to black. + +If we turn to the play itself, we find many references to Othello's +colour and appearance. Most of these are indecisive; for the word +'black' was of course used then where we should speak of a 'dark' +complexion now; and even the nickname 'thick-lips,' appealed to as proof +that Othello was a Negro, might have been applied by an enemy to what we +call a Moor. On the other hand, it is hard to believe that, if Othello +had been light-brown, Brabantio would have taunted him with having a +'sooty bosom,' or that (as Mr. Furness observes) he himself would have +used the words, + + her name, that was as fresh + As Dian's visage, is now begrimed and black + As mine own face. + +These arguments cannot be met by pointing out that Othello was of royal +blood, is not called an Ethiopian, is called a Barbary horse, and is +said to be going to Mauritania. All this would be of importance if we +had reason to believe that Shakespeare shared our ideas, knowledge and +terms. Otherwise it proves nothing. And we know that sixteenth-century +writers called any dark North-African a Moor, or a black Moor, or a +blackamoor. Sir Thomas Elyot, according to Hunter,[103] calls Ethiopians +Moors; and the following are the first two illustrations of 'Blackamoor' +in the Oxford _English Dictionary_: 1547, 'I am a blake More borne in +Barbary'; 1548, '_Ethiopo_, a blake More, or a man of Ethiope.' Thus +geographical names can tell us nothing about the question how +Shakespeare imagined Othello. He may have known that a Mauritanian is +not a Negro nor black, but we cannot assume that he did. He may have +known, again, that the Prince of Morocco, who is described in the +_Merchant of Venice_ as having, like Othello, the complexion of a devil, +was no Negro. But we cannot tell: nor is there any reason why he should +not have imagined the Prince as a brown Moor and Othello as a +Blackamoor. + +_Titus Andronicus_ appeared in the Folio among Shakespeare's works. It +is believed by some good critics to be his: hardly anyone doubts that he +had a hand in it: it is certain that he knew it, for reminiscences of it +are scattered through his plays. Now no one who reads _Titus Andronicus_ +with an open mind can doubt that Aaron was, in our sense, black; and he +appears to have been a Negro. To mention nothing else, he is twice +called 'coal-black'; his colour is compared with that of a raven and a +swan's legs; his child is coal-black and thick-lipped; he himself has a +'fleece of woolly hair.' Yet he is 'Aaron the Moor,' just as Othello is +'Othello the Moor.' In the _Battle of Alcazar_ (Dyce's _Peele_, p. 421) +Muly the Moor is called 'the negro'; and Shakespeare himself in a single +line uses 'negro' and 'Moor' of the same person (_Merchant of Venice_, +III. v. 42). + +The horror of most American critics (Mr. Furness is a bright exception) +at the idea of a black Othello is very amusing, and their arguments are +highly instructive. But they were anticipated, I regret to say, by +Coleridge, and we will hear him. 'No doubt Desdemona saw Othello's +visage in his mind; yet, as we are constituted, and most surely as an +English audience was disposed in the beginning of the seventeenth +century, it would be something monstrous to conceive this beautiful +Venetian girl falling in love with a veritable negro. It would argue a +disproportionateness, a want of balance, in Desdemona, which Shakespeare +does not appear to have in the least contemplated.'[104] Could any +argument be more self-destructive? It actually _did_ appear to Brabantio +'something monstrous to conceive' his daughter falling in love with +Othello,--so monstrous that he could account for her love only by drugs +and foul charms. And the suggestion that such love would argue +'disproportionateness' is precisely the suggestion that Iago _did_ make +in Desdemona's case: + + Foh! one may smell in such a will most rank, + Foul _disproportion_, thoughts unnatural. + +In fact he spoke of the marriage exactly as a filthy-minded cynic now +might speak of the marriage of an English lady to a negro like +Toussaint. Thus the argument of Coleridge and others points straight to +the conclusion against which they argue. + +But this is not all. The question whether to Shakespeare Othello was +black or brown is not a mere question of isolated fact or historical +curiosity; it concerns the character of Desdemona. Coleridge, and still +more the American writers, regard her love, in effect, as Brabantio +regarded it, and not as Shakespeare conceived it. They are simply +blurring this glorious conception when they try to lessen the distance +between her and Othello, and to smooth away the obstacle which his +'visage' offered to her romantic passion for a hero. Desdemona, the +'eternal womanly' in its most lovely and adorable form, simple and +innocent as a child, ardent with the courage and idealism of a saint, +radiant with that heavenly purity of heart which men worship the more +because nature so rarely permits it to themselves, had no theories about +universal brotherhood, and no phrases about 'one blood in all the +nations of the earth' or 'barbarian, Scythian, bond and free'; but when +her soul came in sight of the noblest soul on earth, she made nothing of +the shrinking of her senses, but followed her soul until her senses took +part with it, and 'loved him with the love which was her doom.' It was +not prudent. It even turned out tragically. She met in life with the +reward of those who rise too far above our common level; and we continue +to allot her the same reward when we consent to forgive her for loving a +brown man, but find it monstrous that she should love a black one.[105] + +There is perhaps a certain excuse for our failure to rise to +Shakespeare's meaning, and to realise how extraordinary and splendid a +thing it was in a gentle Venetian girl to love Othello, and to assail +fortune with such a 'downright violence and storm' as is expected only +in a hero. It is that when first we hear of her marriage we have not yet +seen the Desdemona of the later Acts; and therefore we do not perceive +how astonishing this love and boldness must have been in a maiden so +quiet and submissive. And when we watch her in her suffering and death +we are so penetrated by the sense of her heavenly sweetness and +self-surrender that we almost forget that she had shown herself quite as +exceptional in the active assertion of her own soul and will. She tends +to become to us predominantly pathetic, the sweetest and most pathetic +of Shakespeare's women, as innocent as Miranda and as loving as Viola, +yet suffering more deeply than Cordelia or Imogen. And she seems to lack +that independence and strength of spirit which Cordelia and Imogen +possess, and which in a manner raises them above suffering. She appears +passive and defenceless, and can oppose to wrong nothing but the +infinite endurance and forgiveness of a love that knows not how to +resist or resent. She thus becomes at once the most beautiful example of +this love, and the most pathetic heroine in Shakespeare's world. If her +part were acted by an artist equal to Salvini, and with a Salvini for +Othello, I doubt if the spectacle of the last two Acts would not be +pronounced intolerable. + +Of course this later impression of Desdemona is perfectly right, but it +must be carried back and united with the earlier before we can see what +Shakespeare imagined. Evidently, we are to understand, innocence, +gentleness, sweetness, lovingness were the salient and, in a sense, the +principal traits in Desdemona's character. She was, as her father +supposed her to be, + + a maiden never bold, + Of spirit so still and quiet that her motion + Blushed at herself. + +But suddenly there appeared something quite different--something which +could never have appeared, for example, in Ophelia--a love not only full +of romance but showing a strange freedom and energy of spirit, and +leading to a most unusual boldness of action; and this action was +carried through with a confidence and decision worthy of Juliet or +Cordelia. Desdemona does not shrink before the Senate; and her language +to her father, though deeply respectful, is firm enough to stir in us +some sympathy with the old man who could not survive his daughter's +loss. This then, we must understand, was the emergence in Desdemona, as +she passed from girlhood to womanhood, of an individuality and strength +which, if she had lived, would have been gradually fused with her more +obvious qualities and have issued in a thousand actions, sweet and good, +but surprising to her conventional or timid neighbours. And, indeed, we +have already a slight example in her overflowing kindness, her boldness +and her ill-fated persistence in pleading Cassio's cause. But the full +ripening of her lovely and noble nature was not to be. In her brief +wedded life she appeared again chiefly as the sweet and submissive being +of her girlhood; and the strength of her soul, first evoked by love, +found scope to show itself only in a love which, when harshly repulsed, +blamed only its own pain; when bruised, only gave forth a more exquisite +fragrance; and, when rewarded with death, summoned its last labouring +breath to save its murderer. + +Many traits in Desdemona's character have been described with +sympathetic insight by Mrs. Jameson, and I will pass them by and add but +a few words on the connection between this character and the catastrophe +of _Othello_. Desdemona, as Mrs. Jameson remarks, shows less quickness +of intellect and less tendency to reflection than most of Shakespeare's +heroines; but I question whether the critic is right in adding that she +shows much of the 'unconscious address common in women.' She seems to me +deficient in this address, having in its place a frank childlike +boldness and persistency, which are full of charm but are unhappily +united with a certain want of perception. And these graces and this +deficiency appear to be inextricably intertwined, and in the +circumstances conspire tragically against her. They, with her innocence, +hinder her from understanding Othello's state of mind, and lead her to +the most unlucky acts and words; and unkindness or anger subdues her so +completely that she becomes passive and seems to drift helplessly +towards the cataract in front. + +In Desdemona's incapacity to resist there is also, in addition to her +perfect love, something which is very characteristic. She is, in a +sense, a child of nature. That deep inward division which leads to clear +and conscious oppositions of right and wrong, duty and inclination, +justice and injustice, is alien to her beautiful soul. She is not good, +kind and true in spite of a temptation to be otherwise, any more than +she is charming in spite of a temptation to be otherwise. She seems to +know evil only by name, and, her inclinations being good, she acts on +inclination. This trait, with its results, may be seen if we compare +her, at the crises of the story, with Cordelia. In Desdemona's place, +Cordelia, however frightened at Othello's anger about the lost +handkerchief, would not have denied its loss. Painful experience had +produced in her a conscious principle of rectitude and a proud hatred of +falseness, which would have made a lie, even one wholly innocent in +spirit, impossible to her; and the clear sense of justice and right +would have led her, instead, to require an explanation of Othello's +agitation which would have broken Iago's plot to pieces. In the same +way, at the final crisis, no instinctive terror of death would have +compelled Cordelia suddenly to relinquish her demand for justice and to +plead for life. But these moments are fatal to Desdemona, who acts +precisely as if she were guilty; and they are fatal because they ask for +something which, it seems to us, could hardly be united with the +peculiar beauty of her nature. + +This beauty is all her own. Something as beautiful may be found in +Cordelia, but not the same beauty. Desdemona, confronted with Lear's +foolish but pathetic demand for a profession of love, could have done, I +think, what Cordelia could not do--could have refused to compete with +her sisters, and yet have made her father feel that she loved him well. +And I doubt if Cordelia, 'falsely murdered,' would have been capable of +those last words of Desdemona--her answer to Emilia's 'O, who hath done +this deed?' + + Nobody: I myself. Farewell. + Commend me to my kind lord. O, farewell! + +Were we intended to remember, as we hear this last 'falsehood,' that +other falsehood, 'It is not lost,' and to feel that, alike in the +momentary child's fear and the deathless woman's love, Desdemona is +herself and herself alone?[106] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 85: One instance is worth pointing out, because the passage in +_Othello_ has, oddly enough, given trouble. Desdemona says of the maid +Barbara: 'She was in love, and he she loved proved mad And did forsake +her.' Theobald changed 'mad' to 'bad.' Warburton read 'and he she loved +forsook her, And she proved mad'! Johnson said 'mad' meant only 'wild, +frantic, uncertain.' But what Desdemona says of Barbara is just what +Ophelia might have said of herself.] + +[Footnote 86: The whole force of the passages referred to can be felt +only by a reader. The Othello of our stage can never be Shakespeare's +Othello, any more than the Cleopatra of our stage can be his Cleopatra.] + +[Footnote 87: See p. 9.] + +[Footnote 88: Even here, however, there is a great difference; for +although the idea of such a power is not suggested by _King Lear_ as it +is by _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_, it is repeatedly expressed by persons _in_ +the drama. Of such references there are very few in _Othello_. But for +somewhat frequent allusions to hell and the devil the view of the +characters is almost strictly secular. Desdemona's sweetness and +forgivingness are not based on religion, and her only way of accounting +for her undeserved suffering is by an appeal to Fortune: 'It is my +wretched fortune' (IV. ii. 128). In like manner Othello can only appeal +to Fate (V. ii. 264): + + but, oh vain boast! + Who can control his fate?] + +[Footnote 89: Ulrici has good remarks, though he exaggerates, on this +point and the element of intrigue.] + +[Footnote 90: And neither she nor Othello observes what handkerchief it +is. Else she would have remembered how she came to lose it, and would +have told Othello; and Othello, too, would at once have detected Iago's +lie (III. iii. 438) that he had seen Cassio wipe his beard with the +handkerchief 'to-day.' For in fact the handkerchief had been lost _not +an hour_ before Iago told that lie (line 288 of the _same scene_), and +it was at that moment in his pocket. He lied therefore most rashly, but +with his usual luck.] + +[Footnote 91: For those who know the end of the story there is a +terrible irony in the enthusiasm with which Cassio greets the arrival of +Desdemona in Cyprus. Her ship (which is also Iago's) sets out from +Venice a week later than the others, but reaches Cyprus on the same day +with them: + + Tempests themselves, high seas and howling winds, + The gutter'd rocks and congregated sands-- + Traitors ensteep'd to clog the guiltless keel-- + As having sense of beauty, do omit + Their mortal natures, letting go safely by + The divine Desdemona. + +So swiftly does Fate conduct her to her doom.] + +[Footnote 92: The dead bodies are not carried out at the end, as they +must have been if the bed had been on the main stage (for this had no +front curtain). The curtains within which the bed stood were drawn +together at the words, 'Let it be hid' (V. ii. 365).] + +[Footnote 93: Against which may be set the scene of the blinding of +Gloster in _King Lear_.] + +[Footnote 94: The reader who is tempted by it should, however, first ask +himself whether Othello does act like a barbarian, or like a man who, +though wrought almost to madness, does 'all in honour.'] + +[Footnote 95: For the actor, then, to represent him as violently angry +when he cashiers Cassio is an utter mistake.] + +[Footnote 96: I cannot deal fully with this point in the lecture. See +Note L.] + +[Footnote 97: It is important to observe that, in his attempt to arrive +at the facts about Cassio's drunken misdemeanour, Othello had just had +an example of Iago's unwillingness to tell the whole truth where it must +injure a friend. No wonder he feels in the Temptation-scene that 'this +honest creature doubtless Sees and knows more, much more, than he +unfolds.'] + +[Footnote 98: To represent that Venetian women do not regard adultery so +seriously as Othello does, and again that Othello would be wise to +accept the situation like an Italian husband, is one of Iago's most +artful and most maddening devices.] + +[Footnote 99: If the reader has ever chanced to see an African violently +excited, he may have been startled to observe how completely at a loss +he was to interpret those bodily expressions of passion which in a +fellow-countryman he understands at once, and in a European foreigner +with somewhat less certainty. The effect of difference in blood in +increasing Othello's bewilderment regarding his wife is not sufficiently +realised. The same effect has to be remembered in regard to Desdemona's +mistakes in dealing with Othello in his anger.] + +[Footnote 100: See Note M.] + +[Footnote 101: Cf. _Winter's Tale_, I. ii. 137 ff.: + + Can thy dam?--may't be?-- + Affection! thy intention stabs the centre: + Thou dost make possible things not so held, + Communicatest with dreams;--how can this be? + With what's unreal thou coactive art, + And fellow'st nothing: then 'tis very credent + Thou may'st cojoin with something; and thou dost, + And that beyond commission, and I find it, + And that to the infection of my brains + And hardening of my brows.] + +[Footnote 102: See Note O.] + +[Footnote 103: New Illustrations, ii. 281.] + +[Footnote 104: _Lectures on Shakespeare_, ed. Ashe, p. 386.] + +[Footnote 105: I will not discuss the further question whether, granted +that to Shakespeare Othello was a black, he should be represented as a +black in our theatres now. I dare say not. We do not like the real +Shakespeare. We like to have his language pruned and his conceptions +flattened into something that suits our mouths and minds. And even if we +were prepared to make an effort, still, as Lamb observes, to imagine is +one thing and to see is another. Perhaps if we saw Othello coal-black +with the bodily eye, the aversion of our blood, an aversion which comes +as near to being merely physical as anything human can, would overpower +our imagination and sink us below not Shakespeare only but the audiences +of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. + +As I have mentioned Lamb, I may observe that he differed from Coleridge +as to Othello's colour, but, I am sorry to add, thought Desdemona to +stand in need of excuse. 'This noble lady, with a singularity rather to +be wondered at than imitated, had chosen for the object of her +affections a Moor, a black.... Neither is Desdemona to be altogether +condemned for the unsuitableness of the person whom she selected for her +lover' (_Tales from Shakespeare_). Others, of course, have gone much +further and have treated all the calamities of the tragedy as a sort of +judgment on Desdemona's rashness, wilfulness and undutifulness. There is +no arguing with opinions like this; but I cannot believe that even Lamb +is true to Shakespeare in implying that Desdemona is in some degree to +be condemned. What is there in the play to show that Shakespeare +regarded her marriage differently from Imogen's?] + +[Footnote 106: When Desdemona spoke her last words, perhaps that line of +the ballad which she sang an hour before her death was still busy in her +brain, + + Let nobody blame him: his scorn I approve. + +Nature plays such strange tricks, and Shakespeare almost alone among +poets seems to create in somewhat the same manner as Nature. In the same +way, as Malone pointed out, Othello's exclamation, 'Goats and monkeys!' +(IV. i. 274) is an unconscious reminiscence of Iago's words at III. iii. +403.] + + + + +LECTURE VI + +OTHELLO + + +1 + +Evil has nowhere else been portrayed with such mastery as in the +character of Iago. Richard III., for example, beside being less subtly +conceived, is a far greater figure and a less repellent. His physical +deformity, separating him from other men, seems to offer some excuse for +his egoism. In spite of his egoism, too, he appears to us more than a +mere individual: he is the representative of his family, the Fury of the +House of York. Nor is he so negative as Iago: he has strong passions, he +has admirations, and his conscience disturbs him. There is the glory of +power about him. Though an excellent actor, he prefers force to fraud, +and in his world there is no general illusion as to his true nature. +Again, to compare Iago with the Satan of _Paradise Lost_ seems almost +absurd, so immensely does Shakespeare's man exceed Milton's Fiend in +evil. That mighty Spirit, whose + + form had yet not lost + All her original brightness, nor appeared + Less than archangel ruined and the excess + Of glory obscured; + +who knew loyalty to comrades and pity for victims; who + + felt how awful goodness is, and saw + Virtue in her shape how lovely; saw, and pined + His loss; + +who could still weep--how much further distant is he than Iago from +spiritual death, even when, in procuring the fall of Man, he completes +his own fall! It is only in Goethe's Mephistopheles that a fit companion +for Iago can be found. Here there is something of the same deadly +coldness, the same gaiety in destruction. But then Mephistopheles, like +so many scores of literary villains, has Iago for his father. And +Mephistopheles, besides, is not, in the strict sense, a character. He is +half person, half symbol. A metaphysical idea speaks through him. He is +earthy, but could never live upon the earth. + +Of Shakespeare's characters Falstaff, Hamlet, Iago, and Cleopatra (I +name them in the order of their births) are probably the most wonderful. +Of these, again, Hamlet and Iago, whose births come nearest together, +are perhaps the most subtle. And if Iago had been a person as attractive +as Hamlet, as many thousands of pages might have been written about him, +containing as much criticism good and bad. As it is, the majority of +interpretations of his character are inadequate not only to +Shakespeare's conception, but, I believe, to the impressions of most +readers of taste who are unbewildered by analysis. These false +interpretations, if we set aside the usual lunacies,[107] fall into two +groups. The first contains views which reduce Shakespeare to +commonplace. In different ways and degrees they convert his Iago into +an ordinary villain. Their Iago is simply a man who has been slighted +and revenges himself; or a husband who believes he has been wronged, and +will make his enemy suffer a jealousy worse than his own; or an +ambitious man determined to ruin his successful rival--one of these, or +a combination of these, endowed with unusual ability and cruelty. These +are the more popular views. The second group of false interpretations is +much smaller, but it contains much weightier matter than the first. Here +Iago is a being who hates good simply because it is good, and loves evil +purely for itself. His action is not prompted by any plain motive like +revenge, jealousy or ambition. It springs from a 'motiveless malignity,' +or a disinterested delight in the pain of others; and Othello, Cassio +and Desdemona are scarcely more than the material requisite for the full +attainment of this delight. This second Iago, evidently, is no +conventional villain, and he is much nearer to Shakespeare's Iago than +the first. Only he is, if not a psychological impossibility, at any rate +not a _human_ being. He might be in place, therefore, in a symbolical +poem like _Faust_, but in a purely human drama like _Othello_ he would +be a ruinous blunder. Moreover, he is not in _Othello_: he is a product +of imperfect observation and analysis. + +Coleridge, the author of that misleading phrase 'motiveless malignity,' +has some fine remarks on Iago; and the essence of the character has been +described, first in some of the best lines Hazlitt ever wrote, and then +rather more fully by Mr. Swinburne,--so admirably described that I am +tempted merely to read and illustrate these two criticisms. This plan, +however, would make it difficult to introduce all that I wish to say. I +propose, therefore, to approach the subject directly, and, first, to +consider how Iago appeared to those who knew him, and what inferences +may be drawn from their illusions; and then to ask what, if we judge +from the play, his character really was. And I will indicate the points +where I am directly indebted to the criticisms just mentioned. + +But two warnings are first required. One of these concerns Iago's +nationality. It has been held that he is a study of that peculiarly +Italian form of villainy which is considered both too clever and too +diabolical for an Englishman. I doubt if there is much more to be said +for this idea than for the notion that Othello is a study of Moorish +character. No doubt the belief in that Italian villainy was prevalent in +Shakespeare's time, and it may perhaps have influenced him in some +slight degree both here and in drawing the character of Iachimo in +_Cymbeline_. But even this slight influence seems to me doubtful. If Don +John in _Much Ado_ had been an Englishman, critics would have admired +Shakespeare's discernment in making his English villain sulky and +stupid. If Edmund's father had been Duke of Ferrara instead of Earl of +Gloster, they would have said that Edmund could have been nothing but an +Italian. Change the name and country of Richard III., and he would be +called a typical despot of the Italian Renaissance. Change those of +Juliet, and we should find her wholesome English nature contrasted with +the southern dreaminess of Romeo. But this way of interpreting +Shakespeare is not Shakespearean. With him the differences of period, +race, nationality and locality have little bearing on the inward +character, though they sometimes have a good deal on the total +imaginative effect, of his figures. When he does lay stress on such +differences his intention is at once obvious, as in characters like +Fluellen or Sir Hugh Evans, or in the talk of the French princes before +the battle of Agincourt. I may add that Iago certainly cannot be taken +to exemplify the popular Elizabethan idea of a disciple of Macchiavelli. +There is no sign that he is in theory an atheist or even an unbeliever +in the received religion. On the contrary, he uses its language, and +says nothing resembling the words of the prologue to the _Jew of Malta_: + + I count religion but a childish toy, + And hold there is no sin but ignorance. + +Aaron in _Titus Andronicus_ might have said this (and is not more likely +to be Shakespeare's creation on that account), but not Iago. + +I come to a second warning. One must constantly remember not to believe +a syllable that Iago utters on any subject, including himself, until one +has tested his statement by comparing it with known facts and with other +statements of his own or of other people, and by considering whether he +had in the particular circumstances any reason for telling a lie or for +telling the truth. The implicit confidence which his acquaintances +placed in his integrity has descended to most of his critics; and this, +reinforcing the comical habit of quoting as Shakespeare's own statement +everything said by his characters, has been a fruitful source of +misinterpretation. I will take as an instance the very first assertions +made by Iago. In the opening scene he tells his dupe Roderigo that three +great men of Venice went to Othello and begged him to make Iago his +lieutenant; that Othello, out of pride and obstinacy, refused; that in +refusing he talked a deal of military rigmarole, and ended by declaring +(falsely, we are to understand) that he had already filled up the +vacancy; that Cassio, whom he chose, had absolutely no practical +knowledge of war, nothing but bookish theoric, mere prattle, arithmetic, +whereas Iago himself had often fought by Othello's side, and by 'old +gradation' too ought to have been preferred. Most or all of this is +repeated by some critics as though it were information given by +Shakespeare, and the conclusion is quite naturally drawn that Iago had +some reason to feel aggrieved. But if we ask ourselves how much of all +this is true we shall answer, I believe, as follows. It is absolutely +certain that Othello appointed Cassio his lieutenant, and _nothing_ else +is absolutely certain. But there is no reason to doubt the statement +that Iago had seen service with him, nor is there anything inherently +improbable in the statement that he was solicited by three great +personages on Iago's behalf. On the other hand, the suggestions that he +refused out of pride and obstinacy, and that he lied in saying he had +already chosen his officer, have no verisimilitude; and if there is any +fact at all (as there probably is) behind Iago's account of the +conversation, it doubtless is the fact that Iago himself was ignorant of +military science, while Cassio was an expert, and that Othello explained +this to the great personages. That Cassio, again, was an interloper and +a mere closet-student without experience of war is incredible, +considering first that Othello chose him for lieutenant, and secondly +that the senate appointed him to succeed Othello in command at Cyprus; +and we have direct evidence that part of Iago's statement is a lie, for +Desdemona happens to mention that Cassio was a man who 'all his time had +founded his good fortunes' on Othello's love and had 'shared dangers' +with him (III. iv. 93). There remains only the implied assertion that, +if promotion had gone by old gradation, Iago, as the senior, would have +been preferred. It may be true: Othello was not the man to hesitate to +promote a junior for good reasons. But it is just as likely to be a pure +invention; and, though Cassio was young, there is nothing to show that +he was younger, in years or in service, than Iago. Iago, for instance, +never calls him 'young,' as he does Roderigo; and a mere youth would not +have been made Governor of Cyprus. What is certain, finally, in the +whole business is that Othello's mind was perfectly at ease about the +appointment, and that he never dreamed of Iago's being discontented at +it, not even when the intrigue was disclosed and he asked himself how he +had offended Iago. + + +2 + +It is necessary to examine in this manner every statement made by Iago. +But it is not necessary to do so in public, and I proceed to the +question what impression he made on his friends and acquaintances. In +the main there is here no room for doubt. Nothing could be less like +Iago than the melodramatic villain so often substituted for him on the +stage, a person whom everyone in the theatre knows for a scoundrel at +the first glance. Iago, we gather, was a Venetian[108] soldier, +eight-and-twenty years of age, who had seen a good deal of service and +had a high reputation for courage. Of his origin we are ignorant, but, +unless I am mistaken, he was not of gentle birth or breeding.[109] He +does not strike one as a degraded man of culture: for all his great +powers, he is vulgar, and his probable want of military science may well +be significant. He was married to a wife who evidently lacked +refinement, and who appears in the drama almost in the relation of a +servant to Desdemona. His manner was that of a blunt, bluff soldier, who +spoke his mind freely and plainly. He was often hearty, and could be +thoroughly jovial; but he was not seldom rather rough and caustic of +speech, and he was given to making remarks somewhat disparaging to human +nature. He was aware of this trait in himself, and frankly admitted that +he was nothing if not critical, and that it was his nature to spy into +abuses. In these admissions he characteristically exaggerated his fault, +as plain-dealers are apt to do; and he was liked none the less for it, +seeing that his satire was humorous, that on serious matters he did not +speak lightly (III. iii. 119), and that the one thing perfectly obvious +about him was his honesty. 'Honest' is the word that springs to the lips +of everyone who speaks of him. It is applied to him some fifteen times +in the play, not to mention some half-dozen where he employs it, in +derision, of himself. In fact he was one of those sterling men who, in +disgust at gush, say cynical things which they do not believe, and then, +the moment you are in trouble, put in practice the very sentiment they +had laughed at. On such occasions he showed the kindliest sympathy and +the most eager desire to help. When Cassio misbehaved so dreadfully and +was found fighting with Montano, did not Othello see that 'honest Iago +looked dead with grieving'? With what difficulty was he induced, nay, +compelled, to speak the truth against the lieutenant! Another man might +have felt a touch of satisfaction at the thought that the post he had +coveted was now vacant; but Iago not only comforted Cassio, talking to +him cynically about reputation, just to help him over his shame, but he +set his wits to work and at once perceived that the right plan for +Cassio to get his post again was to ask Desdemona to intercede. So +troubled was he at his friend's disgrace that his own wife was sure 'it +grieved her husband as if the case was his.' What wonder that anyone in +sore trouble, like Desdemona, should send at once for Iago (IV. ii. +106)? If this rough diamond had any flaw, it was that Iago's warm loyal +heart incited him to too impulsive action. If he merely heard a friend +like Othello calumniated, his hand flew to his sword; and though he +restrained himself he almost regretted his own virtue (I. ii. 1-10). + +Such seemed Iago to the people about him, even to those who, like +Othello, had known him for some time. And it is a fact too little +noticed but most remarkable, that he presented an appearance not very +different to his wife. There is no sign either that Emilia's marriage +was downright unhappy, or that she suspected the true nature of her +husband.[110] No doubt she knew rather more of him than others. Thus we +gather that he was given to chiding and sometimes spoke shortly and +sharply to her (III. iii. 300 f.); and it is quite likely that she gave +him a good deal of her tongue in exchange (II. i. 101 f.). He was also +unreasonably jealous; for his own statement that he was jealous of +Othello is confirmed by Emilia herself, and must therefore be believed +(IV. ii. 145).[111] But it seems clear that these defects of his had not +seriously impaired Emilia's confidence in her husband or her affection +for him. She knew in addition that he was not quite so honest as he +seemed, for he had often begged her to steal Desdemona's handkerchief. +But Emilia's nature was not very delicate or scrupulous about trifles. +She thought her husband odd and 'wayward,' and looked on his fancy for +the handkerchief as an instance of this (III. iii. 292); but she never +dreamed he was a villain, and there is no reason to doubt the sincerity +of her belief that he was heartily sorry for Cassio's disgrace. Her +failure, on seeing Othello's agitation about the handkerchief, to form +any suspicion of an intrigue, shows how little she doubted her husband. +Even when, later, the idea strikes her that some scoundrel has poisoned +Othello's mind, the tone of all her speeches, and her mention of the +rogue who (she believes) had stirred up Iago's jealousy of her, prove +beyond doubt that the thought of Iago's being the scoundrel has not +crossed her mind (IV. ii. 115-147). And if any hesitation on the subject +could remain, surely it must be dispelled by the thrice-repeated cry of +astonishment and horror, 'My husband!', which follows Othello's words, +'Thy husband knew it all'; and by the choking indignation and desperate +hope which we hear in her appeal when Iago comes in: + + Disprove this villain if thou be'st a man: + He says thou told'st him that his wife was false: + I know thou did'st not, thou'rt not such a villain: + Speak, for my heart is full. + +Even if Iago _had_ betrayed much more of his true self to his wife than +to others, it would make no difference to the contrast between his true +self and the self he presented to the world in general. But he never did +so. Only the feeble eyes of the poor gull Roderigo were allowed a +glimpse into that pit. + +The bearing of this contrast upon the apparently excessive credulity of +Othello has been already pointed out. What further conclusions can be +drawn from it? Obviously, to begin with, the inference, which is +accompanied by a thrill of admiration, that Iago's powers of +dissimulation and of self-control must have been prodigious: for he was +not a youth, like Edmund, but had worn this mask for years, and he had +apparently never enjoyed, like Richard, occasional explosions of the +reality within him. In fact so prodigious does his self-control appear +that a reader might be excused for feeling a doubt of its possibility. +But there are certain observations and further inferences which, apart +from confidence in Shakespeare, would remove this doubt. It is to be +observed, first, that Iago was able to find a certain relief from the +discomfort of hypocrisy in those caustic or cynical speeches which, +being misinterpreted, only heightened confidence in his honesty. They +acted as a safety-valve, very much as Hamlet's pretended insanity did. +Next, I would infer from the entire success of his hypocrisy--what may +also be inferred on other grounds, and is of great importance--that he +was by no means a man of strong feelings and passions, like Richard, but +decidedly cold by temperament. Even so, his self-control was wonderful, +but there never was in him any violent storm to be controlled. Thirdly, +I would suggest that Iago, though thoroughly selfish and unfeeling, was +not by nature malignant, nor even morose, but that, on the contrary, he +had a superficial good-nature, the kind of good-nature that wins +popularity and is often taken as the sign, not of a good digestion, but +of a good heart. And lastly, it may be inferred that, before the giant +crime which we witness, Iago had never been detected in any serious +offence and may even never have been guilty of one, but had pursued a +selfish but outwardly decent life, enjoying the excitement of war and of +casual pleasures, but never yet meeting with any sufficient temptation +to risk his position and advancement by a dangerous crime. So that, in +fact, the tragedy of _Othello_ is in a sense his tragedy too. It shows +us not a violent man, like Richard, who spends his life in murder, but a +thoroughly bad, _cold_ man, who is at last tempted to let loose the +forces within him, and is at once destroyed. + + +3 + +In order to see how this tragedy arises let us now look more closely +into Iago's inner man. We find here, in the first place, as has been +implied in part, very remarkable powers both of intellect and of will. +Iago's insight, within certain limits, into human nature; his ingenuity +and address in working upon it; his quickness and versatility in dealing +with sudden difficulties and unforeseen opportunities, have probably no +parallel among dramatic characters. Equally remarkable is his strength +of will. Not Socrates himself, not the ideal sage of the Stoics, was +more lord of himself than Iago appears to be. It is not merely that he +never betrays his true nature; he seems to be master of _all_ the +motions that might affect his will. In the most dangerous moments of his +plot, when the least slip or accident would be fatal, he never shows a +trace of nervousness. When Othello takes him by the throat he merely +shifts his part with his usual instantaneous adroitness. When he is +attacked and wounded at the end he is perfectly unmoved. As Mr. +Swinburne says, you cannot believe for a moment that the pain of torture +will ever open Iago's lips. He is equally unassailable by the +temptations of indolence or of sensuality. It is difficult to imagine +him inactive; and though he has an obscene mind, and doubtless took his +pleasures when and how he chose, he certainly took them by choice and +not from weakness, and if pleasure interfered with his purposes the +holiest of ascetics would not put it more resolutely by. 'What should I +do?' Roderigo whimpers to him; 'I confess it is my shame to be so fond; +but it is not in my virtue to amend it.' He answers: 'Virtue! a fig! +'tis in ourselves that we are thus and thus. It all depends on our will. +Love is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will. Come, +be a man.... Ere I would say I would drown myself for the love of a +guinea-hen, I would change my humanity with a baboon.' Forget for a +moment that love is for Iago the appetite of a baboon; forget that he is +as little assailable by pity as by fear or pleasure; and you will +acknowledge that this lordship of the will, which is his practice as +well as his doctrine, is great, almost sublime. Indeed, in intellect +(always within certain limits) and in will (considered as a mere power, +and without regard to its objects) Iago _is_ great. + +To what end does he use these great powers? His creed--for he is no +sceptic, he has a definite creed--is that absolute egoism is the only +rational and proper attitude, and that conscience or honour or any kind +of regard for others is an absurdity. He does not deny that this +absurdity exists. He does not suppose that most people secretly share +his creed, while pretending to hold and practise another. On the +contrary, he regards most people as honest fools. He declares that he +has never yet met a man who knew how to love himself; and his one +expression of admiration in the play is for servants + + Who, trimmed in forms and visages of duty, + Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves. + +'These fellows,' he says, 'have some soul.' He professes to stand, and +he, attempts to stand, wholly outside the world of morality. + +The existence of Iago's creed and of his corresponding practice is +evidently connected with a characteristic in which he surpasses nearly +all the other inhabitants of Shakespeare's world. Whatever he may once +have been, he appears, when we meet him, to be almost destitute of +humanity, of sympathetic or social feeling. He shows no trace of +affection, and in presence of the most terrible suffering he shows +either pleasure or an indifference which, if not complete, is nearly so. +Here, however, we must be careful. It is important to realise, and few +readers are in danger of ignoring, this extraordinary deadness of +feeling, but it is also important not to confuse it with a general +positive ill-will. When Iago has no dislike or hostility to a person he +does _not_ show pleasure in the suffering of that person: he shows at +most the absence of pain. There is, for instance, not the least sign of +his enjoying the distress of Desdemona. But his sympathetic feelings are +so abnormally feeble and cold that, when his dislike is roused, or when +an indifferent person comes in the way of his purpose, there is scarcely +anything within him to prevent his applying the torture. + +What is it that provokes his dislike or hostility? Here again we must +look closely. Iago has been represented as an incarnation of envy, as a +man who, being determined to get on in the world, regards everyone else +with enmity as his rival. But this idea, though containing truth, seems +much exaggerated. Certainly he is devoted to himself; but if he were an +eagerly ambitious man, surely we should see much more positive signs of +this ambition; and surely too, with his great powers, he would already +have risen high, instead of being a mere ensign, short of money, and +playing Captain Rook to Roderigo's Mr. Pigeon. Taking all the facts, one +must conclude that his desires were comparatively moderate and his +ambition weak; that he probably enjoyed war keenly, but, if he had money +enough, did not exert himself greatly to acquire reputation or position; +and, therefore, that he was not habitually burning with envy and +actively hostile to other men as possible competitors. + +But what is clear is that Iago is keenly sensitive to anything that +touches his pride or self-esteem. It would be most unjust to call him +vain, but he has a high opinion of himself and a great contempt for +others. He is quite aware of his superiority to them in certain +respects; and he either disbelieves in or despises the qualities in +which they are superior to him. Whatever disturbs or wounds his sense of +superiority irritates him at once; and in _that_ sense he is highly +competitive. This is why the appointment of Cassio provokes him. This is +why Cassio's scientific attainments provoke him. This is the reason of +his jealousy of Emilia. He does not care for his wife; but the fear of +another man's getting the better of him, and exposing him to pity or +derision as an unfortunate husband, is wormwood to him; and as he is +sure that no woman is virtuous at heart, this fear is ever with him. For +much the same reason he has a spite against goodness in men (for it is +characteristic that he is less blind to its existence in men, the +stronger, than in women, the weaker). He has a spite against it, not +from any love of evil for evil's sake, but partly because it annoys his +intellect as a stupidity; partly (though he hardly knows this) because +it weakens his satisfaction with himself, and disturbs his faith that +egoism is the right and proper thing; partly because, the world being +such a fool, goodness is popular and prospers. But he, a man ten times +as able as Cassio or even Othello, does not greatly prosper. Somehow, +for all the stupidity of these open and generous people, they get on +better than the 'fellow of some soul' And this, though he is not +particularly eager to get on, wounds his pride. Goodness therefore +annoys him. He is always ready to scoff at it, and would like to strike +at it. In ordinary circumstances these feelings of irritation are not +vivid in Iago--_no_ feeling is so--but they are constantly present. + + +4 + +Our task of analysis is not finished; but we are now in a position to +consider the rise of Iago's tragedy. Why did he act as we see him acting +in the play? What is the answer to that appeal of Othello's: + + Will you, I pray, demand that demi-devil + Why he hath thus ensnared my soul and body? + +This question Why? is _the_ question about Iago, just as the question +Why did Hamlet delay? is _the_ question about Hamlet. Iago refused to +answer it; but I will venture to say that he _could_ not have answered +it, any more than Hamlet could tell why he delayed. But Shakespeare knew +the answer, and if these characters are great creations and not blunders +we ought to be able to find it too. + +Is it possible to elicit it from Iago himself against his will? He makes +various statements to Roderigo, and he has several soliloquies. From +these sources, and especially from the latter, we should learn +something. For with Shakespeare soliloquy generally gives information +regarding the secret springs as well as the outward course of the plot; +and, moreover, it is a curious point of technique with him that the +soliloquies of his villains sometimes read almost like explanations +offered to the audience.[112] Now, Iago repeatedly offers explanations +either to Roderigo or to himself. In the first place, he says more than +once that he 'hates' Othello. He gives two reasons for his hatred. +Othello has made Cassio lieutenant; and he suspects, and has heard it +reported, that Othello has an intrigue with Emilia. Next there is +Cassio. He never says he hates Cassio, but he finds in him three causes +of offence: Cassio has been preferred to him; he suspects _him_ too of +an intrigue with Emilia; and, lastly, Cassio has a daily beauty in his +life which makes Iago ugly. In addition to these annoyances he wants +Cassio's place. As for Roderigo, he calls him a snipe, and who can hate +a snipe? But Roderigo knows too much; and he is becoming a nuisance, +getting angry, and asking for the gold and jewels he handed to Iago to +give to Desdemona. So Iago kills Roderigo. Then for Desdemona: a +fig's-end for her virtue! but he has no ill-will to her. In fact he +'loves' her, though he is good enough to explain, varying the word, that +his 'lust' is mixed with a desire to pay Othello in his own coin. To be +sure she must die, and so must Emilia, and so would Bianca if only the +authorities saw things in their true light; but he did not set out with +any hostile design against these persons. + +Is the account which Iago gives of the causes of his action the true +account? The answer of the most popular view will be, 'Yes. Iago was, as +he says, chiefly incited by two things, the desire of advancement, and a +hatred of Othello due principally to the affair of the lieutenancy. +These are perfectly intelligible causes; we have only to add to them +unusual ability and cruelty, and all is explained. Why should Coleridge +and Hazlitt and Swinburne go further afield?' To which last question I +will at once oppose these: If your view is correct, why should Iago be +considered an extraordinary creation; and is it not odd that the people +who reject it are the people who elsewhere show an exceptional +understanding of Shakespeare? + +The difficulty about this popular view is, in the first place, that it +attributes to Iago what cannot be found in the Iago of the play. Its +Iago is impelled by _passions_, a passion of ambition and a passion of +hatred; for no ambition or hatred short of passion could drive a man who +is evidently so clear-sighted, and who must hitherto have been so +prudent, into a plot so extremely hazardous. Why, then, in the Iago of +the play do we find no sign of these passions or of anything approaching +to them? Why, if Shakespeare meant that Iago was impelled by them, does +he suppress the signs of them? Surely not from want of ability to +display them. The poet who painted Macbeth and Shylock understood his +business. Who ever doubted Macbeth's ambition or Shylock's hate? And +what resemblance is there between these passions and any feeling that we +can trace in Iago? The resemblance between a volcano in eruption and a +flameless fire of coke; the resemblance between a consuming desire to +hack and hew your enemy's flesh, and the resentful wish, only too +familiar in common life, to inflict pain in return for a slight. +Passion, in Shakespeare's plays, is perfectly easy to recognise. What +vestige of it, of passion unsatisfied or of passion gratified, is +visible in Iago? None: that is the very horror of him. He has _less_ +passion than an ordinary man, and yet he does these frightful things. +The only ground for attributing to him, I do not say a passionate +hatred, but anything deserving the name of hatred at all, is his own +statement, 'I hate Othello'; and we know what his statements are worth. + +But the popular view, beside attributing to Iago what he does not show, +ignores what he does show. It selects from his own account of his +motives one or two, and drops the rest; and so it makes everything +natural. But it fails to perceive how unnatural, how strange and +suspicious, his own account is. Certainly he assigns motives enough; the +difficulty is that he assigns so many. A man moved by simple passions +due to simple causes does not stand fingering his feelings, +industriously enumerating their sources, and groping about for new ones. +But this is what Iago does. And this is not all. These motives appear +and disappear in the most extraordinary manner. Resentment at Cassio's +appointment is expressed in the first conversation with Roderigo, and +from that moment is never once mentioned again in the whole play. Hatred +of Othello is expressed in the First Act alone. Desire to get Cassio's +place scarcely appears after the first soliloquy, and when it is +gratified Iago does not refer to it by a single word. The suspicion of +Cassio's intrigue with Emilia emerges suddenly, as an after-thought, not +in the first soliloquy but the second, and then disappears for +ever.[113] Iago's 'love' of Desdemona is alluded to in the second +soliloquy; there is not the faintest trace of it in word or deed either +before or after. The mention of jealousy of Othello is followed by +declarations that Othello is infatuated about Desdemona and is of a +constant nature, and during Othello's sufferings Iago never shows a sign +of the idea that he is now paying his rival in his own coin. In the +second soliloquy he declares that he quite believes Cassio to be in love +with Desdemona; it is obvious that he believes no such thing, for he +never alludes to the idea again, and within a few hours describes Cassio +in soliloquy as an honest fool. His final reason for ill-will to Cassio +never appears till the Fifth Act. + +What is the meaning of all this? Unless Shakespeare was out of his mind, +it must have a meaning. And certainly this meaning is not contained in +any of the popular accounts of Iago. + +Is it contained then in Coleridge's word 'motive-hunting'? Yes, +'motive-hunting' exactly answers to the impression that Iago's +soliloquies produce. He is pondering his design, and unconsciously +trying to justify it to himself. He speaks of one or two real feelings, +such as resentment against Othello, and he mentions one or two real +causes of these feelings. But these are not enough for him. Along with +them, or alone, there come into his head, only to leave it again, ideas +and suspicions, the creations of his own baseness or uneasiness, some +old, some new, caressed for a moment to feed his purpose and give it a +reasonable look, but never really believed in, and never the main forces +which are determining his action. In fact, I would venture to describe +Iago in these soliloquies as a man setting out on a project which +strongly attracts his desire, but at the same time conscious of a +resistance to the desire, and unconsciously trying to argue the +resistance away by assigning reasons for the project. He is the +counterpart of Hamlet, who tries to find reasons for his delay in +pursuing a design which excites his aversion. And most of Iago's reasons +for action are no more the real ones than Hamlet's reasons for delay +were the real ones. Each is moved by forces which he does not +understand; and it is probably no accident that these two studies of +states psychologically so similar were produced at about the same +period. + +What then were the real moving forces of Iago's action? Are we to fall +back on the idea of a 'motiveless malignity;'[114] that is to say, a +disinterested love of evil, or a delight in the pain of others as simple +and direct as the delight in one's own pleasure? Surely not. I will not +insist that this thing or these things are inconceivable, mere phrases, +not ideas; for, even so, it would remain possible that Shakespeare had +tried to represent an inconceivability. But there is not the slightest +reason to suppose that he did so. Iago's action is intelligible; and +indeed the popular view contains enough truth to refute this desperate +theory. It greatly exaggerates his desire for advancement, and the +ill-will caused by his disappointment, and it ignores other forces more +important than these; but it is right in insisting on the presence of +this desire and this ill-will, and their presence is enough to destroy +Iago's claims to be more than a demi-devil. For love of the evil that +advances my interest and hurts a person I dislike, is a very different +thing from love of evil simply as evil; and pleasure in the pain of a +person disliked or regarded as a competitor is quite distinct from +pleasure in the pain of others simply as others. The first is +intelligible, and we find it in Iago. The second, even if it were +intelligible, we do not find in Iago. + +Still, desire of advancement and resentment about the lieutenancy, +though factors and indispensable factors in the cause of Iago's action, +are neither the principal nor the most characteristic factors. To find +these, let us return to our half-completed analysis of the character. +Let us remember especially the keen sense of superiority, the contempt +of others, the sensitiveness to everything which wounds these feelings, +the spite against goodness in men as a thing not only stupid but, both +in its nature and by its success, contrary to Iago's nature and +irritating to his pride. Let us remember in addition the annoyance of +having always to play a part, the consciousness of exceptional but +unused ingenuity and address, the enjoyment of action, and the absence +of fear. And let us ask what would be the greatest pleasure of such a +man, and what the situation which might tempt him to abandon his +habitual prudence and pursue this pleasure. Hazlitt and Mr. Swinburne do +not put this question, but the answer I proceed to give to it is in +principle theirs.[115] + +The most delightful thing to such a man would be something that gave an +extreme satisfaction to his sense of power and superiority; and if it +involved, secondly, the triumphant exertion of his abilities, and, +thirdly, the excitement of danger, his delight would be consummated. And +the moment most dangerous to such a man would be one when his sense of +superiority had met with an affront, so that its habitual craving was +reinforced by resentment, while at the same time he saw an opportunity +of satisfying it by subjecting to his will the very persons who had +affronted it. Now, this is the temptation that comes to Iago. Othello's +eminence, Othello's goodness, and his own dependence on Othello, must +have been a perpetual annoyance to him. At _any_ time he would have +enjoyed befooling and tormenting Othello. Under ordinary circumstances +he was restrained, chiefly by self-interest, in some slight degree +perhaps by the faint pulsations of conscience or humanity. But +disappointment at the loss of the lieutenancy supplied the touch of +lively resentment that was required to overcome these obstacles; and the +prospect of satisfying the sense of power by mastering Othello through +an intricate and hazardous intrigue now became irresistible. Iago did +not clearly understand what was moving his desire; though he tried to +give himself reasons for his action, even those that had some reality +made but a small part of the motive force; one may almost say they were +no more than the turning of the handle which admits the driving power +into the machine. Only once does he appear to see something of the +truth. It is when he uses the phrase '_to plume up my will_ in double +knavery.' + +To 'plume up the will,' to heighten the sense of power or +superiority--this seems to be the unconscious motive of many acts of +cruelty which evidently do not spring chiefly from ill-will, and which +therefore puzzle and sometimes horrify us most. It is often this that +makes a man bully the wife or children of whom he is fond. The boy who +torments another boy, as we say, 'for no reason,' or who without any +hatred for frogs tortures a frog, is pleased with his victim's pain, not +from any disinterested love of evil or pleasure in pain, but mainly +because this pain is the unmistakable proof of his own power over his +victim. So it is with Iago. His thwarted sense of superiority wants +satisfaction. What fuller satisfaction could it find than the +consciousness that he is the master of the General who has undervalued +him and of the rival who has been preferred to him; that these worthy +people, who are so successful and popular and stupid, are mere puppets +in his hands, but living puppets, who at the motion of his finger must +contort themselves in agony, while all the time they believe that he is +their one true friend and comforter? It must have been an ecstasy of +bliss to him. And this, granted a most abnormal deadness of human +feeling, is, however horrible, perfectly intelligible. There is no +mystery in the psychology of Iago; the mystery lies in a further +question, which the drama has not to answer, the question why such a +being should exist. + +Iago's longing to satisfy the sense of power is, I think, the strongest +of the forces that drive him on. But there are two others to be noticed. +One is the pleasure in an action very difficult and perilous and, +therefore, intensely exciting. This action sets all his powers on the +strain. He feels the delight of one who executes successfully a feat +thoroughly congenial to his special aptitude, and only just within his +compass; and, as he is fearless by nature, the fact that a single slip +will cost him his life only increases his pleasure. His exhilaration +breaks out in the ghastly words with which he greets the sunrise after +the night of the drunken tumult which has led to Cassio's disgrace: 'By +the mass, 'tis morning. Pleasure and action make the hours seem short.' +Here, however, the joy in exciting action is quickened by other +feelings. It appears more simply elsewhere in such a way as to suggest +that nothing but such actions gave him happiness, and that his happiness +was greater if the action was destructive as well as exciting. We find +it, for instance, in his gleeful cry to Roderigo, who proposes to shout +to Brabantio in order to wake him and tell him of his daughter's flight: + + Do, with like timorous[116] accent and dire yell + As when, by night and negligence, the fire + Is spied in populous cities. + +All through that scene; again, in the scene where Cassio is attacked and +Roderigo murdered; everywhere where Iago is in physical action, we catch +this sound of almost feverish enjoyment. His blood, usually so cold and +slow, is racing through his veins. + +But Iago, finally, is not simply a man of action; he is an artist. His +action is a plot, the intricate plot of a drama, and in the conception +and execution of it he experiences the tension and the joy of artistic +creation. 'He is,' says Hazlitt, 'an amateur of tragedy in real life; +and, instead of employing his invention on imaginary characters or +long-forgotten incidents, he takes the bolder and more dangerous course +of getting up his plot at home, casts the principal parts among his +newest friends and connections, and rehearses it in downright earnest, +with steady nerves and unabated resolution.' Mr. Swinburne lays even +greater stress on this aspect of Iago's character, and even declares +that 'the very subtlest and strongest component of his complex nature' +is 'the instinct of what Mr. Carlyle would call an inarticulate poet.' +And those to whom this idea is unfamiliar, and who may suspect it at +first sight of being fanciful, will find, if they examine the play in +the light of Mr. Swinburne's exposition, that it rests on a true and +deep perception, will stand scrutiny, and might easily be illustrated. +They may observe, to take only one point, the curious analogy between +the early stages of dramatic composition and those soliloquies in which +Iago broods over his plot, drawing at first only an outline, puzzled how +to fix more than the main idea, and gradually seeing it develop and +clarify as he works upon it or lets it work. Here at any rate +Shakespeare put a good deal of himself into Iago. But the tragedian in +real life was not the equal of the tragic poet. His psychology, as we +shall see, was at fault at a critical point, as Shakespeare's never was. +And so his catastrophe came out wrong, and his piece was ruined. + +Such, then, seem to be the chief ingredients of the force which, +liberated by his resentment at Cassio's promotion, drives Iago from +inactivity into action, and sustains him through it. And, to pass to a +new point, this force completely possesses him; it is his fate. It is +like the passion with which a tragic hero wholly identifies himself, and +which bears him on to his doom. It is true that, once embarked on his +course, Iago _could_ not turn back, even if this passion did abate; and +it is also true that he is compelled, by his success in convincing +Othello, to advance to conclusions of which at the outset he did not +dream. He is thus caught in his own web, and could not liberate himself +if he would. But, in fact, he never shows a trace of wishing to do so, +not a trace of hesitation, of looking back, or of fear, any more than of +remorse; there is no ebb in the tide. As the crisis approaches there +passes through his mind a fleeting doubt whether the deaths of Cassio +and Roderigo are indispensable; but that uncertainty, which does not +concern the main issue, is dismissed, and he goes forward with +undiminished zest. Not even in his sleep--as in Richard's before his +final battle--does any rebellion of outraged conscience or pity, or any +foreboding of despair, force itself into clear consciousness. His +fate--which is himself--has completely mastered him: so that, in the +later scenes, where the improbability of the entire success of a design +built on so many different falsehoods forces itself on the reader, Iago +appears for moments not as a consummate schemer, but as a man absolutely +infatuated and delivered over to certain destruction. + + +5 + +Iago stands supreme among Shakespeare's evil characters because the +greatest intensity and subtlety of imagination have gone to his making, +and because he illustrates in the most perfect combination the two facts +concerning evil which seem to have impressed Shakespeare most. The first +of these is the fact that perfectly sane people exist in whom +fellow-feeling of any kind is so weak that an almost absolute egoism +becomes possible to them, and with it those hard vices--such as +ingratitude and cruelty--which to Shakespeare were far the worst. The +second is that such evil is compatible, and even appears to ally itself +easily, with exceptional powers of will and intellect. In the latter +respect Iago is nearly or quite the equal of Richard, in egoism he is +the superior, and his inferiority in passion and massive force only +makes him more repulsive. How is it then that we can bear to contemplate +him; nay, that, if we really imagine him, we feel admiration and some +kind of sympathy? Henry the Fifth tells us: + + There is some soul of goodness in things evil, + Would men observingly distil it out; + +but here, it may be said, we are shown a thing absolutely evil, +and--what is more dreadful still--this absolute evil is united with +supreme intellectual power. Why is the representation tolerable, and why +do we not accuse its author either of untruth or of a desperate +pessimism? + +To these questions it might at once be replied: Iago does not stand +alone; he is a factor in a whole; and we perceive him there and not in +isolation, acted upon as well as acting, destroyed as well as +destroying.[117] But, although this is true and important, I pass it by +and, continuing to regard him by himself, I would make three remarks in +answer to the questions. + +In the first place, Iago is not merely negative or evil--far from it. +Those very forces that moved him and made his fate--sense of power, +delight in performing a difficult and dangerous action, delight in the +exercise of artistic skill--are not at all evil things. We sympathise +with one or other of them almost every day of our lives. And, +accordingly, though in Iago they are combined with something detestable +and so contribute to evil, our perception of them is accompanied with +sympathy. In the same way, Iago's insight, dexterity, quickness, +address, and the like, are in themselves admirable things; the perfect +man would possess them. And certainly he would possess also Iago's +courage and self-control, and, like Iago, would stand above the impulses +of mere feeling, lord of his inner world. All this goes to evil ends in +Iago, but in itself it has a great worth; and, although in reading, of +course, we do not sift it out and regard it separately, it inevitably +affects us and mingles admiration with our hatred or horror. + +All this, however, might apparently co-exist with absolute egoism and +total want of humanity. But, in the second place, it is not true that in +Iago this egoism and this want are absolute, and that in this sense he +is a thing of mere evil. They are frightful, but if they were absolute +Iago would be a monster, not a man. The fact is, he _tries_ to make them +absolute and cannot succeed; and the traces of conscience, shame and +humanity, though faint, are discernible. If his egoism were absolute he +would be perfectly indifferent to the opinion of others; and he clearly +is not so. His very irritation at goodness, again, is a sign that his +faith in his creed is not entirely firm; and it is not entirely firm +because he himself has a perception, however dim, of the goodness of +goodness. What is the meaning of the last reason he gives himself for +killing Cassio: + + He hath a daily beauty in his life + That makes me ugly? + +Does he mean that he is ugly to others? Then he is not an absolute +egoist. Does he mean that he is ugly to himself? Then he makes an open +confession of moral sense. And, once more, if he really possessed no +moral sense, we should never have heard those soliloquies which so +clearly betray his uneasiness and his unconscious desire to persuade +himself that he has some excuse for the villainy he contemplates. These +seem to be indubitable proofs that, against his will, Iago is a little +better than his creed, and has failed to withdraw himself wholly from +the human atmosphere about him. And to these proofs I would add, though +with less confidence, two others. Iago's momentary doubt towards the end +whether Roderigo and Cassio must be killed has always surprised me. As a +mere matter of calculation it is perfectly obvious that they must; and I +believe his hesitation is not merely intellectual, it is another symptom +of the obscure working of conscience or humanity. Lastly, is it not +significant that, when once his plot has begun to develop, Iago never +seeks the presence of Desdemona; that he seems to leave her as quickly +as he can (III. iv. 138); and that, when he is fetched by +Emilia to see her in her distress (IV. ii. 110 ff.), we fail to +catch in his words any sign of the pleasure he shows in Othello's +misery, and seem rather to perceive a certain discomfort, and, if one +dare say it, a faint touch of shame or remorse? This interpretation of +the passage, I admit, is not inevitable, but to my mind (quite apart +from any theorising about Iago) it seems the natural one.[118] And if it +is right, Iago's discomfort is easily understood; for Desdemona is the +one person concerned against whom it is impossible for him even to +imagine a ground of resentment, and so an excuse for cruelty.[119] + +There remains, thirdly, the idea that Iago is a man of supreme +intellect who is at the same time supremely wicked. That he is supremely +wicked nobody will doubt; and I have claimed for him nothing that will +interfere with his right to that title. But to say that his intellectual +power is supreme is to make a great mistake. Within certain limits he +has indeed extraordinary penetration, quickness, inventiveness, +adaptiveness; but the limits are defined with the hardest of lines, and +they are narrow limits. It would scarcely be unjust to call him simply +astonishingly clever, or simply a consummate master of intrigue. But +compare him with one who may perhaps be roughly called a bad man of +supreme intellectual power, Napoleon, and you see how small and negative +Iago's mind is, incapable of Napoleon's military achievements, and much +more incapable of his political constructions. Or, to keep within the +Shakespearean world, compare him with Hamlet, and you perceive how +miserably close is his intellectual horizon; that such a thing as a +thought beyond the reaches of his soul has never come near him; that he +is prosaic through and through, deaf and blind to all but a tiny +fragment of the meaning of things. Is it not quite absurd, then, to call +him a man of supreme intellect? + +And observe, lastly, that his failure in perception is closely connected +with his badness. He was destroyed by the power that he attacked, the +power of love; and he was destroyed by it because he could not +understand it; and he could not understand it because it was not in him. +Iago never meant his plot to be so dangerous to himself. He knew that +jealousy is painful, but the jealousy of a love like Othello's he could +not imagine, and he found himself involved in murders which were no part +of his original design. That difficulty he surmounted, and his changed +plot still seemed to prosper. Roderigo and Cassio and Desdemona once +dead, all will be well. Nay, when he fails to kill Cassio, all may still +be well. He will avow that he told Othello of the adultery, and persist +that he told the truth, and Cassio will deny it in vain. And then, in a +moment, his plot is shattered by a blow from a quarter where he never +dreamt of danger. He knows his wife, he thinks. She is not +over-scrupulous, she will do anything to please him, and she has learnt +obedience. But one thing in her he does not know--that she _loves_ her +mistress and would face a hundred deaths sooner than see her fair fame +darkened. There is genuine astonishment in his outburst 'What! Are you +mad?' as it dawns upon him that she means to speak the truth about the +handkerchief. But he might well have applied to himself the words she +flings at Othello, + + O gull! O dolt! + As ignorant as dirt! + +The foulness of his own soul made him so ignorant that he built into the +marvellous structure of his plot a piece of crass stupidity. + +To the thinking mind the divorce of unusual intellect from goodness is a +thing to startle; and Shakespeare clearly felt it so. The combination of +unusual intellect with extreme evil is more than startling, it is +frightful. It is rare, but it exists; and Shakespeare represented it in +Iago. But the alliance of evil like Iago's with _supreme_ intellect is +an impossible fiction; and Shakespeare's fictions were truth. + + +6 + +The characters of Cassio and Emilia hardly require analysis, and I will +touch on them only from a single point of view. In their combination of +excellences and defects they are good examples of that truth to nature +which in dramatic art is the one unfailing source of moral instruction. + +Cassio is a handsome, light-hearted, good-natured young fellow, who +takes life gaily, and is evidently very attractive and popular. Othello, +who calls him by his Christian name, is fond of him; Desdemona likes him +much; Emilia at once interests herself on his behalf. He has warm +generous feelings, an enthusiastic admiration for the General, and a +chivalrous adoration for his peerless wife. But he is too easy-going. He +finds it hard to say No; and accordingly, although he is aware that he +has a very weak head, and that the occasion is one on which he is bound +to run no risk, he gets drunk--not disgustingly so, but ludicrously +so.[120] And, besides, he amuses himself without any scruple by +frequenting the company of a woman of more than doubtful reputation, who +has fallen in love with his good looks. Moralising critics point out +that he pays for the first offence by losing his post, and for the +second by nearly losing his life. They are quite entitled to do so, +though the careful reader will not forget Iago's part in these +transactions. But they ought also to point out that Cassio's looseness +does not in the least disturb our confidence in him in his relations +with Desdemona and Othello. He is loose, and we are sorry for it; but we +never doubt that there was 'a daily beauty in his life,' or that his +rapturous admiration of Desdemona was as wholly beautiful a thing as it +appears, or that Othello was perfectly safe when in his courtship he +employed Cassio to 'go between' Desdemona and himself. It is fortunately +a fact in human nature that these aspects of Cassio's character are +quite compatible. Shakespeare simply sets it down; and it is just +because he is truthful in these smaller things that in greater things we +trust him absolutely never to pervert the truth for the sake of some +doctrine or purpose of his own. + +There is something very lovable about Cassio, with his fresh eager +feelings; his distress at his disgrace and still more at having lost +Othello's trust; his hero-worship; and at the end his sorrow and pity, +which are at first too acute for words. He is carried in, wounded, on a +chair. He looks at Othello and cannot speak. His first words come later +when, to Lodovico's question, 'Did you and he consent in Cassio's +death?' Othello answers 'Ay.' Then he falters out, 'Dear General, I +never gave you cause.' One is sure he had never used that adjective +before. The love in it makes it beautiful, but there is something else +in it, unknown to Cassio, which goes to one's heart. It tells us that +his hero is no longer unapproachably above him. + +Few of Shakespeare's minor characters are more distinct than Emilia, and +towards few do our feelings change so much within the course of a play. +Till close to the end she frequently sets one's teeth on edge; and at +the end one is ready to worship her. She nowhere shows any sign of +having a bad heart; but she is common, sometimes vulgar, in minor +matters far from scrupulous, blunt in perception and feeling, and quite +destitute of imagination. She let Iago take the handkerchief though she +knew how much its loss would distress Desdemona; and she said nothing +about it though she saw that Othello was jealous. We rightly resent her +unkindness in permitting the theft, but--it is an important point--we +are apt to misconstrue her subsequent silence, because we know that +Othello's jealousy was intimately connected with the loss of the +handkerchief. Emilia, however, certainly failed to perceive this; for +otherwise, when Othello's anger showed itself violently and she was +really distressed for her mistress, she could not have failed to think +of the handkerchief, and would, I believe, undoubtedly have told the +truth about it. But, in fact, she never thought of it, although she +guessed that Othello was being deceived by some scoundrel. Even after +Desdemona's death, nay, even when she knew that Iago had brought it +about, she still did not remember the handkerchief; and when Othello at +last mentions, as a proof of his wife's guilt, that he had seen the +handkerchief in Cassio's hand, the truth falls on Emilia like a +thunder-bolt. 'O God!' she bursts out, 'O heavenly God!'[121] Her +stupidity in this matter is gross, but it is stupidity and nothing +worse. + +But along with it goes a certain coarseness of nature. The contrast +between Emilia and Desdemona in their conversation about the infidelity +of wives (IV. iii.) is too famous to need a word,--unless it be a word +of warning against critics who take her light talk too seriously. But +the contrast in the preceding scene is hardly less remarkable. Othello, +affecting to treat Emilia as the keeper of a brothel, sends her away, +bidding her shut the door behind her; and then he proceeds to torture +himself as well as Desdemona by accusations of adultery. But, as a +critic has pointed out, Emilia listens at the door, for we find, as soon +as Othello is gone and Iago has been summoned, that she knows what +Othello has said to Desdemona. And what could better illustrate those +defects of hers which make one wince, than her repeating again and again +in Desdemona's presence the word Desdemona could not repeat; than her +talking before Desdemona of Iago's suspicions regarding Othello and +herself; than her speaking to Desdemona of husbands who strike their +wives; than the expression of her honest indignation in the words, + + Has she forsook so many noble matches, + Her father and her country and her friends, + To be called whore? + +If one were capable of laughing or even of smiling when this point in +the play is reached, the difference between Desdemona's anguish at the +loss of Othello's love, and Emilia's recollection of the noble matches +she might have secured, would be irresistibly ludicrous. + +And yet how all this, and all her defects, vanish into nothingness when +we see her face to face with that which she can understand and feel! +From the moment of her appearance after the murder to the moment of her +death she is transfigured; and yet she remains perfectly true to +herself, and we would not have her one atom less herself. She is the +only person who utters for us the violent common emotions which we feel, +together with those more tragic emotions which she does not comprehend. +She has done this once already, to our great comfort. When she suggests +that some villain has poisoned Othello's mind, and Iago answers, + + Fie, there is no such man; it is impossible; + +and Desdemona answers, + + If any such there be, Heaven pardon him; + +Emilia's retort, + + A halter pardon him, and Hell gnaw his bones, + +says what we long to say, and helps us. And who has not felt in the last +scene how her glorious carelessness of her own life, and her outbursts +against Othello--even that most characteristic one, + + She was too fond of her most filthy bargain-- + +lift the overwhelming weight of calamity that oppresses us, and bring us +an extraordinary lightening of the heart? Terror and pity are here too +much to bear; we long to be allowed to feel also indignation, if not +rage; and Emilia lets us feel them and gives them words. She brings us +too the relief of joy and admiration,--a joy that is not lessened by her +death. Why should she live? If she lived for ever she never could soar a +higher pitch, and nothing in her life became her like the losing +it.[122] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 107: It has been held, for example, that Othello treated Iago +abominably in preferring Cassio to him; that he _did_ seduce Emilia; +that he and Desdemona were too familiar before marriage; and that in any +case his fate was a moral judgment on his sins, and Iago a righteous, if +sharp, instrument of Providence.] + +[Footnote 108: See III. iii. 201, V. i. 89 f. The statements are his +own, but he has no particular reason for lying. One reason of his +disgust at Cassio's appointment was that Cassio was a Florentine (I. i. +20). When Cassio says (III. i. 42) 'I never knew a Florentine more kind +and honest,' of course he means, not that Iago is a Florentine, but that +he could not be kinder and honester if he were one.] + +[Footnote 109: I am here merely recording a general impression. There is +no specific evidence, unless we take Cassio's language in his drink (II. +ii. 105 f.) to imply that Iago was not a 'man of quality' like himself. +I do not know if it has been observed that Iago uses more nautical +phrases and metaphors than is at all usual with Shakespeare's +characters. This might naturally be explained by his roving military +life, but it is curious that almost all the examples occur in the +earlier scenes (see _e.g._ I. i. 30, 153, 157; I. ii. 17, 50; I. iii. +343; II. iii. 65), so that the use of these phrases and metaphors may +not be characteristic of Iago but symptomatic of a particular state of +Shakespeare's mind.] + +[Footnote 110: See further Note P.] + +[Footnote 111: But it by no means follows that we are to believe his +statement that there was a report abroad about an intrigue between his +wife and Othello (I. iii. 393), or his statement (which may be divined +from IV. ii. 145) that someone had spoken to him on the subject.] + +[Footnote 112: See, for instance, Aaron in _Titus Andronicus_, II. iii.; +Richard in _3 Henry VI._, III. ii. and V. vi., and in _Richard III._, I. +i. (twice), I. ii.; Edmund in _King Lear_, I. ii. (twice), III. iii. and +v., V. i.] + +[Footnote 113: See, further, Note Q.] + +[Footnote 114: On the meaning which this phrase had for its author, +Coleridge, see note on p. 228.][Transcriber's note: Reference is to +Footnote 115.] + +[Footnote 115: Coleridge's view is not materially different, though less +complete. When he speaks of 'the motive-hunting of a motiveless +malignity,' he does not mean by the last two words that 'disinterested +love of evil' or 'love of evil for evil's sake' of which I spoke just +now, and which other critics attribute to Iago. He means really that +Iago's malignity does not spring from the causes to which Iago himself +refers it, nor from any 'motive' in the sense of an idea present to +consciousness. But unfortunately his phrase suggests the theory which +has been criticised above. On the question whether there is such a thing +as this supposed pure malignity, the reader may refer to a discussion +between Professor Bain and F.H. Bradley in _Mind_, vol. viii.] + +[Footnote 116: _I.e._ terrifying.] + +[Footnote 117: Cf. note at end of lecture.][Transcriber's note: Refers +to Footnote 122.] + +[Footnote 118: It was suggested to me by a Glasgow student.] + +[Footnote 119: A curious proof of Iago's inability to hold by his creed +that absolute egoism is the only proper attitude, and that loyalty and +affection are mere stupidity or want of spirit, may be found in his one +moment of real passion, where he rushes at Emilia with the cry, +'Villainous whore!' (V. ii. 229). There is more than fury in his cry, +there is indignation. She has been false to him, she has betrayed him. +Well, but why should she not, if his creed is true? And what a +melancholy exhibition of human inconsistency it is that he should use as +terms of reproach words which, according to him, should be quite +neutral, if not complimentary!] + +[Footnote 120: Cassio's invective against drink may be compared with +Hamlet's expressions of disgust at his uncle's drunkenness. Possibly the +subject may for some reason have been prominent in Shakespeare's mind +about this time.] + +[Footnote 121: So the Quarto, and certainly rightly, though modern +editors reprint the feeble alteration of the Folio, due to fear of the +Censor, 'O heaven! O heavenly Powers!'] + +[Footnote 122: The feelings evoked by Emilia are one of the causes which +mitigate the excess of tragic pain at the conclusion. Others are the +downfall of Iago, and the fact, already alluded to, that both Desdemona +and Othello show themselves at their noblest just before death.] + + + + +LECTURE VII + +KING LEAR + + +_King Lear_ has again and again been described as Shakespeare's greatest +work, the best of his plays, the tragedy in which he exhibits most fully +his multitudinous powers; and if we were doomed to lose all his dramas +except one, probably the majority of those who know and appreciate him +best would pronounce for keeping _King Lear_. + +Yet this tragedy is certainly the least popular of the famous four. The +'general reader' reads it less often than the others, and, though he +acknowledges its greatness, he will sometimes speak of it with a certain +distaste. It is also the least often presented on the stage, and the +least successful there. And when we look back on its history we find a +curious fact. Some twenty years after the Restoration, Nahum Tate +altered _King Lear_ for the stage, giving it a happy ending, and putting +Edgar in the place of the King of France as Cordelia's lover. From that +time Shakespeare's tragedy in its original form was never seen on the +stage for a century and a half. Betterton acted Tate's version; Garrick +acted it and Dr. Johnson approved it. Kemble acted it, Kean acted it. In +1823 Kean, 'stimulated by Hazlitt's remonstrances and Charles Lamb's +essays,' restored the original tragic ending. At last, in 1838, Macready +returned to Shakespeare's text throughout. + +What is the meaning of these opposite sets of facts? Are the lovers of +Shakespeare wholly in the right; and is the general reader and +play-goer, were even Tate and Dr. Johnson, altogether in the wrong? I +venture to doubt it. When I read _King Lear_ two impressions are left on +my mind, which seem to answer roughly to the two sets of facts. _King +Lear_ seems to me Shakespeare's greatest achievement, but it seems to me +_not_ his best play. And I find that I tend to consider it from two +rather different points of view. When I regard it strictly as a drama, +it appears to me, though in certain parts overwhelming, decidedly +inferior as a whole to _Hamlet_, _Othello_ and _Macbeth_. When I am +feeling that it is greater than any of these, and the fullest revelation +of Shakespeare's power, I find I am not regarding it simply as a drama, +but am grouping it in my mind with works like the _Prometheus Vinctus_ +and the _Divine Comedy_, and even with the greatest symphonies of +Beethoven and the statues in the Medici Chapel. + +This two-fold character of the play is to some extent illustrated by the +affinities and the probable chronological position of _King Lear_. It is +allied with two tragedies, _Othello_ and _Timon of Athens_; and these +two tragedies are utterly unlike.[123] _Othello_ was probably composed +about 1604, and _King Lear_ about 1605; and though there is a somewhat +marked change in style and versification, there are obvious resemblances +between the two. The most important have been touched on already: these +are the most painful and the most pathetic of the four tragedies, those +in which evil appears in its coldest and most inhuman forms, and those +which exclude the supernatural from the action. But there is also in +_King Lear_ a good deal which sounds like an echo of _Othello_,--a fact +which should not surprise us, since there are other instances where the +matter of a play seems to go on working in Shakespeare's mind and +re-appears, generally in a weaker form, in his next play. So, in _King +Lear_, the conception of Edmund is not so fresh as that of Goneril. +Goneril has no predecessor; but Edmund, though of course essentially +distinguished from Iago, often reminds us of him, and the soliloquy, +'This is the excellent foppery of the world,' is in the very tone of +Iago's discourse on the sovereignty of the will. The gulling of Gloster, +again, recalls the gulling of Othello. Even Edmund's idea (not carried +out) of making his father witness, without over-hearing, his +conversation with Edgar, reproduces the idea of the passage where +Othello watches Iago and Cassio talking about Bianca; and the conclusion +of the temptation, where Gloster says to Edmund: + + and of my land, + Loyal and natural boy, I'll work the means + To make thee capable, + +reminds us of Othello's last words in the scene of temptation, 'Now art +thou my lieutenant.' This list might be extended; and the appearance of +certain unusual words and phrases in both the plays increases the +likelihood that the composition of the one followed at no great distance +on that of the other.[124] + +When we turn from _Othello_ to _Timon of Athens_ we find a play of quite +another kind. _Othello_ is dramatically the most perfect of the +tragedies. _Timon_, on the contrary, is weak, ill-constructed and +confused; and, though care might have made it clear, no mere care could +make it really dramatic. Yet it is undoubtedly Shakespearean in part, +probably in great part; and it immediately reminds us of _King Lear_. +Both plays deal with the tragic effects of ingratitude. In both the +victim is exceptionally unsuspicious, soft-hearted and vehement. In both +he is completely overwhelmed, passing through fury to madness in the one +case, to suicide in the other. Famous passages in both plays are curses. +The misanthropy of Timon pours itself out in a torrent of maledictions +on the whole race of man; and these at once recall, alike by their form +and their substance, the most powerful speeches uttered by Lear in his +madness. In both plays occur repeated comparisons between man and the +beasts; the idea that 'the strain of man's bred out into baboon,' wolf, +tiger, fox; the idea that this bestial degradation will end in a furious +struggle of all with all, in which the race will perish. The +'pessimistic' strain in _Timon_ suggests to many readers, even more +imperatively than _King Lear_, the notion that Shakespeare was giving +vent to some personal feeling, whether present or past; for the signs of +his hand appear most unmistakably when the hero begins to pour the vials +of his wrath upon mankind. _Timon_, lastly, in some of the +unquestionably Shakespearean parts, bears (as it appears to me) so +strong a resemblance to _King Lear_ in style and in versification that +it is hard to understand how competent judges can suppose that it +belongs to a time at all near that of the final romances, or even that +it was written so late as the last Roman plays. It is more likely to +have been composed immediately after _King Lear_ and before +_Macbeth_.[125] + +Drawing these comparisons together, we may say that, while as a work of +art and in tragic power _King Lear_ is infinitely nearer to _Othello_ +than to _Timon_, in its spirit and substance its affinity with _Timon_ +is a good deal the stronger. And, returning to the point from which +these comparisons began, I would now add that there is in _King Lear_ a +reflection or anticipation, however faint, of the structural weakness of +_Timon_. This weakness in _King Lear_ is not due, however, to anything +intrinsically undramatic in the story, but to characteristics which were +necessary to an effect not wholly dramatic. The stage is the test of +strictly dramatic quality, and _King Lear_ is too huge for the stage. Of +course, I am not denying that it is a great stage-play. It has scenes +immensely effective in the theatre; three of them--the two between Lear +and Goneril and between Lear, Goneril and Regan, and the ineffably +beautiful scene in the Fourth Act between Lear and Cordelia--lose in the +theatre very little of the spell they have for imagination; and the +gradual interweaving of the two plots is almost as masterly as in _Much +Ado_. But (not to speak of defects due to mere carelessness) that which +makes the _peculiar_ greatness of King Lear,--the immense scope of the +work; the mass and variety of intense experience which it contains; the +interpenetration of sublime imagination, piercing pathos, and humour +almost as moving as the pathos; the vastness of the convulsion both of +nature and of human passion; the vagueness of the scene where the action +takes place, and of the movements of the figures which cross this scene; +the strange atmosphere, cold and dark, which strikes on us as we enter +this scene, enfolding these figures and magnifying their dim outlines +like a winter mist; the half-realised suggestions of vast universal +powers working in the world of individual fates and passions,--all this +interferes with dramatic clearness even when the play is read, and in +the theatre not only refuses to reveal itself fully through the senses +but seems to be almost in contradiction with their reports. This is not +so with the other great tragedies. No doubt, as Lamb declared, +theatrical representation gives only a part of what we imagine when we +read them; but there is no _conflict_ between the representation and the +imagination, because these tragedies are, in essentials, perfectly +dramatic. But _King Lear_, as a whole, is imperfectly dramatic, and +there is something in its very essence which is at war with the senses, +and demands a purely imaginative realisation. It is therefore +Shakespeare's greatest work, but it is not what Hazlitt called it, the +best of his plays; and its comparative unpopularity is due, not merely +to the extreme painfulness of the catastrophe, but in part to its +dramatic defects, and in part to a failure in many readers to catch the +peculiar effects to which I have referred,--a failure which is natural +because the appeal is made not so much to dramatic perception as to a +rarer and more strictly poetic kind of imagination. For this reason, +too, even the best attempts at exposition of _King Lear_ are +disappointing; they remind us of attempts to reduce to prose the +impalpable spirit of the _Tempest_. + +I propose to develop some of these ideas by considering, first, the +dramatic defects of the play, and then some of the causes of its +extraordinary imaginative effect. + + +1 + +We may begin, however, by referring to two passages which have often +been criticised with injustice. The first is that where the blinded +Gloster, believing that he is going to leap down Dover cliff, does in +fact fall flat on the ground at his feet, and then is persuaded that he +_has_ leaped down Dover cliff but has been miraculously preserved. +Imagine this incident transferred to _Othello_, and you realise how +completely the two tragedies differ in dramatic atmosphere. In _Othello_ +it would be a shocking or a ludicrous dissonance, but it is in harmony +with the spirit of _King Lear_. And not only is this so, but, contrary +to expectation, it is not, if properly acted, in the least absurd on the +stage. The imagination and the feelings have been worked upon with such +effect by the description of the cliff, and by the portrayal of the old +man's despair and his son's courageous and loving wisdom, that we are +unconscious of the grotesqueness of the incident for common sense. + +The second passage is more important, for it deals with the origin of +the whole conflict. The oft-repeated judgment that the first scene of +_King Lear_ is absurdly improbable, and that no sane man would think of +dividing his kingdom among his daughters in proportion to the strength +of their several protestations of love, is much too harsh and is based +upon a strange misunderstanding. This scene acts effectively, and to +imagination the story is not at all incredible. It is merely strange, +like so many of the stories on which our romantic dramas are based. +Shakespeare, besides, has done a good deal to soften the improbability +of the legend, and he has done much more than the casual reader +perceives. The very first words of the drama, as Coleridge pointed out, +tell us that the division of the kingdom is already settled in all its +details, so that only the public announcement of it remains.[126] Later +we find that the lines of division have already been drawn on the map of +Britain (l. 38), and again that Cordelia's share, which is her dowry, is +perfectly well known to Burgundy, if not to France (ll. 197, 245). That +then which is censured as absurd, the dependence of the division on the +speeches of the daughters, was in Lear's intention a mere form, devised +as a childish scheme to gratify his love of absolute power and his +hunger for assurances of devotion. And this scheme is perfectly in +character. We may even say that the main cause of its failure was not +that Goneril and Regan were exceptionally hypocritical, but that +Cordelia was exceptionally sincere and unbending. And it is essential to +observe that its failure, and the consequent necessity of publicly +reversing his whole well-known intention, is one source of Lear's +extreme anger. He loved Cordelia most and knew that she loved him best, +and the supreme moment to which he looked forward was that in which she +should outdo her sisters in expressions of affection, and should be +rewarded by that 'third' of the kingdom which was the most 'opulent.' +And then--so it naturally seemed to him--she put him to open shame. + +There is a further point, which seems to have escaped the attention of +Coleridge and others. Part of the absurdity of Lear's plan is taken to +be his idea of living with his three daughters in turn. But he never +meant to do this. He meant to live with Cordelia, and with her +alone.[127] The scheme of his alternate monthly stay with Goneril and +Regan is forced on him at the moment by what he thinks the undutifulness +of his favourite child. In fact his whole original plan, though foolish +and rash, was not a 'hideous rashness'[128] or incredible folly. If +carried out it would have had no such consequences as followed its +alteration. It would probably have led quickly to war,[129] but not to +the agony which culminated in the storm upon the heath. The first scene, +therefore, is not absurd, though it must be pronounced dramatically +faulty in so far as it discloses the true position of affairs only to an +attention more alert than can be expected in a theatrical audience or +has been found in many critics of the play. + +Let us turn next to two passages of another kind, the two which are +mainly responsible for the accusation of excessive painfulness, and so +for the distaste of many readers and the long theatrical eclipse of +_King Lear_. The first of these is much the less important; it is the +scene of the blinding of Gloster. The blinding of Gloster on the stage +has been condemned almost universally; and surely with justice, because +the mere physical horror of such a spectacle would in the theatre be a +sensation so violent as to overpower the purely tragic emotions, and +therefore the spectacle would seem revolting or shocking. But it is +otherwise in reading. For mere imagination the physical horror, though +not lost, is so far deadened that it can do its duty as a stimulus to +pity, and to that appalled dismay at the extremity of human cruelty +which it is of the essence of the tragedy to excite. Thus the blinding +of Gloster belongs rightly to _King Lear_ in its proper world of +imagination; it is a blot upon _King Lear_ as a stage-play. + +But what are we to say of the second and far more important passage, the +conclusion of the tragedy, the 'unhappy ending,' as it is called, though +the word 'unhappy' sounds almost ironical in its weakness? Is this too a +blot upon _King Lear_ as a stage-play? The question is not so easily +answered as might appear. Doubtless we are right when we turn with +disgust from Tate's sentimental alterations, from his marriage of Edgar +and Cordelia, and from that cheap moral which every one of Shakespeare's +tragedies contradicts, 'that Truth and Virtue shall at last succeed.' +But are we so sure that we are right when we unreservedly condemn the +feeling which prompted these alterations, or at all events the feeling +which beyond question comes naturally to many readers of _King Lear_ who +would like Tate as little as we? What they wish, though they have not +always the courage to confess it even to themselves, is that the deaths +of Edmund, Goneril, Regan and Gloster should be followed by the escape +of Lear and Cordelia from death, and that we should be allowed to +imagine the poor old King passing quietly in the home of his beloved +child to the end which cannot be far off. Now, I do not dream of saying +that we ought to wish this, so long as we regard _King Lear_ simply as a +work of poetic imagination. But if _King Lear_ is to be considered +strictly as a drama, or simply as we consider _Othello_, it is not so +clear that the wish is unjustified. In fact I will take my courage in +both hands and say boldly that I share it, and also that I believe +Shakespeare would have ended his play thus had he taken the subject in +hand a few years later, in the days of _Cymbeline_ and the _Winter's +Tale_. If I read _King Lear_ simply as a drama, I find that my feelings +call for this 'happy ending.' I do not mean the human, the +philanthropic, feelings, but the dramatic sense. The former wish Hamlet +and Othello to escape their doom; the latter does not; but it does wish +Lear and Cordelia to be saved. Surely, it says, the tragic emotions have +been sufficiently stirred already. Surely the tragic outcome of Lear's +error and his daughters' ingratitude has been made clear enough and +moving enough. And, still more surely, such a tragic catastrophe as this +should seem _inevitable_. But this catastrophe, unlike those of all the +other mature tragedies, does not seem at all inevitable. It is not even +satisfactorily motived.[130] In fact it seems expressly designed to fall +suddenly like a bolt from a sky cleared by the vanished storm. And +although from a wider point of view one may fully recognise the value of +this effect, and may even reject with horror the wish for a 'happy +ending,' this wider point of view, I must maintain, is not strictly +dramatic or tragic. + +Of course this is a heresy and all the best authority is against it. But +then the best authority, it seems to me, is either influenced +unconsciously by disgust at Tate's sentimentalism or unconsciously takes +that wider point of view. When Lamb--there is no higher +authority--writes, 'A happy ending!--as if the living martyrdom that +Lear had gone through, the flaying of his feelings alive, did not make a +fair dismissal from the stage of life the only decorous thing for him,' +I answer, first, that it is precisely this _fair_ dismissal which we +desire for him instead of renewed anguish; and, secondly, that what we +desire for him during the brief remainder of his days is not 'the +childish pleasure of getting his gilt robes and sceptre again,' not what +Tate gives him, but what Shakespeare himself might have given him--peace +and happiness by Cordelia's fireside. And if I am told that he has +suffered too much for this, how can I possibly believe it with these +words ringing in my ears: + + Come, let's away to prison: + We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage. + When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, + And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live, + And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh + At gilded butterflies? + +And again when Schlegel declares that, if Lear were saved, 'the whole' +would 'lose its significance,' because it would no longer show us that +the belief in Providence 'requires a wider range than the dark +pilgrimage on earth to be established in its whole extent,' I answer +that, if the drama does show us that, it takes us beyond the strictly +tragic point of view.[131] + +A dramatic mistake in regard to the catastrophe, however, even supposing +it to exist, would not seriously affect the whole play. The principal +structural weakness of _King Lear_ lies elsewhere. It is felt to some +extent in the earlier Acts, but still more (as from our study of +Shakespeare's technique we have learnt to expect) in the Fourth and the +first part of the Fifth. And it arises chiefly from the double action, +which is a peculiarity of _King Lear_ among the tragedies. By the side +of Lear, his daughters, Kent, and the Fool, who are the principal +figures in the main plot, stand Gloster and his two sons, the chief +persons of the secondary plot. Now by means of this double action +Shakespeare secured certain results highly advantageous even from the +strictly dramatic point of view, and easy to perceive. But the +disadvantages were dramatically greater. The number of essential +characters is so large, their actions and movements are so complicated, +and events towards the close crowd on one another so thickly, that the +reader's attention,[132] rapidly transferred from one centre of interest +to another, is overstrained. He becomes, if not intellectually confused, +at least emotionally fatigued. The battle, on which everything turns, +scarcely affects him. The deaths of Edmund, Goneril, Regan and Gloster +seem 'but trifles here'; and anything short of the incomparable pathos +of the close would leave him cold. There is something almost ludicrous +in the insignificance of this battle, when it is compared with the +corresponding battles in _Julius Caesar_ and _Macbeth_; and though there +may have been further reasons for its insignificance, the main one is +simply that there was no room to give it its due effect among such a +host of competing interests.[133] + +A comparison of the last two Acts of _Othello_ with the last two Acts of +_King Lear_ would show how unfavourable to dramatic clearness is a +multiplicity of figures. But that this multiplicity is not in itself a +fatal obstacle is evident from the last two Acts of _Hamlet_, and +especially from the final scene. This is in all respects one of +Shakespeare's triumphs, yet the stage is crowded with characters. Only +they are not _leading_ characters. The plot is single; Hamlet and the +King are the 'mighty opposites'; and Ophelia, the only other person in +whom we are obliged to take a vivid interest, has already disappeared. +It is therefore natural and right that the deaths of Laertes and the +Queen should affect us comparatively little. But in _King Lear_, because +the plot is double, we have present in the last scene no less than five +persons who are technically of the first importance--Lear, his three +daughters and Edmund; not to speak of Kent and Edgar, of whom the latter +at any rate is technically quite as important as Laertes. And again, +owing to the pressure of persons and events, and owing to the +concentration of our anxiety on Lear and Cordelia, the combat of Edgar +and Edmund, which occupies so considerable a space, fails to excite a +tithe of the interest of the fencing-match in _Hamlet_. The truth is +that all through these Acts Shakespeare has too vast a material to use +with complete dramatic effectiveness, however essential this very +vastness was for effects of another kind. + +Added to these defects there are others, which suggest that in _King +Lear_ Shakespeare was less concerned than usual with dramatic fitness: +improbabilities, inconsistencies, sayings and doings which suggest +questions only to be answered by conjecture. The improbabilities in +_King Lear_ surely far surpass those of the other great tragedies in +number and in grossness. And they are particularly noticeable in the +secondary plot. For example, no sort of reason is given why Edgar, who +lives in the same house with Edmund, should write a letter to him +instead of speaking; and this is a letter absolutely damning to his +character. Gloster was very foolish, but surely not so foolish as to +pass unnoticed this improbability; or, if so foolish, what need for +Edmund to forge a letter rather than a conversation, especially as +Gloster appears to be unacquainted with his son's handwriting?[134] Is +it in character that Edgar should be persuaded without the slightest +demur to avoid his father instead of confronting him and asking him the +cause of his anger? Why in the world should Gloster, when expelled from +his castle, wander painfully all the way to Dover simply in order to +destroy himself (IV. i. 80)? And is it not extraordinary that, after +Gloster's attempted suicide, Edgar should first talk to him in the +language of a gentleman, then to Oswald in his presence in broad peasant +dialect, then again to Gloster in gentle language, and yet that Gloster +should not manifest the least surprise? + +Again, to take three instances of another kind; (_a_) only a fortnight +seems to have elapsed between the first scene and the breach with +Goneril; yet already there are rumours not only of war between Goneril +and Regan but of the coming of a French army; and this, Kent says, is +perhaps connected with the harshness of _both_ the sisters to their +father, although Regan has apparently had no opportunity of showing any +harshness till the day before. (_b_) In the quarrel with Goneril Lear +speaks of his having to dismiss fifty of his followers at a clap, yet +she has neither mentioned any number nor had any opportunity of +mentioning it off the stage. (_c_) Lear and Goneril, intending to hurry +to Regan, both send off messengers to her, and both tell the messengers +to bring back an answer. But it does not appear either how the +messengers _could_ return or what answer could be required, as their +superiors are following them with the greatest speed. + +Once more, (_a_) why does Edgar not reveal himself to his blind father, +as he truly says he ought to have done? The answer is left to mere +conjecture. (_b_) Why does Kent so carefully preserve his incognito till +the last scene? He says he does it for an important purpose, but what +the purpose is we have to guess. (_c_) Why Burgundy rather than France +should have first choice of Cordelia's hand is a question we cannot help +asking, but there is no hint of any answer.[135] (_d_) I have referred +already to the strange obscurity regarding Edmund's delay in trying to +save his victims, and I will not extend this list of examples. No one of +such defects is surprising when considered by itself, but their number +is surely significant. Taken in conjunction with other symptoms it means +that Shakespeare, set upon the dramatic effect of the great scenes and +upon certain effects not wholly dramatic, was exceptionally careless of +probability, clearness and consistency in smaller matters, introducing +what was convenient or striking for a momentary purpose without +troubling himself about anything more than the moment. In presence of +these signs it seems doubtful whether his failure to give information +about the fate of the Fool was due to anything more than carelessness or +an impatient desire to reduce his overloaded material.[136] + +Before I turn to the other side of the subject I will refer to one more +characteristic of this play which is dramatically disadvantageous. In +Shakespeare's dramas, owing to the absence of scenery from the +Elizabethan stage, the question, so vexatious to editors, of the exact +locality of a particular scene is usually unimportant and often +unanswerable; but, as a rule, we know, broadly speaking, where the +persons live and what their journeys are. The text makes this plain, for +example, almost throughout _Hamlet_, _Othello_ and _Macbeth_; and the +imagination is therefore untroubled. But in _King Lear_ the indications +are so scanty that the reader's mind is left not seldom both vague and +bewildered. Nothing enables us to imagine whereabouts in Britain Lear's +palace lies, or where the Duke of Albany lives. In referring to the +dividing-lines on the map, Lear tells us of shadowy forests and +plenteous rivers, but, unlike Hotspur and his companions, he studiously +avoids proper names. The Duke of Cornwall, we presume in the absence of +information, is likely to live in Cornwall; but we suddenly find, from +the introduction of a place-name which all readers take at first for a +surname, that he lives at Gloster (I. v. 1).[137] This seems likely to +be also the home of the Earl of Gloster, to whom Cornwall is patron. But +no: it is a night's journey from Cornwall's 'house' to Gloster's, and +Gloster's is in the middle of an uninhabited heath.[138] Here, for the +purpose of the crisis, nearly all the persons assemble, but they do so +in a manner which no casual spectator or reader could follow. Afterwards +they all drift towards Dover for the purpose of the catastrophe; but +again the localities and movements are unusually indefinite. And this +indefiniteness is found in smaller matters. One cannot help asking, for +example, and yet one feels one had better not ask, where that 'lodging' +of Edmund's can be, in which he hides Edgar from his father, and whether +Edgar is mad that he should return from his hollow tree (in a district +where 'for many miles about there's scarce a bush') to his father's +castle in order to soliloquise (II. iii.):--for the favourite +stage-direction, 'a wood' (which is more than 'a bush'), however +convenient to imagination, is scarcely compatible with the presence of +Kent asleep in the stocks.[139] Something of the confusion which +bewilders the reader's mind in _King Lear_ recurs in _Antony and +Cleopatra_, the most faultily constructed of all the tragedies; but +there it is due not so much to the absence or vagueness of the +indications as to the necessity of taking frequent and fatiguing +journeys over thousands of miles. Shakespeare could not help himself in +the Roman play: in _King Lear_ he did not choose to help himself, +perhaps deliberately chose to be vague. + +From these defects, or from some of them, follows one result which must +be familiar to many readers of _King Lear_. It is far more difficult to +retrace in memory the steps of the action in this tragedy than in +_Hamlet_, _Othello_, or _Macbeth_. The outline is of course quite clear; +anyone could write an 'argument' of the play. But when an attempt is +made to fill in the detail, it issues sooner or later in confusion even +with readers whose dramatic memory is unusually strong.[140] + + +2 + +How is it, now, that this defective drama so overpowers us that we are +either unconscious of its blemishes or regard them as almost irrelevant? +As soon as we turn to this question we recognise, not merely that _King +Lear_ possesses purely dramatic qualities which far outweigh its +defects, but that its greatness consists partly in imaginative effects +of a wider kind. And, looking for the sources of these effects, we find +among them some of those very things which appeared to us dramatically +faulty or injurious. Thus, to take at once two of the simplest examples +of this, that very vagueness in the sense of locality which we have just +considered, and again that excess in the bulk of the material and the +number of figures, events and movements, while they interfere with the +clearness of vision, have at the same time a positive value for +imagination. They give the feeling of vastness, the feeling not of a +scene or particular place, but of a world; or, to speak more accurately, +of a particular place which is also a world. This world is dim to us, +partly from its immensity, and partly because it is filled with gloom; +and in the gloom shapes approach and recede, whose half-seen faces and +motions touch us with dread, horror, or the most painful +pity,--sympathies and antipathies which we seem to be feeling not only +for them but for the whole race. This world, we are told, is called +Britain; but we should no more look for it in an atlas than for the +place, called Caucasus, where Prometheus was chained by Strength and +Force and comforted by the daughters of Ocean, or the place where +Farinata stands erect in his glowing tomb, 'Come avesse lo Inferno in +gran dispitto.' + +Consider next the double action. It has certain strictly dramatic +advantages, and may well have had its origin in purely dramatic +considerations. To go no further, the secondary plot fills out a story +which would by itself have been somewhat thin, and it provides a most +effective contrast between its personages and those of the main plot, +the tragic strength and stature of the latter being heightened by +comparison with the slighter build of the former. But its chief value +lies elsewhere, and is not merely dramatic. It lies in the fact--in +Shakespeare without a parallel--that the sub-plot simply repeats the +theme of the main story. Here, as there, we see an old man 'with a white +beard.' He, like Lear, is affectionate, unsuspicious, foolish, and +self-willed. He, too, wrongs deeply a child who loves him not less for +the wrong. He, too, meets with monstrous ingratitude from the child whom +he favours, and is tortured and driven to death. This repetition does +not simply double the pain with which the tragedy is witnessed: it +startles and terrifies by suggesting that the folly of Lear and the +ingratitude of his daughters are no accidents or merely individual +aberrations, but that in that dark cold world some fateful malignant +influence is abroad, turning the hearts of the fathers against their +children and of the children against their fathers, smiting the earth +with a curse, so that the brother gives the brother to death and the +father the son, blinding the eyes, maddening the brain, freezing the +springs of pity, numbing all powers except the nerves of anguish and the +dull lust of life.[141] + +Hence too, as well as from other sources, comes that feeling which +haunts us in _King Lear_, as though we were witnessing something +universal,--a conflict not so much of particular persons as of the +powers of good and evil in the world. And the treatment of many of the +characters confirms this feeling. Considered simply as psychological +studies few of them, surely, are of the highest interest. Fine and +subtle touches could not be absent from a work of Shakespeare's +maturity; but, with the possible exception of Lear himself, no one of +the characters strikes us as psychologically a _wonderful_ creation, +like Hamlet or Iago or even Macbeth; one or two seem even to be somewhat +faint and thin. And, what is more significant, it is not quite natural +to us to regard them from this point of view at all. Rather we observe a +most unusual circumstance. If Lear, Gloster and Albany are set apart, +the rest fall into two distinct groups, which are strongly, even +violently, contrasted: Cordelia, Kent, Edgar, the Fool on one side, +Goneril, Regan, Edmund, Cornwall, Oswald on the other. These characters +are in various degrees individualised, most of them completely so; but +still in each group there is a quality common to all the members, or one +spirit breathing through them all. Here we have unselfish and devoted +love, there hard self-seeking. On both sides, further, the common +quality takes an extreme form; the love is incapable of being chilled by +injury, the selfishness of being softened by pity; and, it may be added, +this tendency to extremes is found again in the characters of Lear and +Gloster, and is the main source of the accusations of improbability +directed against their conduct at certain points. Hence the members of +each group tend to appear, at least in part, as varieties of one +species; the radical differences of the two species are emphasized in +broad hard strokes; and the two are set in conflict, almost as if +Shakespeare, like Empedocles, were regarding Love and Hate as the two +ultimate forces of the universe. + +The presence in _King Lear_ of so large a number of characters in whom +love or self-seeking is so extreme, has another effect. They do not +merely inspire in us emotions of unusual strength, but they also stir +the intellect to wonder and speculation. How can there be such men and +women? we ask ourselves. How comes it that humanity can take such +absolutely opposite forms? And, in particular, to what omission of +elements which should be present in human nature, or, if there is no +omission, to what distortion of these elements is it due that such +beings as some of these come to exist? This is a question which Iago +(and perhaps no previous creation of Shakespeare's) forces us to ask, +but in _King Lear_ it is provoked again and again. And more, it seems to +us that the author himself is asking this question. 'Then let them +anatomise Regan, see what breeds about her heart. Is there any cause in +nature that makes these hard hearts?'--the strain of thought which +appears here seems to be present in some degree throughout the play. We +seem to trace the tendency which, a few years later, produced Ariel and +Caliban, the tendency of imagination to analyse and abstract, to +decompose human nature into its constituent factors, and then to +construct beings in whom one or more of these factors is absent or +atrophied or only incipient. This, of course, is a tendency which +produces symbols, allegories, personifications of qualities and abstract +ideas; and we are accustomed to think it quite foreign to Shakespeare's +genius, which was in the highest degree concrete. No doubt in the main +we are right here; but it is hazardous to set limits to that genius. The +Sonnets, if nothing else, may show us how easy it was to Shakespeare's +mind to move in a world of 'Platonic' ideas;[142] and, while it would be +going too far to suggest that he was employing conscious symbolism or +allegory in _King Lear_, it does appear to disclose a mode of +imagination not so very far removed from the mode with which, we must +remember, Shakespeare was perfectly familiar in Morality plays and in +the _Fairy Queen_. + +This same tendency shows itself in _King Lear_ in other forms. To it is +due the idea of monstrosity--of beings, actions, states of mind, which +appear not only abnormal but absolutely contrary to nature; an idea, +which, of course, is common enough in Shakespeare, but appears with +unusual frequency in _King Lear_, for instance in the lines: + + Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend, + More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child + Than the sea-monster! + +or in the exclamation, + + Filial ingratitude! + Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand + For lifting food to't? + +It appears in another shape in that most vivid passage where Albany, as +he looks at the face which had bewitched him, now distorted with +dreadful passions, suddenly sees it in a new light and exclaims in +horror: + + Thou changed and self-cover'd thing, for shame. + Be-monster not thy feature. Were't my fitness + To let these hands obey my blood, + They are apt enough to dislocate and tear + Thy flesh and bones: howe'er thou art a fiend, + A woman's shape doth shield thee.[143] + +It appears once more in that exclamation of Kent's, as he listens to +the description of Cordelia's grief: + + It is the stars, + The stars above us, govern our conditions; + Else one self mate and mate could not beget + Such different issues. + +(This is not the only sign that Shakespeare had been musing over +heredity, and wondering how it comes about that the composition of two +strains of blood or two parent souls can produce such astonishingly +different products.) + +This mode of thought is responsible, lastly, for a very striking +characteristic of _King Lear_--one in which it has no parallel except +_Timon_--the incessant references to the lower animals[144] and man's +likeness to them. These references are scattered broadcast through the +whole play, as though Shakespeare's mind were so busy with the subject +that he could hardly write a page without some allusion to it. The dog, +the horse, the cow, the sheep, the hog, the lion, the bear, the wolf, +the fox, the monkey, the pole-cat, the civet-cat, the pelican, the owl, +the crow, the chough, the wren, the fly, the butterfly, the rat, the +mouse, the frog, the tadpole, the wall-newt, the water-newt, the worm--I +am sure I cannot have completed the list, and some of them are mentioned +again and again. Often, of course, and especially in the talk of Edgar +as the Bedlam, they have no symbolical meaning; but not seldom, even in +his talk, they are expressly referred to for their typical +qualities--'hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in +madness, lion in prey,' 'The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't With +a more riotous appetite.' Sometimes a person in the drama is compared, +openly or implicitly, with one of them. Goneril is a kite: her +ingratitude has a serpent's tooth: she has struck her father most +serpent-like upon the very heart: her visage is wolvish: she has tied +sharp-toothed unkindness like a vulture on her father's breast: for her +husband she is a gilded serpent: to Gloster her cruelty seems to have +the fangs of a boar. She and Regan are dog-hearted: they are tigers, not +daughters: each is an adder to the other: the flesh of each is covered +with the fell of a beast. Oswald is a mongrel, and the son and heir of a +mongrel: ducking to everyone in power, he is a wag-tail: white with +fear, he is a goose. Gloster, for Regan, is an ingrateful fox: Albany, +for his wife, has a cowish spirit and is milk-liver'd: when Edgar as the +Bedlam first appeared to Lear he made him think a man a worm. As we +read, the souls of all the beasts in turn seem to us to have entered the +bodies of these mortals; horrible in their venom, savagery, lust, +deceitfulness, sloth, cruelty, filthiness; miserable in their +feebleness, nakedness, defencelessness, blindness; and man, 'consider +him well,' is even what they are. Shakespeare, to whom the idea of the +transmigration of souls was familiar and had once been material for +jest,[145] seems to have been brooding on humanity in the light of it. +It is remarkable, and somewhat sad, that he seems to find none of man's +better qualities in the world of the brutes (though he might well have +found the prototype of the self-less love of Kent and Cordelia in the +dog whom he so habitually maligns);[146] but he seems to have been +asking himself whether that which he loathes in man may not be due to +some strange wrenching of this frame of things, through which the lower +animal souls have found a lodgment in human forms, and there found--to +the horror and confusion of the thinking mind--brains to forge, tongues +to speak, and hands to act, enormities which no mere brute can conceive +or execute. He shows us in _King Lear_ these terrible forces bursting +into monstrous life and flinging themselves upon those human beings who +are weak and defenceless, partly from old age, but partly because they +_are_ human and lack the dreadful undivided energy of the beast. And the +only comfort he might seem to hold out to us is the prospect that at +least this bestial race, strong only where it is vile, cannot endure: +though stars and gods are powerless, or careless, or empty dreams, yet +there must be an end of this horrible world: + + It will come; + Humanity must perforce prey on itself + Like monsters of the deep.[147] + +The influence of all this on imagination as we read _King Lear_ is very +great; and it combines with other influences to convey to us, not in the +form of distinct ideas but in the manner proper to poetry, the wider or +universal significance of the spectacle presented to the inward eye. But +the effect of theatrical exhibition is precisely the reverse. There the +poetic atmosphere is dissipated; the meaning of the very words which +create it passes half-realised; in obedience to the tyranny of the eye +we conceive the characters as mere particular men and women; and all +that mass of vague suggestion, if it enters the mind at all, appears in +the shape of an allegory which we immediately reject. A similar conflict +between imagination and sense will be found if we consider the dramatic +centre of the whole tragedy, the Storm-scenes. The temptation of Othello +and the scene of Duncan's murder may lose upon the stage, but they do +not lose their essence, and they gain as well as lose. The Storm-scenes +in _King Lear_ gain nothing and their very essence is destroyed. It is +comparatively a small thing that the theatrical storm, not to drown the +dialogue, must be silent whenever a human being wishes to speak, and is +wretchedly inferior to many a storm we have witnessed. Nor is it simply +that, as Lamb observed, the corporal presence of Lear, 'an old man +tottering about the stage with a walking-stick,' disturbs and depresses +that sense of the greatness of his mind which fills the imagination. +There is a further reason, which is not expressed, but still emerges, in +these words of Lamb's: 'the explosions of his passion are terrible as a +volcano: they are storms turning up and disclosing to the bottom that +sea, his mind, with all its vast riches.' Yes, 'they are _storms_.' For +imagination, that is to say, the explosions of Lear's passion, and the +bursts of rain and thunder, are not, what for the senses they must be, +two things, but manifestations of one thing. It is the powers of the +tormented soul that we hear and see in the 'groans of roaring wind and +rain' and the 'sheets of fire'; and they that, at intervals almost more +overwhelming, sink back into darkness and silence. Nor yet is even this +all; but, as those incessant references to wolf and tiger made us see +humanity 'reeling back into the beast' and ravening against itself, so +in the storm we seem to see Nature herself convulsed by the same +horrible passions; the 'common mother,' + + Whose womb immeasurable and infinite breast + Teems and feeds all, + +turning on her children, to complete the ruin they have wrought upon +themselves. Surely something not less, but much more, than these +helpless words convey, is what comes to us in these astounding scenes; +and if, translated thus into the language of prose, it becomes confused +and inconsistent, the reason is simply that it itself is poetry, and +such poetry as cannot be transferred to the space behind the +foot-lights, but has its being only in imagination. Here then is +Shakespeare at his very greatest, but not the mere dramatist +Shakespeare.[148] + +And now we may say this also of the catastrophe, which we found +questionable from the strictly dramatic point of view. Its purpose is +not merely dramatic. This sudden blow out of the darkness, which seems +so far from inevitable, and which strikes down our reviving hopes for +the victims of so much cruelty, seems now only what we might have +expected in a world so wild and monstrous. It is as if Shakespeare said +to us: 'Did you think weakness and innocence have any chance here? Were +you beginning to dream that? I will show you it is not so.' + +I come to a last point. As we contemplate this world, the question +presses on us, What can be the ultimate power that moves it, that +excites this gigantic war and waste, or, perhaps, that suffers them and +overrules them? And in _King Lear_ this question is not left to us to +ask, it is raised by the characters themselves. References to religious +or irreligious beliefs and feelings are more frequent than is usual in +Shakespeare's tragedies, as frequent perhaps as in his final plays. He +introduces characteristic differences in the language of the different +persons about fortune or the stars or the gods, and shows how the +question What rules the world? is forced upon their minds. They answer +it in their turn: Kent, for instance: + + It is the stars, + The stars above us, govern our condition: + +Edmund: + + Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law + My services are bound: + +and again, + + This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are + sick in fortune--often the surfeit of our own behaviour--we + make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon and the stars; + as if we were villains by necessity, fools by heavenly + compulsion, ... and all that we are evil in by a divine + thrusting on: + +Gloster: + + As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; + They kill us for their sport; + +Edgar: + + Think that the clearest gods, who make them honours + Of men's impossibilities, have preserved thee. + +Here we have four distinct theories of the nature of the ruling power. +And besides this, in such of the characters as have any belief in gods +who love good and hate evil, the spectacle of triumphant injustice or +cruelty provokes questionings like those of Job, or else the thought, +often repeated, of divine retribution. To Lear at one moment the storm +seems the messenger of heaven: + + Let the great gods, + That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads, + Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, + That hast within thee undivulged crimes.... + +At another moment those habitual miseries of the poor, of which he has +taken too little account, seem to him to accuse the gods of injustice: + + Take physic, pomp; + Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, + That thou mayst shake the superflux to them + And show the heavens more just; + +and Gloster has almost the same thought (IV. i. 67 ff.). Gloster again, +thinking of the cruelty of Lear's daughters, breaks out, + + but I shall see + The winged vengeance overtake such children. + +The servants who have witnessed the blinding of Gloster by Cornwall and +Regan, cannot believe that cruelty so atrocious will pass unpunished. +One cries, + + I'll never care what wickedness I do, + If this man come to good; + +and another, + + if she live long, + And in the end meet the old course of death, + Women will all turn monsters. + +Albany greets the news of Cornwall's death with the exclamation, + + This shows you are above, + You justicers, that these our nether crimes + So speedily can venge; + +and the news of the deaths of the sisters with the words, + + This judgment[149] of the heavens, that makes us tremble, + Touches us not with pity. + +Edgar, speaking to Edmund of their father, declares + + The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices + Make instruments to plague us, + +and Edmund himself assents. Almost throughout the latter half of the +drama we note in most of the better characters a pre-occupation with the +question of the ultimate power, and a passionate need to explain by +reference to it what otherwise would drive them to despair. And the +influence of this pre-occupation and need joins with other influences in +affecting the imagination, and in causing it to receive from _King Lear_ +an impression which is at least as near of kin to the _Divine Comedy_ as +to _Othello_. + + +3 + +For Dante that which is recorded in the _Divine Comedy_ was the justice +and love of God. What did _King Lear_ record for Shakespeare? Something, +it would seem, very different. This is certainly the most terrible +picture that Shakespeare painted of the world. In no other of his +tragedies does humanity appear more pitiably infirm or more hopelessly +bad. What is Iago's malignity against an envied stranger compared with +the cruelty of the son of Gloster and the daughters of Lear? What are +the sufferings of a strong man like Othello to those of helpless age? +Much too that we have already observed--the repetition of the main theme +in that of the under-plot, the comparisons of man with the most wretched +and the most horrible of the beasts, the impression of Nature's +hostility to him, the irony of the unexpected catastrophe--these, with +much else, seem even to indicate an intention to show things at their +worst, and to return the sternest of replies to that question of the +ultimate power and those appeals for retribution. Is it an accident, for +example, that Lear's first appeal to something beyond the earth, + + O heavens, + If you do love old men, if your sweet sway + Allow[150] obedience, if yourselves are old, + Make it your cause: + +is immediately answered by the iron voices of his daughters, raising by +turns the conditions on which they will give him a humiliating +harbourage; or that his second appeal, heart-rending in its piteousness, + + You see me here, you gods, a poor old man, + As full of grief as age; wretched in both: + +is immediately answered from the heavens by the sounds of the breaking +storm?[151] Albany and Edgar may moralise on the divine justice as they +will, but how, in face of all that we see, shall we believe that they +speak Shakespeare's mind? Is not his mind rather expressed in the bitter +contrast between their faith and the events we witness, or in the +scornful rebuke of those who take upon them the mystery of things as if +they were God's spies?[152] Is it not Shakespeare's judgment on his kind +that we hear in Lear's appeal, + + And thou, all-shaking thunder, + Smite flat the thick rotundity o' the world! + Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once, + That make ingrateful man! + +and Shakespeare's judgment on the worth of existence that we hear in +Lear's agonised cry, 'No, no, no life!'? + +Beyond doubt, I think, some such feelings as these possess us, and, if +we follow Shakespeare, ought to possess us, from time to time as we read +_King Lear_. And some readers will go further and maintain that this is +also the ultimate and total impression left by the tragedy. _King Lear_ +has been held to be profoundly 'pessimistic' in the full meaning of that +word,--the record of a time when contempt and loathing for his kind had +overmastered the poet's soul, and in despair he pronounced man's life to +be simply hateful and hideous. And if we exclude the biographical part +of this view,[153] the rest may claim some support even from the +greatest of Shakespearean critics since the days of Coleridge, Hazlitt +and Lamb. Mr. Swinburne, after observing that _King Lear_ is 'by far the +most Aeschylean' of Shakespeare's works, proceeds thus: + +'But in one main point it differs radically from the work and the spirit +of Aeschylus. Its fatalism is of a darker and harder nature. To +Prometheus the fetters of the lord and enemy of mankind were bitter; +upon Orestes the hand of heaven was laid too heavily to bear; yet in the +not utterly infinite or everlasting distance we see beyond them the +promise of the morning on which mystery and justice shall be made one; +when righteousness and omnipotence at last shall kiss each other. But on +the horizon of Shakespeare's tragic fatalism we see no such twilight of +atonement, such pledge of reconciliation as this. Requital, redemption, +amends, equity, explanation, pity and mercy, are words without a meaning +here. + + As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; + They kill us for their sport. + +Here is no need of the Eumenides, children of Night everlasting; for +here is very Night herself. + +'The words just cited are not casual or episodical; they strike the +keynote of the whole poem, lay the keystone of the whole arch of +thought. There is no contest of conflicting forces, no judgment so much +as by casting of lots: far less is there any light of heavenly harmony +or of heavenly wisdom, of Apollo or Athene from above. We have heard +much and often from theologians of the light of revelation: and some +such thing indeed we find in Aeschylus; but the darkness of revelation +is here.'[154] + +It is hard to refuse assent to these eloquent words, for they express in +the language of a poet what we feel at times in reading _King Lear_ but +cannot express. But do they represent the total and final impression +produced by the play? If they do, this impression, so far as the +substance of the drama is concerned (and nothing else is in question +here), must, it would seem, be one composed almost wholly of painful +feelings,--utter depression, or indignant rebellion, or appalled +despair. And that would surely be strange. For _King Lear_ is admittedly +one of the world's greatest poems, and yet there is surely no other of +these poems which produces on the whole this effect, and we regard it as +a very serious flaw in any considerable work of art that this should be +its ultimate effect.[155] So that Mr. Swinburne's description, if taken +as final, and any description of King Lear as 'pessimistic' in the +proper sense of that word, would imply a criticism which is not +intended, and which would make it difficult to leave the work in the +position almost universally assigned to it. + +But in fact these descriptions, like most of the remarks made on _King +Lear_ in the present lecture, emphasise only certain aspects of the play +and certain elements in the total impression; and in that impression the +effect of these aspects, though far from being lost, is modified by that +of others. I do not mean that the final effect resembles that of the +_Divine Comedy_ or the _Oresteia_: how should it, when the first of +these can be called by its author a 'Comedy,' and when the second, +ending (as doubtless the _Prometheus_ trilogy also ended) with a +solution, is not in the Shakespearean sense a tragedy at all?[156] Nor +do I mean that _King Lear_ contains a revelation of righteous +omnipotence or heavenly harmony, or even a promise of the reconciliation +of mystery and justice. But then, as we saw, neither do Shakespeare's +other tragedies contain these things. Any theological interpretation of +the world on the author's part is excluded from them, and their effect +would be disordered or destroyed equally by the ideas of righteous or of +unrighteous omnipotence. Nor, in reading them, do we think of 'justice' +or 'equity' in the sense of a strict requital or such an adjustment of +merit and prosperity as our moral sense is said to demand; and there +never was vainer labour than that of critics who try to make out that +the persons in these dramas meet with 'justice' or their 'deserts.'[157] +But, on the other hand, man is not represented in these tragedies as the +mere plaything of a blind or capricious power, suffering woes which have +no relation to his character and actions; nor is the world represented +as given over to darkness. And in these respects _King Lear_, though the +most terrible of these works, does not differ in essence from the rest. +Its keynote is surely to be heard neither in the words wrung from +Gloster in his anguish, nor in Edgar's words 'the gods are just.' Its +final and total result is one in which pity and terror, carried perhaps +to the extreme limits of art, are so blended with a sense of law and +beauty that we feel at last, not depression and much less despair, but a +consciousness of greatness in pain, and of solemnity in the mystery we +cannot fathom. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 123: I leave undiscussed the position of _King Lear_ in +relation to the 'comedies' of _Measure for Measure_, _Troilus and +Cressida_ and _All's Well_.] + +[Footnote 124: See Note R.] + +[Footnote 125: On some of the points mentioned in this paragraph see +Note S.] + +[Footnote 126: + + '_Kent._ I thought the king had more affected the Duke of + Albany than Cornwall. + + _Glos._ It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division + of the kingdom, it appears not which of the dukes + he values most.' + +For (Gloster goes on to say) their shares are exactly equal in value. +And if the shares of the two elder daughters are fixed, obviously that +of the third is so too.] + +[Footnote 127: + + I loved her most, and thought to set my rest + On her kind nursery.] + +[Footnote 128: It is to Lear's altered plan that Kent applies these +words.] + +[Footnote 129: There is talk of a war between Goneril and Regan within a +fortnight of the division of the kingdom (II. i. 11 f.).] + +[Footnote 130: I mean that no sufficiently clear reason is supplied for +Edmund's delay in attempting to save Cordelia and Lear. The matter +stands thus. Edmund, after the defeat of the opposing army, sends Lear +and Cordelia to prison. Then, in accordance with a plan agreed on +between himself and Goneril, he despatches a captain with secret orders +to put them both to death _instantly_ (V. iii. 26-37, 244, 252). He then +has to fight with the disguised Edgar. He is mortally wounded, and, as +he lies dying, he says to Edgar (at line 162, _more than a hundred +lines_ after he gave that commission to the captain): + + What you have charged me with, that have I done; + And more, much more; the time will bring it out; + 'Tis past, and so am I. + +In 'more, much more' he seems to be thinking of the order for the deaths +of Lear and Cordelia (what else remained undisclosed?); yet he says +nothing about it. A few lines later he recognises the justice of his +fate, yet still says nothing. Then he hears the story of his father's +death, says it has moved him and 'shall perchance do good' (What good +except saving his victims?); yet he still says nothing. Even when he +hears that Goneril is dead and Regan poisoned, he _still_ says nothing. +It is only when directly questioned about Lear and Cordelia that he +tries to save the victims who were to be killed 'instantly' (242). How +can we explain his delay? Perhaps, thinking the deaths of Lear and +Cordelia would be of use to Goneril and Regan, he will not speak till he +is sure that both the sisters are dead. Or perhaps, though he can +recognise the justice of his fate and can be touched by the account of +his father's death, he is still too self-absorbed to rise to the active +effort to 'do some good, despite of his own nature.' But, while either +of these conjectures is possible, it is surely far from satisfactory +that we should be left to mere conjecture as to the cause of the delay +which permits the catastrophe to take place. The _real_ cause lies +outside the dramatic _nexus_. It is Shakespeare's wish to deliver a +sudden and crushing blow to the hopes which he has excited.] + +[Footnote 131: Everything in these paragraphs must, of course, be taken +in connection with later remarks.] + +[Footnote 132: I say 'the reader's,' because on the stage, whenever I +have seen _King Lear_, the 'cuts' necessitated by modern scenery would +have made this part of the play absolutely unintelligible to me if I had +not been familiar with it. It is significant that Lamb in his _Tale of +King Lear_ almost omits the sub-plot.] + +[Footnote 133: Even if Cordelia had won the battle, Shakespeare would +probably have hesitated to concentrate interest on it, for her victory +would have been a British defeat. On Spedding's view, that he did mean +to make the battle more interesting, and that his purpose has been +defeated by our wrong division of Acts IV. and V., see Note X.] + +[Footnote 134: It is vain to suggest that Edmund has only just come +home, and that the letter is supposed to have been sent to him when he +was 'out' See I. ii. 38-40, 65 f.] + +[Footnote 135: The idea in scene i., perhaps, is that Cordelia's +marriage, like the division of the kingdom, has really been +pre-arranged, and that the ceremony of choosing between France and +Burgundy (I. i. 46 f.) is a mere fiction. Burgundy is to be her husband, +and that is why, when Lear has cast her off, he offers her to Burgundy +first (l. 192 ff.). It might seem from 211 ff. that Lear's reason for +doing so is that he prefers France, or thinks him the greater man, and +therefore will not offer him first what is worthless: but the language +of France (240 ff.) seems to show that he recognises a prior right in +Burgundy.] + +[Footnote 136: See Note T. and p. 315.] + +[Footnote 137: See Note U.] + +[Footnote 138: The word 'heath' in the stage-directions of the +storm-scenes is, I may remark, Rowe's, not Shakespeare's, who never used +the word till he wrote _Macbeth_.] + +[Footnote 139: It is pointed out in Note V. that what modern editors +call Scenes ii., iii., iv. of Act II. are really one scene, for Kent is +on the stage through them all.] + +[Footnote 140: [On the locality of Act I., Sc. ii., see _Modern Language +Review_ for Oct., 1908, and Jan., 1909.]] + +[Footnote 141: This effect of the double action seems to have been +pointed out first by Schlegel.] + +[Footnote 142: How prevalent these are is not recognised by readers +familiar only with English poetry. See Simpson's _Introduction to the +Philosophy of Shakespeare's Sonnets_ (1868) and Mr. Wyndham's edition of +Shakespeare's Poems. Perhaps both writers overstate, and Simpson's +interpretations are often forced or arbitrary, but his book is valuable +and ought not to remain out of print.] + +[Footnote 143: The monstrosity here is a being with a woman's body and a +fiend's soul. For the interpretation of the lines see Note Y.] + +[Footnote 144: Since this paragraph was written I have found that the +abundance of these references has been pointed out and commented on by +J. Kirkman, _New Shaks. Soc. Trans._, 1877.] + +[Footnote 145: _E.g._ in _As You Like It_, III. ii. 187, 'I was never so +berhymed since Pythagoras' time, that I was an Irish rat, which I can +hardly remember'; _Twelfth Night_, IV. ii. 55, '_Clown._ What is the +opinion of Pythagoras concerning wild fowl? _Mal._ That the soul of our +grandam might haply inhabit a bird. _Clown._ What thinkest thou of his +opinion? _Mal._ I think nobly of the soul, and no way approve his +opinion,' etc. But earlier comes a passage which reminds us of _King +Lear_, _Merchant of Venice_, IV. i. 128: + + O be thou damn'd, inexecrable dog! + And for thy life let justice be accused. + Thou almost makest me waver in my faith + To hold opinion with Pythagoras, + That souls of animals infuse themselves + Into the trunks of men: thy currish spirit + Govern'd a wolf, who, hang'd for human slaughter, + Even from the gallows did his fell soul fleet, + And, whilst thou lay'st in thy unhallow'd dam, + Infused itself in thee; for thy desires + Are wolvish, bloody, starved and ravenous.] + +[Footnote 146: I fear it is not possible, however, to refute, on the +whole, one charge,--that the dog is a snob, in the sense that he +respects power and prosperity, and objects to the poor and despised. It +is curious that Shakespeare refers to this trait three times in _King +Lear_, as if he were feeling a peculiar disgust at it. See III. vi. 65, +'The little dogs and all,' etc.: IV. vi. 159, 'Thou hast seen a farmer's +dog bark at a beggar ... and the creature run from the cur? There thou +mightst behold the great image of authority': V. iii. 186, 'taught me to +shift Into a madman's rags; to assume a semblance That very dogs +disdain'd.' Cf. _Oxford Lectures_, p. 341.] + +[Footnote 147: With this compare the following lines in the great speech +on 'degree' in _Troilus and Cressida_, I. iii.: + + Take but degree away, untune that string, + And, hark, what discord follows! Each thing meets + In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters + Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores + And make a sop of all this solid globe: + Strength should be lord of imbecility, + And the rude son should strike his father dead: + Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong, + Between whose endless jar justice resides, + Should lose their names, and so should justice too. + Then everything includes itself in power, + Power into will, will into appetite; + And appetite, an universal wolf, + So doubly seconded with will and power, + Must make perforce an universal prey, + And last eat up himself.] + +[Footnote 148: Nor is it believable that Shakespeare, whose means of +imitating a storm were so greatly inferior even to ours, had the +stage-performance only or chiefly in view in composing these scenes. He +may not have thought of readers (or he may), but he must in any case +have written to satisfy his own imagination. I have taken no notice of +the part played in these scenes by anyone except Lear. The matter is too +huge, and too strictly poetic, for analysis. I may observe that in our +present theatres, owing to the use of elaborate scenery, the three +Storm-scenes are usually combined, with disastrous effect. Shakespeare, +as we saw (p. 49), interposed between them short scenes of much lower +tone.] + +[Footnote 149: 'justice,' Qq.] + +[Footnote 150: =approve.] + +[Footnote 151: The direction 'Storm and tempest' at the end of this +speech is not modern, it is in the Folio.] + +[Footnote 152: The gods are mentioned many times in _King Lear_, but +'God' only here (V. ii. 16).] + +[Footnote 153: The whole question how far Shakespeare's works represent +his personal feelings and attitude, and the changes in them, would carry +us so far beyond the bounds of the four tragedies, is so needless for +the understanding of them, and is so little capable of decision, that I +have excluded it from these lectures; and I will add here a note on it +only as it concerns the 'tragic period.' + +There are here two distinct sets of facts, equally important, (1) On the +one side there is the fact that, so far as we can make out, after +_Twelfth Night_ Shakespeare wrote, for seven or eight years, no play +which, like many of his earlier works, can be called happy, much less +merry or sunny. He wrote tragedies; and if the chronological order +_Hamlet_, _Othello_, _King Lear_, _Timon_, _Macbeth_, is correct, these +tragedies show for some time a deepening darkness, and _King Lear_ and +_Timon_ lie at the nadir. He wrote also in these years (probably in the +earlier of them) certain 'comedies,' _Measure for Measure_ and _Troilus +and Cressida_, and perhaps _All's Well_. But about these comedies there +is a peculiar air of coldness; there is humour, of course, but little +mirth; in _Measure for Measure_ perhaps, certainly in _Troilus and +Cressida_, a spirit of bitterness and contempt seems to pervade an +intellectual atmosphere of an intense but hard clearness. With _Macbeth_ +perhaps, and more decidedly in the two Roman tragedies which followed, +the gloom seems to lift; and the final romances show a mellow serenity +which sometimes warms into radiant sympathy, and even into a mirth +almost as light-hearted as that of younger days. When we consider these +facts, not as barely stated thus but as they affect us in reading the +plays, it is, to my mind, very hard to believe that their origin was +simply and solely a change in dramatic methods or choice of subjects, or +even merely such inward changes as may be expected to accompany the +arrival and progress of middle age. + +(2) On the other side, and over against these facts, we have to set the +multitudinousness of Shakespeare's genius, and his almost unlimited +power of conceiving and expressing human experience of all kinds. And we +have to set more. Apparently during this period of years he never ceased +to write busily, or to exhibit in his writings the greatest mental +activity. He wrote also either nothing or very little (_Troilus and +Cressida_ and his part of _Timon_ are the possible exceptions) in which +there is any appearance of personal feeling overcoming or seriously +endangering the self-control or 'objectivity' of the artist. And finally +it is not possible to make out any continuously deepening _personal_ +note: for although _Othello_ is darker than _Hamlet_ it surely strikes +one as about as impersonal as a play can be; and, on grounds of style +and versification, it appears (to me, at least) impossible to bring +_Troilus and Cressida_ chronologically close to _King Lear_ and _Timon_; +even if parts of it are later than others, the late parts must be +decidedly earlier than those plays. + +The conclusion we may very tentatively draw from these sets of facts +would seem to be as follows. Shakespeare during these years was probably +not a happy man, and it is quite likely that he felt at times even an +intense melancholy, bitterness, contempt, anger, possibly even loathing +and despair. It is quite likely too that he used these experiences of +his in writing such plays as _Hamlet_, _Troilus and Cressida_, _King +Lear_, _Timon_. But it is evident that he cannot have been for any +considerable time, if, ever, overwhelmed by such feelings, and there is +no appearance of their having issued in any settled 'pessimistic' +conviction which coloured his whole imagination and expressed itself in +his works. The choice of the subject of ingratitude, for instance, in +_King Lear_ and _Timon_, and the method of handling it, may have been +due in part to personal feeling; but it does not follow that this +feeling was particularly acute at this particular time, and, even if it +was, it certainly was not so absorbing as to hinder Shakespeare from +representing in the most sympathetic manner aspects of life the very +reverse of pessimistic. Whether the total impression of _King Lear_ can +be called pessimistic is a further question, which is considered in the +text.] + +[Footnote 154: _A Study of Shakespeare_, pp. 171, 172.] + +[Footnote 155: A flaw, I mean, in a work of art considered not as a +moral or theological document but as a work of art,--an aesthetic flaw. +I add the word 'considerable' because we do not regard the effect in +question as a flaw in a work like a lyric or a short piece of music, +which may naturally be taken as expressions merely of a mood or a +subordinate aspect of things.] + +[Footnote 156: Caution is very necessary in making comparisons between +Shakespeare and the Greek dramatists. A tragedy like the _Antigone_ +stands, in spite of differences, on the same ground as a Shakespearean +tragedy; it is a self-contained whole with a catastrophe. A drama like +the _Philoctetes_ is a self-contained whole, but, ending with a +solution, it corresponds not with a Shakespearean tragedy but with a +play like _Cymbeline_. A drama like the _Agamemnon_ or the _Prometheus +Vinctus_ answers to no Shakespearean form of play. It is not a +self-contained whole, but a part of a trilogy. If the trilogy is +considered as a unit, it answers not to _Hamlet_ but to _Cymbeline_. If +the part is considered as a whole, it answers to _Hamlet_, but may then +be open to serious criticism. Shakespeare never made a tragedy end with +the complete triumph of the worse side: the _Agamemnon_ and +_Prometheus_, if wrongly taken as wholes, would do this, and would so +far, I must think, be bad tragedies. [It can scarcely be necessary to +remind the reader that, in point of 'self-containedness,' there is a +difference of degree between the pure tragedies of Shakespeare and some +of the historical.]] + +[Footnote 157: I leave it to better authorities to say how far these +remarks apply also to Greek Tragedy, however much the language of +'justice' may be used there.] + + + + +LECTURE VIII + +KING LEAR + + +We have now to look at the characters in _King Lear_; and I propose to +consider them to some extent from the point of view indicated at the +close of the last lecture, partly because we have so far been regarding +the tragedy mainly from an opposite point of view, and partly because +these characters are so numerous that it would not be possible within +our limits to examine them fully. + + +1 + +The position of the hero in this tragedy is in one important respect +peculiar. The reader of _Hamlet_, _Othello_, or _Macbeth_, is in no +danger of forgetting, when the catastrophe is reached, the part played +by the hero in bringing it on. His fatal weakness, error, wrong-doing, +continues almost to the end. It is otherwise with _King Lear_. When the +conclusion arrives, the old King has for a long while been passive. We +have long regarded him not only as 'a man more sinned against than +sinning,' but almost wholly as a sufferer, hardly at all as an agent. +His sufferings too have been so cruel, and our indignation against those +who inflicted them has been so intense, that recollection of the wrong +he did to Cordelia, to Kent, and to his realm, has been well-nigh +effaced. Lastly, for nearly four Acts he has inspired in us, together +with this pity, much admiration and affection. The force of his passion +has made us feel that his nature was great; and his frankness and +generosity, his heroic efforts to be patient, the depth of his shame and +repentance, and the ecstasy of his re-union with Cordelia, have melted +our very hearts. Naturally, therefore, at the close we are in some +danger of forgetting that the storm which has overwhelmed him was +liberated by his own deed. + +Yet it is essential that Lear's contribution to the action of the drama +should be remembered; not at all in order that we may feel that he +'deserved' what he suffered, but because otherwise his fate would appear +to us at best pathetic, at worst shocking, but certainly not tragic. And +when we were reading the earlier scenes of the play we recognised this +contribution clearly enough. At the very beginning, it is true, we are +inclined to feel merely pity and misgivings. The first lines tell us +that Lear's mind is beginning to fail with age.[158] Formerly he had +perceived how different were the characters of Albany and Cornwall, but +now he seems either to have lost this perception or to be unwisely +ignoring it. The rashness of his division of the kingdom troubles us, +and we cannot but see with concern that its motive is mainly selfish. +The absurdity of the pretence of making the division depend on +protestations of love from his daughters, his complete blindness to the +hypocrisy which is patent to us at a glance, his piteous delight in +these protestations, the openness of his expressions of preference for +his youngest daughter--all make us smile, but all pain us. But pity +begins to give way to another feeling when we witness the precipitance, +the despotism, the uncontrolled anger of his injustice to Cordelia and +Kent, and the 'hideous rashness' of his persistence in dividing the +kingdom after the rejection of his one dutiful child. We feel now the +presence of force, as well as weakness, but we feel also the presence of +the tragic [Greek: hubris]. Lear, we see, is generous and unsuspicious, +of an open and free nature, like Hamlet and Othello and indeed most of +Shakespeare's heroes, who in this, according to Ben Jonson, resemble the +poet who made them. Lear, we see, is also choleric by temperament--the +first of Shakespeare's heroes who is so. And a long life of absolute +power, in which he has been flattered to the top of his bent, has +produced in him that blindness to human limitations, and that +presumptuous self-will, which in Greek tragedy we have so often seen +stumbling against the altar of Nemesis. Our consciousness that the decay +of old age contributes to this condition deepens our pity and our sense +of human infirmity, but certainly does not lead us to regard the old +King as irresponsible, and so to sever the tragic _nexus_ which binds +together his error and his calamities. + +The magnitude of this first error is generally fully recognised by the +reader owing to his sympathy with Cordelia, though, as we have seen, he +often loses the memory of it as the play advances. But this is not so, I +think, with the repetition of this error, in the quarrel with Goneril. +Here the daughter excites so much detestation, and the father so much +sympathy, that we often fail to receive the due impression of his +violence. There is not here, of course, the _injustice_ of his rejection +of Cordelia, but there is precisely the same [Greek: hubris]. This had +been shown most strikingly in the first scene when, _immediately_ upon +the apparently cold words of Cordelia, 'So young, my lord, and true,' +there comes this dreadful answer: + + Let it be so; thy truth then be thy dower. + For, by the sacred radiance of the sun, + The mysteries of Hecate and the night; + By all the operation of the orbs + From whom we do exist and cease to be; + Here I disclaim all my paternal care, + Propinquity and property of blood, + And as a stranger to my heart and me + Hold thee from this for ever. The barbarous Scythian, + Or he that makes his generation messes + To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom + Be as well neighbour'd, pitied and relieved, + As thou my sometime daughter. + +Now the dramatic effect of this passage is exactly, and doubtless +intentionally, repeated in the curse pronounced against Goneril. This +does not come after the daughters have openly and wholly turned against +their father. Up to the moment of its utterance Goneril has done no more +than to require him 'a little to disquantity' and reform his train of +knights. Certainly her manner and spirit in making this demand are +hateful, and probably her accusations against the knights are false; and +we should expect from any father in Lear's position passionate distress +and indignation. But surely the famous words which form Lear's immediate +reply were meant to be nothing short of frightful: + + Hear, nature, hear; dear goddess, hear! + Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend + To make this creature fruitful! + Into her womb convey sterility! + Dry up in her the organs of increase; + And from her derogate body never spring + A babe to honour her! If she must teem, + Create her child of spleen; that it may live, + And be a thwart disnatured torment to her! + Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth; + With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks; + Turn all her mother's pains and benefits + To laughter and contempt; that she may feel + How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is + To have a thankless child! + +The question is not whether Goneril deserves these appalling +imprecations, but what they tell us about Lear. They show that, although +he has already recognised his injustice towards Cordelia, is secretly +blaming himself, and is endeavouring to do better, the disposition from +which his first error sprang is still unchanged. And it is precisely the +disposition to give rise, in evil surroundings, to calamities dreadful +but at the same time tragic, because due in some measure to the person +who endures them. + +The perception of this connection, if it is not lost as the play +advances, does not at all diminish our pity for Lear, but it makes it +impossible for us permanently to regard the world displayed in this +tragedy as subject to a mere arbitrary or malicious power. It makes us +feel that this world is so far at least a rational and a moral order, +that there holds in it the law, not of proportionate requital, but of +strict connection between act and consequence. It is, so far, the world +of all Shakespeare's tragedies. + +But there is another aspect of Lear's story, the influence of which +modifies, in a way quite different and more peculiar to this tragedy, +the impressions called pessimistic and even this impression of law. +There is nothing more noble and beautiful in literature than +Shakespeare's exposition of the effect of suffering in reviving the +greatness and eliciting the sweetness of Lear's nature. The occasional +recurrence, during his madness, of autocratic impatience or of desire +for revenge serves only to heighten this effect, and the moments when +his insanity becomes merely infinitely piteous do not weaken it. The old +King who in pleading with his daughters feels so intensely his own +humiliation and their horrible ingratitude, and who yet, at fourscore +and upward, constrains himself to practise a self-control and patience +so many years disused; who out of old affection for his Fool, and in +repentance for his injustice to the Fool's beloved mistress, tolerates +incessant and cutting reminders of his own folly and wrong; in whom the +rage of the storm awakes a power and a poetic grandeur surpassing even +that of Othello's anguish; who comes in his affliction to think of +others first, and to seek, in tender solicitude for his poor boy, the +shelter he scorns for his own bare head; who learns to feel and to pray +for the miserable and houseless poor, to discern the falseness of +flattery and the brutality of authority, and to pierce below the +differences of rank and raiment to the common humanity beneath; whose +sight is so purged by scalding tears that it sees at last how power and +place and all things in the world are vanity except love; who tastes in +his last hours the extremes both of love's rapture and of its agony, but +could never, if he lived on or lived again, care a jot for aught +beside--there is no figure, surely, in the world of poetry at once so +grand, so pathetic, and so beautiful as his. Well, but Lear owes the +whole of this to those sufferings which made us doubt whether life were +not simply evil, and men like the flies which wanton boys torture for +their sport. Should we not be at least as near the truth if we called +this poem _The Redemption of King Lear_, and declared that the business +of 'the gods' with him was neither to torment him, nor to teach him a +'noble anger,' but to lead him to attain through apparently hopeless +failure the very end and aim of life? One can believe that Shakespeare +had been tempted at times to feel misanthropy and despair, but it is +quite impossible that he can have been mastered by such feelings at the +time when he produced this conception. + +To dwell on the stages of this process of purification (the word is +Professor Dowden's) is impossible here; and there are scenes, such as +that of the meeting of Lear and Cordelia, which it seems almost a +profanity to touch.[159] But I will refer to two scenes which may remind +us more in detail of some of the points just mentioned. The third and +fourth scenes of Act III. present one of those contrasts which speak as +eloquently even as Shakespeare's words, and which were made possible in +his theatre by the absence of scenery and the consequent absence of +intervals between the scenes. First, in a scene of twenty-three lines, +mostly in prose, Gloster is shown, telling his son Edmund how Goneril +and Regan have forbidden him on pain of death to succour the houseless +King; how a secret letter has reached him, announcing the arrival of a +French force; and how, whatever the consequences may be, he is +determined to relieve his old master. Edmund, left alone, soliloquises +in words which seem to freeze one's blood: + + This courtesy, forbid thee, shall the duke + Instantly know; and of that letter too: + This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me + That which my father loses; no less than all: + The younger rises when the old doth fall. + +He goes out; and the next moment, as the fourth scene opens, we find +ourselves in the icy storm with Lear, Kent and the Fool, and yet in the +inmost shrine of love. I am not speaking of the devotion of the others +to Lear, but of Lear himself. He had consented, merely for the Fool's +sake, to seek shelter in the hovel: + + Come, your hovel. + Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart + That's sorry yet for thee. + +But on the way he has broken down and has been weeping (III. iv. 17), +and now he resists Kent's efforts to persuade him to enter. He does not +feel the storm: + + when the mind's free + The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind + Doth from my senses take all feeling else + Save what beats there: + +and the thoughts that will drive him mad are burning in his brain: + + Filial ingratitude! + Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand + For lifting food to't? But I will punish home. + No, I will weep no more. In such a night + To shut me out! Pour on; I will endure. + In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril! + Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,-- + O, that way madness lies; let me shun that; + No more of that. + +And then suddenly, as he controls himself, the blessed spirit of +kindness breathes on him 'like a meadow gale of spring,' and he turns +gently to Kent: + + Prithee, go in thyself; seek thine own ease: + This tempest will not give me leave to ponder + On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in. + In, boy; go first. You houseless poverty-- + Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll sleep. + +But his prayer is not for himself. + + Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, + +it begins, and I need not quote more. This is one of those passages +which make one worship Shakespeare.[160] + +Much has been written on the representation of insanity in _King Lear_, +and I will confine myself to one or two points which may have escaped +notice. The most obvious symptom of Lear's insanity, especially in its +first stages, is of course the domination of a fixed idea. Whatever +presents itself to his senses, is seized on by this idea and compelled +to express it; as for example in those words, already quoted, which +first show that his mind has actually given way: + + Hast thou given all + To thy two daughters? And art thou come to this?[161] + +But it is remarkable that what we have here is only, in an exaggerated +and perverted form, the very same action of imagination that, just +before the breakdown of reason, produced those sublime appeals: + + O heavens, + If you do love old men, if your sweet sway + Allow obedience, if yourselves are old, + Make it your cause; + +and: + + Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain! + Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters: + I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness; + I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children, + You owe me no subscription: then let fall + Your horrible pleasure; here I stand, your slave, + A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man: + But yet I call you servile ministers, + That have with two pernicious daughters join'd + Your high engender'd battles 'gainst a head + So old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul! + +Shakespeare, long before this, in the _Midsummer Night's Dream_, had +noticed the resemblance between the lunatic, the lover, and the poet; +and the partial truth that genius is allied to insanity was quite +familiar to him. But he presents here the supplementary half-truth that +insanity is allied to genius. + +He does not, however, put into the mouth of the insane Lear any such +sublime passages as those just quoted. Lear's insanity, which destroys +the coherence, also reduces the poetry of his imagination. What it +stimulates is that power of moral perception and reflection which had +already been quickened by his sufferings. This, however partial and +however disconnectedly used, first appears, quite soon after the +insanity has declared itself, in the idea that the naked beggar +represents truth and reality, in contrast with those conventions, +flatteries, and corruptions of the great world, by which Lear has so +long been deceived and will never be deceived again: + + Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou owest the + worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no + perfume. Ha! here's three on's are sophisticated: thou art the + thing itself. + +Lear regards the beggar therefore with reverence and delight, as a +person who is in the secret of things, and he longs to question him +about their causes. It is this same strain of thought which much later +(IV. vi.), gaining far greater force, though the insanity has otherwise +advanced, issues in those famous Timon-like speeches which make us +realise the original strength of the old King's mind. And when this +strain, on his recovery, unites with the streams of repentance and love, +it produces that serene renunciation of the world, with its power and +glory and resentments and revenges, which is expressed in the speech (V. +iii.): + + No, no, no, no! Come, let's away to prison: + We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage: + When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, + And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live, + And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh + At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues + Talk of court news; and we'll talk with them too, + Who loses, and who wins; who's in, who's out; + And take upon's the mystery of things, + As if we were God's spies: and we'll wear out, + In a wall'd prison, packs and sets of great ones, + That ebb and flow by the moon. + +This is that renunciation which is at the same time a sacrifice offered +to the gods, and on which the gods themselves throw incense; and, it may +be, it would never have been offered but for the knowledge that came to +Lear in his madness. + +I spoke of Lear's 'recovery,' but the word is too strong. The Lear of +the Fifth Act is not indeed insane, but his mind is greatly enfeebled. +The speech just quoted is followed by a sudden flash of the old +passionate nature, reminding us most pathetically of Lear's efforts, +just before his madness, to restrain his tears: + + Wipe thine eyes: + The good-years shall devour them, flesh and fell, + Ere they shall make us weep: we'll see 'em starve first. + +And this weakness is still more pathetically shown in the blindness of +the old King to his position now that he and Cordelia are made +prisoners. It is evident that Cordelia knows well what mercy her father +is likely to receive from her sisters; that is the reason of her +weeping. But he does not understand her tears; it never crosses his mind +that they have anything more than imprisonment to fear. And what is that +to them? They have made that sacrifice, and all is well: + + Have I caught thee? + He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven, + And fire us hence like foxes. + +This blindness is most affecting to us, who know in what manner they +will be parted; but it is also comforting. And we find the same mingling +of effects in the overwhelming conclusion of the story. If to the +reader, as to the bystanders, that scene brings one unbroken pain, it is +not so with Lear himself. His shattered mind passes from the first +transports of hope and despair, as he bends over Cordelia's body and +holds the feather to her lips, into an absolute forgetfulness of the +cause of these transports. This continues so long as he can converse +with Kent; becomes an almost complete vacancy; and is disturbed only to +yield, as his eyes suddenly fall again on his child's corpse, to an +agony which at once breaks his heart. And, finally, though he is killed +by an agony of pain, the agony in which he actually dies is one not of +pain but of ecstasy. Suddenly, with a cry represented in the oldest text +by a four-times repeated 'O,' he exclaims: + + Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips, + Look there, look there! + +These are the last words of Lear. He is sure, at last, that she _lives_: +and what had he said when he was still in doubt? + + She lives! if it be so, + It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows + That ever I have felt! + +To us, perhaps, the knowledge that he is deceived may bring a +culmination of pain: but, if it brings _only_ that, I believe we are +false to Shakespeare, and it seems almost beyond question that any actor +is false to the text who does not attempt to express, in Lear's last +accents and gestures and look, an unbearable _joy_.[162] + +To dwell on the pathos of Lear's last speech would be an impertinence, +but I may add a remark on the speech from the literary point of view. In +the simplicity of its language, which consists almost wholly of +monosyllables of native origin, composed in very brief sentences of the +plainest structure, it presents an extraordinary contrast to the dying +speech of Hamlet and the last words of Othello to the by-standers. The +fact that Lear speaks in passion is one cause of the difference, but not +the sole cause. The language is more than simple, it is familiar. And +this familiarity is characteristic of Lear (except at certain moments, +already referred to) from the time of his madness onwards, and is the +source of the peculiarly poignant effect of some of his sentences (such +as 'The little dogs and all....'). We feel in them the loss of power to +sustain his royal dignity; we feel also that everything external has +become nothingness to him, and that what remains is 'the thing itself,' +the soul in its bare greatness. Hence also it is that two lines in this +last speech show, better perhaps than any other passage of poetry, one +of the qualities we have in mind when we distinguish poetry as +'romantic.' Nothing like Hamlet's mysterious sigh 'The rest is silence,' +nothing like Othello's memories of his life of marvel and achievement, +was possible to Lear. Those last thoughts are romantic in their +strangeness: Lear's five-times repeated 'Never,' in which the simplest +and most unanswerable cry of anguish rises note by note till the heart +breaks, is romantic in its naturalism; and to make a verse out of this +one word required the boldness as well as the inspiration which came +infallibly to Shakespeare at the greatest moments. But the familiarity, +boldness and inspiration are surpassed (if that can be) by the next +line, which shows the bodily oppression asking for bodily relief. The +imagination that produced Lear's curse or his defiance of the storm may +be paralleled in its kind, but where else are we to seek the imagination +that could venture to follow that cry of 'Never' with such a phrase as +'undo this button,' and yet could leave us on the topmost peaks of +poetry?[163] + + +2 + +Gloster and Albany are the two neutral characters of the tragedy. The +parallel between Lear and Gloster, already noticed, is, up to a certain +point, so marked that it cannot possibly be accidental. Both are old +white-haired men (III. vii. 37); both, it would seem, widowers, with +children comparatively young. Like Lear, Gloster is tormented, and his +life is sought, by the child whom he favours; he is tended and healed by +the child whom he has wronged. His sufferings, like Lear's, are partly +traceable to his own extreme folly and injustice, and, it may be added, +to a selfish pursuit of his own pleasure.[164] His sufferings, again, +like Lear's, purify and enlighten him: he dies a better and wiser man +than he showed himself at first. They even learn the same lesson, and +Gloster's repetition (noticed and blamed by Johnson) of the thought in a +famous speech of Lear's is surely intentional.[165] And, finally, +Gloster dies almost as Lear dies. Edgar reveals himself to him and asks +his blessing (as Cordelia asks Lear's): + + but his flaw'd heart-- + Alack, too weak the conflict to support-- + 'Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief, + Burst smilingly. + +So far, the resemblance of the two stories, and also of the ways in +which their painful effect is modified, is curiously close. And in +character too Gloster is, like his master, affectionate,[166] credulous +and hasty. But otherwise he is sharply contrasted with the tragic Lear, +who is a towering figure, every inch a king,[167] while Gloster is built +on a much smaller scale, and has infinitely less force and fire. He is, +indeed, a decidedly weak though good-hearted man; and, failing wholly to +support Kent in resisting Lear's original folly and injustice,[168] he +only gradually takes the better part. Nor is his character either very +interesting or very distinct. He often gives one the impression of being +wanted mainly to fill a place in the scheme of the play; and, though it +would be easy to give a long list of his characteristics, they scarcely, +it seems to me, compose an individual, a person whom we are sure we +should recognise at once. If this is so, the fact is curious, +considering how much we see and hear of him. + +I will add a single note. Gloster is the superstitious character of the +drama,--the only one. He thinks much of 'these late eclipses in the sun +and moon.' His two sons, from opposite points of view, make nothing of +them. His easy acceptance of the calumny against Edgar is partly due to +this weakness, and Edmund builds upon it, for an evil purpose, when he +describes Edgar thus: + + Here stood he in the dark, his sharp sword out, + Mumbling of wicked charms, conjuring the moon, + To prove's auspicious mistress. + +Edgar in turn builds upon it, for a good purpose, when he persuades his +blind father that he was led to jump down Dover cliff by the temptation +of a fiend in the form of a beggar, and was saved by a miracle: + + As I stood here below, methought his eyes + Were two full moons; he had a thousand noses, + Horns whelk'd and waved like the enridged sea: + It was some fiend; therefore, thou happy father, + Think that the clearest gods, who make them honours + Of men's impossibilities, have preserved thee. + +This passage is odd in its collocation of the thousand noses and the +clearest gods, of grotesque absurdity and extreme seriousness. Edgar +knew that the 'fiend' was really Gloster's 'worser spirit,' and that +'the gods' were himself. Doubtless, however--for he is the most +religious person in the play--he thought that it _was_ the gods who, +through him, had preserved his father; but he knew that the truth could +only enter this superstitious mind in a superstitious form. + +The combination of parallelism and contrast that we observe in Lear and +Gloster, and again in the attitude of the two brothers to their father's +superstition, is one of many indications that in _King Lear_ Shakespeare +was working more than usual on a basis of conscious and reflective +ideas. Perhaps it is not by accident, then, that he makes Edgar and Lear +preach to Gloster in precisely the same strain. Lear says to him: + + If thou wilt weep my fortunes, take my eyes. + I know thee well enough; thy name is Gloster: + Thou must be patient; we came crying hither: + Thou know'st, the first time that we smell the air, + We wawl and cry. I will preach to thee: mark. + +Edgar's last words to him are: + + What, in ill thoughts again? Men must endure + Their going hence, even as their coming hither: + Ripeness is all. + +Albany is merely sketched, and he is so generally neglected that a few +words about him may be in place. He too ends a better and wiser man than +he began. When the play opens he is, of course, only just married to +Goneril; and the idea is, I think, that he has been bewitched by her +fiery beauty not less than by her dowry. He is an inoffensive +peace-loving man, and is overborne at first by his 'great love' for his +wife and by her imperious will. He is not free from responsibility for +the treatment which the King receives in his house; the Knight says to +Lear, 'there's a great abatement of kindness appears as well in the +general dependants as in _the duke himself also_ and your daughter.' But +he takes no part in the quarrel, and doubtless speaks truly when he +protests that he is as guiltless as ignorant of the cause of Lear's +violent passion. When the King departs, he begins to remonstrate with +Goneril, but shrinks in a cowardly manner, which is a trifle comical, +from contest with her. She leaves him behind when she goes to join +Regan, and he is not further responsible for what follows. When he hears +of it, he is struck with horror: the scales drop from his eyes, Goneril +becomes hateful to him, he determines to revenge Gloster's eyes. His +position is however very difficult, as he is willing to fight against +Cordelia in so far as her army is French, and unwilling in so far as she +represents her father. This difficulty, and his natural inferiority to +Edmund in force and ability, pushes him into the background; the battle +is not won by him but by Edmund; and but for Edgar he would certainly +have fallen a victim to the murderous plot against him. When it is +discovered, however, he is fearless and resolute enough, beside being +full of kind feeling towards Kent and Edgar, and of sympathetic distress +at Gloster's death. And one would be sure that he is meant to retain +this strength till the end, but for his last words. He has announced his +intention of resigning, during Lear's life, the 'absolute power' which +has come to him; and that may be right. But after Lear's death he says +to Kent and Edgar: + + Friends of my soul, you twain + Rule in this realm, and the gored state sustain. + +If this means that he wishes to hand over his absolute power to them, +Shakespeare's intention is certainly to mark the feebleness of a +well-meaning but weak man. But possibly he means by 'this realm' only +that half of Britain which had belonged to Cornwall and Regan. + + +3 + +I turn now to those two strongly contrasted groups of good and evil +beings; and to the evil first. The members of this group are by no means +on a level. Far the most contemptible of them is Oswald, and Kent has +fortunately expressed our feelings towards him. Yet twice we are able to +feel sympathy with him. Regan cannot tempt him to let her open Goneril's +letter to Edmund; and his last thought as he dies is given to the +fulfilment of his trust. It is to a monster that he is faithful, and he +is faithful to her in a monstrous design. Still faithfulness is +faithfulness, and he is not wholly worthless. Dr. Johnson says: 'I know +not well why Shakespeare gives to Oswald, who is a mere factor of +wickedness, so much fidelity'; but in any other tragedy this touch, so +true to human nature, is only what we should expect. If it surprises us +in _King Lear_, the reason is that Shakespeare, in dealing with the +other members of the group, seems to have been less concerned than usual +with such mingling of light with darkness, and intent rather on making +the shadows as utterly black as a regard for truth would permit. + +Cornwall seems to have been a fit mate for Regan; and what worse can be +said of him? It is a great satisfaction to think that he endured what to +him must have seemed the dreadful disgrace of being killed by a servant. +He shows, I believe, no redeeming trait, and he is a coward, as may be +seen from the sudden rise in his courage when Goneril arrives at the +castle and supports him and Regan against Lear (II. iv. 202). But as his +cruelties are not aimed at a blood-relation, he is not, in this sense, a +'monster,' like the remaining three. + +Which of these three is the least and which the most detestable there +can surely be no question. For Edmund, not to mention other +alleviations, is at any rate not a woman. And the differences between +the sisters, which are distinctly marked and need not be exhibited once +more in full, are all in favour of 'the elder and more terrible.' That +Regan did not commit adultery, did not murder her sister or plot to +murder her husband, did not join her name with Edmund's on the order for +the deaths of Cordelia and Lear, and in other respects failed to take +quite so active a part as Goneril in atrocious wickedness, is quite true +but not in the least to her credit. It only means that she had much less +force, courage and initiative than her sister, and for that reason is +less formidable and more loathsome. Edmund judged right when, caring for +neither sister but aiming at the crown, he preferred Goneril, for he +could trust her to remove the living impediments to her desires. The +scornful and fearless exclamation, 'An interlude!' with which she greets +the exposure of her design, was quite beyond Regan. Her unhesitating +suicide was perhaps no less so. She would not have condescended to the +lie which Regan so needlessly tells to Oswald: + + It was great ignorance, Gloster's eyes being out, + To let him live: where he arrives he moves + All hearts against us: Edmund, I think, is gone, + _In pity of his misery_, to dispatch + His nighted life. + +Her father's curse is nothing to her. She scorns even to mention the +gods.[169] Horrible as she is, she is almost awful. But, to set against +Regan's inferiority in power, there is nothing: she is superior only in +a venomous meanness which is almost as hateful as her cruelty. She is +the most hideous human being (if she is one) that Shakespeare ever drew. + +I have already noticed the resemblance between Edmund and Iago in one +point; and Edmund recalls his greater forerunner also in courage, +strength of will, address, egoism, an abnormal want of feeling, and the +possession of a sense of humour. But here the likeness ends. Indeed a +decided difference is observable even in the humour. Edmund is +apparently a good deal younger than Iago. He has a lighter and more +superficial nature, and there is a certain genuine gaiety in him which +makes one smile not unsympathetically as one listens to his first +soliloquy, with its cheery conclusion, so unlike Iago's references to +the powers of darkness, + + Now, gods, stand up for bastards! + +Even after we have witnessed his dreadful deeds, a touch of this +sympathy is felt again when we hear his nonchalant reflections before +the battle: + + To both these sisters have I sworn my love: + Each jealous of the other, as the stung + Are of the adder. Which of them shall I take? + Both? one? or neither? + +Besides, there is nothing in Edmund of Iago's motive-hunting, and very +little of any of the secret forces which impelled Iago. He is +comparatively a straightforward character, as straightforward as the +Iago of some critics. He moves wonder and horror merely because the fact +that a man so young can have a nature so bad is a dark mystery. + +Edmund is an adventurer pure and simple. He acts in pursuance of a +purpose, and, if he has any affections or dislikes, ignores them. He is +determined to make his way, first to his brother's lands, then--as the +prospect widens--to the crown; and he regards men and women, with their +virtues and vices, together with the bonds of kinship, friendship, or +allegiance, merely as hindrances or helps to his end. They are for him +divested of all quality except their relation to this end; as +indifferent as mathematical quantities or mere physical agents. + + A credulous father and a brother noble, + ... I see the business, + +he says, as if he were talking of _x_ and _y_. + + This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me + That which my father loses; no less than all: + The younger rises when the old doth fall: + +he meditates, as if he were considering a problem in mechanics. He +preserves this attitude with perfect consistency until the possibility +of attaining his end is snatched from him by death. + +Like the deformity of Richard, Edmund's illegitimacy furnishes, of +course, no excuse for his villainy, but it somewhat influences our +feelings. It is no fault of his, and yet it separates him from other +men. He is the product of Nature--of a natural appetite asserting itself +against the social order; and he has no recognised place within this +order. So he devotes himself to Nature, whose law is that of the +stronger, and who does not recognise those moral obligations which exist +only by convention,--by 'custom' or 'the curiosity of nations.'[170] +Practically, his attitude is that of a professional criminal. 'You tell +me I do not belong to you,' he seems to say to society: 'very well: I +will make my way into your treasure-house if I can. And if I have to +take life in doing so, that is your affair.' How far he is serious in +this attitude, and really indignant at the brand of bastardy, how far +his indignation is a half-conscious self-excuse for his meditated +villainy, it is hard to say; but the end shows that he is not entirely +in earnest. + +As he is an adventurer, with no more ill-will to anyone than good-will, +it is natural that, when he has lost the game, he should accept his +failure without showing personal animosity. But he does more. He admits +the truth of Edgar's words about the justice of the gods, and applies +them to his own case (though the fact that he himself refers to +fortune's wheel rather than to the gods may be significant). He shows +too that he is not destitute of feeling; for he is touched by the story +of his father's death, and at last 'pants for life' in the effort to do +'some good' by saving Lear and Cordelia. There is something pathetic +here which tempts one to dream that, if Edmund had been whole brother to +Edgar, and had been at home during those 'nine years' when he was 'out,' +he might have been a very different man. But perhaps his words, + + Some good I mean to do, + _Despite of mine own nature_, + +suggest rather that Shakespeare is emphasising the mysterious fact, +commented on by Kent in the case of the three daughters of Lear, of an +immense original difference between children of one father. Stranger +than this emergence of better feelings, and curiously pathetic, is the +pleasure of the dying man in the thought that he was loved by both the +women whose corpses are almost the last sight he is to see. Perhaps, as +we conjectured, the cause of his delay in saving Lear and Cordelia even +after he hears of the deaths of the sisters is that he is sunk in dreamy +reflections on his past. When he murmurs, 'Yet Edmund was beloved,' one +is almost in danger of forgetting that he had done much more than reject +the love of his father and half-brother. The passage is one of several +in Shakespeare's plays where it strikes us that he is recording some +fact about human nature with which he had actually met, and which had +seemed to him peculiarly strange. + +What are we to say of the world which contains these five beings, +Goneril, Regan, Edmund, Cornwall, Oswald? I have tried to answer this +question in our first lecture; for in its representation of evil _King +Lear_ differs from the other tragedies only in degree and manner. It is +the tragedy in which evil is shown in the greatest abundance; and the +evil characters are peculiarly repellent from their hard savagery, and +because so little good is mingled with their evil. The effect is +therefore more startling than elsewhere; it is even appalling. But in +substance it is the same as elsewhere; and accordingly, although it may +be useful to recall here our previous discussion, I will do so only by +the briefest statement. + +On the one hand we see a world which generates terrible evil in +profusion. Further, the beings in whom this evil appears at its +strongest are able, to a certain extent, to thrive. They are not +unhappy, and they have power to spread misery and destruction around +them. All this is undeniable fact. + +On the other hand this evil is _merely_ destructive: it founds nothing, +and seems capable of existing only on foundations laid by its opposite. +It is also self-destructive: it sets these beings at enmity; they can +scarcely unite against a common and pressing danger; if it were averted +they would be at each other's throats in a moment; the sisters do not +even wait till it is past. Finally, these beings, all five of them, are +dead a few weeks after we see them first; three at least die young; the +outburst of their evil is fatal to them. These also are undeniable +facts; and, in face of them, it seems odd to describe _King Lear_ as 'a +play in which the wicked prosper' (Johnson). + +Thus the world in which evil appears seems to be at heart unfriendly to +it. And this impression is confirmed by the fact that the convulsion of +this world is due to evil, mainly in the worst forms here considered, +partly in the milder forms which we call the errors or defects of the +better characters. Good, in the widest sense, seems thus to be the +principle of life and health in the world; evil, at least in these worst +forms, to be a poison. The world reacts against it violently, and, in +the struggle to expel it, is driven to devastate itself. + +If we ask why the world should generate that which convulses and wastes +it, the tragedy gives no answer, and we are trying to go beyond tragedy +in seeking one. But the world, in this tragic picture, is convulsed by +evil, and rejects it. + + +4 + +And if here there is 'very Night herself,' she comes 'with stars in her +raiment.' Cordelia, Kent, Edgar, the Fool--these form a group not less +remarkable than that which we have just left. There is in the world of +_King Lear_ the same abundance of extreme good as of extreme evil. It +generates in profusion self-less devotion and unconquerable love. And +the strange thing is that neither Shakespeare nor we are surprised. We +approve these characters, admire them, love them; but we feel no +mystery. We do not ask in bewilderment, Is there any cause in nature +that makes these kind hearts? Such hardened optimists are we, and +Shakespeare,--and those who find the darkness of revelation in a tragedy +which reveals Cordelia. Yet surely, if we condemn the universe for +Cordelia's death, we ought also to remember that it gave her birth. The +fact that Socrates was executed does not remove the fact that he lived, +and the inference thence to be drawn about the world that produced him. + +Of these four characters Edgar excites the least enthusiasm, but he is +the one whose development is the most marked. His behaviour in the early +part of the play, granted that it is not too improbable, is so foolish +as to provoke one. But he learns by experience, and becomes the most +capable person in the story, without losing any of his purity and +nobility of mind. There remain in him, however, touches which a little +chill one's feeling for him. + + The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices + Make instruments to plague us: + The dark and vicious place where thee he got + Cost him his eyes: + +--one wishes he had not said to his dying brother those words about +their dead father. 'The gods are just' would have been enough.[171] It +may be suggested that Shakespeare merely wished to introduce this moral +somehow, and did not mean the speech to be characteristic of the +speaker. But I doubt this: he might well have delivered it through +Albany, if he was determined to deliver it. This trait in Edgar _is_ +characteristic. It seems to be connected with his pronounced and +conscious religiousness. He interprets everything religiously, and is +speaking here from an intense conviction which overrides personal +feelings. With this religiousness, on the other side, is connected his +cheerful and confident endurance, and his practical helpfulness and +resource. He never thinks of despairing; in the worst circumstances he +is sure there is something to be done to make things better. And he is +sure of this, not only from temperament, but from faith in 'the clearest +gods.' He is the man on whom we are to rely at the end for the recovery +and welfare of the state: and we do rely on him. + +I spoke of his temperament. There is in Edgar, with much else that is +fine, something of that buoyancy of spirit which charms us in Imogen. +Nothing can subdue in him the feeling that life is sweet and must be +cherished. At his worst, misconstrued, contemned, exiled, under sentence +of death, 'the lowest and most dejected thing of fortune,' he keeps his +head erect. The inextinguishable spirit of youth and delight is in him; +he _embraces_ the unsubstantial air which has blown him to the worst; +for him 'the worst returns to laughter.'[172] 'Bear free and patient +thoughts,' he says to his father. His own thoughts are more than +patient, they are 'free,' even joyous, in spite of the tender sympathies +which strive in vain to overwhelm him. This ability to feel and offer +great sympathy with distress, without losing through the sympathy any +elasticity or strength, is a noble quality, sometimes found in souls +like Edgar's, naturally buoyant and also religious. It may even be +characteristic of him that, when Lear is sinking down in death, he tries +to rouse him and bring him back to life. 'Look up, my lord!' he cries. +It is Kent who feels that + + he hates him, + That would upon the rack of this tough world + Stretch him out longer. + +Kent is one of the best-loved characters in Shakespeare. He is beloved +for his own sake, and also for the sake of Cordelia and of Lear. We are +grateful to him because he stands up for Cordelia, and because, when she +is out of sight, he constantly keeps her in our minds. And how well +these two love each other we see when they meet. Yet it is not Cordelia +who is dearest to Kent. His love for Lear is the passion of his life: it +_is_ his life. At the beginning he braves Lear's wrath even more for +Lear's sake than Cordelia's.[173] At the end he seems to realise +Cordelia's death only as it is reflected in Lear's agony. Nor does he +merely love his master passionately, as Cordelia loves her father. That +word 'master,' and Kent's appeal to the 'authority' he saw in the old +King's face, are significant. He belongs to Lear, body and soul, as a +dog does to his master and god. The King is not to him old, wayward, +unreasonable, piteous: he is still terrible, grand, the king of men. +Through his eyes we see the Lear of Lear's prime, whom Cordelia never +saw. Kent never forgets this Lear. In the Storm-scenes, even after the +King becomes insane, Kent never addresses him without the old terms of +respect, 'your grace,' 'my lord,' 'sir.' How characteristic it is that +in the scene of Lear's recovery Kent speaks to him but once: it is when +the King asks 'Am I in France?' and he answers 'In your own kingdom, +sir.' + +In acting the part of a blunt and eccentric serving-man Kent retains +much of his natural character. The eccentricity seems to be put on, but +the plainness which gets him set in the stocks is but an exaggeration of +his plainness in the opening scene, and Shakespeare certainly meant him +for one of those characters whom we love none the less for their +defects. He is hot and rash; noble but far from skilful in his +resistance to the King; he might well have chosen wiser words to gain +his point. But, as he himself says, he has more man than wit about him. +He shows this again when he rejoins Lear as a servant, for he at once +brings the quarrel with Goneril to a head; and, later, by falling upon +Oswald, whom he so detests that he cannot keep his hands off him, he +provides Regan and Cornwall with a pretext for their inhospitality. One +has not the heart to wish him different, but he illustrates the truth +that to run one's head unselfishly against a wall is not the best way to +help one's friends. + +One fact about Kent is often overlooked. He is an old man. He tells Lear +that he is eight and forty, but it is clear that he is much older; not +so old as his master, who was 'four-score and upward' and whom he 'loved +as his father,' but, one may suppose, three-score and upward. From the +first scene we get this impression, and in the scene with Oswald it is +repeatedly confirmed. His beard is grey. 'Ancient ruffian,' 'old +fellow,' 'you stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart'--these are +some of the expressions applied to him. 'Sir,' he says to Cornwall, 'I +am too old to learn.' If his age is not remembered, we fail to realise +the full beauty of his thoughtlessness of himself, his incessant care of +the King, his light-hearted indifference to fortune or fate.[174] We +lose also some of the naturalness and pathos of his feeling that his +task is nearly done. Even at the end of the Fourth Act we find him +saying, + + My point and period will be throughly wrought + Or well or ill, as this day's battle's fought. + +His heart is ready to break when he falls with his strong arms about +Edgar's neck; bellows out as he'd burst heaven (how like him!); + + threw him on my father, + Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him + That ever ear received; which in recounting + His grief grew puissant, and the strings of life + Began to crack. Twice then the trumpet sounded, + And there I left him tranced; + +and a little after, when he enters, we hear the sound of death in his +voice: + + I am come + To bid my king and master aye goodnight. + +This desire possesses him wholly. When the bodies of Goneril and Regan +are brought in he asks merely, 'Alack, why thus?' How can he care? He is +waiting for one thing alone. He cannot but yearn for recognition, cannot +but beg for it even when Lear is bending over the body of Cordelia; and +even in that scene of unmatched pathos we feel a sharp pang at his +failure to receive it. It is of himself he is speaking, perhaps, when he +murmurs, as his master dies, 'Break, heart, I prithee, break!' He puts +aside Albany's invitation to take part in the government; his task is +over: + + I have a journey, sir, shortly to go: + My master calls me; I must not say no. + +Kent in his devotion, his self-effacement, his cheerful stoicism, his +desire to follow his dead lord, has been well likened to Horatio. But +Horatio is not old; nor is he hot-headed; and though he is stoical he is +also religious. Kent, as compared with him and with Edgar, is not so. He +has not Edgar's ever-present faith in the 'clearest gods.' He refers to +them, in fact, less often than to fortune or the stars. He lives mainly +by the love in his own heart.[175] + + * * * * * + +The theatrical fool or clown (we need not distinguish them here) was a +sore trial to the cultured poet and spectator in Shakespeare's day. He +came down from the Morality plays, and was beloved of the groundlings. +His antics, his songs, his dances, his jests, too often unclean, +delighted them, and did something to make the drama, what the vulgar, +poor or rich, like it to be, a variety entertainment. Even if he +confined himself to what was set down for him, he often disturbed the +dramatic unity of the piece; and the temptation to 'gag' was too strong +for him to resist. Shakespeare makes Hamlet object to it in emphatic +terms. The more learned critics and poets went further and would have +abolished the fool altogether. His part declines as the drama advances, +diminishing markedly at the end of the sixteenth century. Jonson and +Massinger exclude him. Shakespeare used him--we know to what effect--as +he used all the other popular elements of the drama; but he abstained +from introducing him into the Roman plays,[176] and there is no fool in +the last of the pure tragedies, _Macbeth_. + +But the Fool is one of Shakespeare's triumphs in _King Lear_. Imagine +the tragedy without him, and you hardly know it. To remove him would +spoil its harmony, as the harmony of a picture would be spoiled if one +of the colours were extracted. One can almost imagine that Shakespeare, +going home from an evening at the Mermaid, where he had listened to +Jonson fulminating against fools in general and perhaps criticising the +Clown in _Twelfth Night_ in particular, had said to himself: 'Come, my +friends, I will show you once for all that the mischief is in you, and +not in the fool or the audience. I will have a fool in the most tragic +of my tragedies. He shall not play a little part. He shall keep from +first to last the company in which you most object to see him, the +company of a king. Instead of amusing the king's idle hours, he shall +stand by him in the very tempest and whirlwind of passion. Before I have +done you shall confess, between laughter and tears, that he is of the +very essence of life, that you have known him all your days though you +never recognised him till now, and that you would as soon go without +Hamlet as miss him.' + +The Fool in _King Lear_ has been so favourite a subject with good +critics that I will confine myself to one or two points on which a +difference of opinion is possible. To suppose that the Fool is, like +many a domestic fool at that time, a perfectly sane man pretending to be +half-witted, is surely a most prosaic blunder. There is no difficulty in +imagining that, being slightly touched in the brain, and holding the +office of fool, he performs the duties of his office intentionally as +well as involuntarily: it is evident that he does so. But unless we +suppose that he _is_ touched in the brain we lose half the effect of +his appearance in the Storm-scenes. The effect of those scenes (to state +the matter as plainly as possible) depends largely on the presence of +three characters, and on the affinities and contrasts between them; on +our perception that the differences of station in King, Fool, and +beggar-noble, are levelled by one blast of calamity; but also on our +perception of the differences between these three in one respect,--viz. +in regard to the peculiar affliction of insanity. The insanity of the +King differs widely in its nature from that of the Fool, and that of the +Fool from that of the beggar. But the insanity of the King differs from +that of the beggar not only in its nature, but also in the fact that one +is real and the other simply a pretence. Are we to suppose then that the +insanity of the third character, the Fool, is, in this respect, a mere +repetition of that of the second, the beggar,--that it too is _mere_ +pretence? To suppose this is not only to impoverish miserably the +impression made by the trio as a whole, it is also to diminish the +heroic and pathetic effect of the character of the Fool. For his heroism +consists largely in this, that his efforts to outjest his master's +injuries are the efforts of a being to whom a responsible and consistent +course of action, nay even a responsible use of language, is at the best +of times difficult, and from whom it is never at the best of times +expected. It is a heroism something like that of Lear himself in his +endeavour to learn patience at the age of eighty. But arguments against +the idea that the Fool is wholly sane are either needless or futile; for +in the end they are appeals to the perception that this idea almost +destroys the poetry of the character. + +This is not the case with another question, the question whether the +Fool is a man or a boy. Here the evidence and the grounds for discussion +are more tangible. He is frequently addressed as 'boy.' This is not +decisive; but Lear's first words to him, 'How now, my pretty knave, how +dost thou?' are difficult to reconcile with the idea of his being a man, +and the use of this phrase on his first entrance may show Shakespeare's +desire to prevent any mistake on the point. As a boy, too, he would be +more strongly contrasted in the Storm-scenes with Edgar as well as with +Lear; his faithfulness and courage would be even more heroic and +touching; his devotion to Cordelia, and the consequent bitterness of +some of his speeches to Lear, would be even more natural. Nor does he +seem to show a knowledge of the world impossible to a quick-witted +though not whole-witted lad who had lived at Court. The only serious +obstacle to this view, I think, is the fact that he is not known to have +been represented as a boy or youth till Macready produced _King +Lear_.[177] + +But even if this obstacle were serious and the Fool were imagined as a +grown man, we may still insist that he must also be imagined as a timid, +delicate and frail being, who on that account and from the expression of +his face has a boyish look.[178] He pines away when Cordelia goes to +France. Though he takes great liberties with his master he is frightened +by Goneril, and becomes quite silent when the quarrel rises high. In the +terrible scene between Lear and his two daughters and Cornwall +(II. iv. 129-289), he says not a word; we have almost forgotten +his presence when, at the topmost pitch of passion, Lear suddenly turns +to him from the hateful faces that encompass him: + + You think I'll weep; + No, I'll not weep: + I have full cause of weeping; but this heart + Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws + Or ere I'll weep. O fool, I shall go mad. + +From the beginning of the Storm-scenes, though he thinks of his master +alone, we perceive from his words that the cold and rain are almost more +than he can bear. His childishness comes home to us when he runs out of +the hovel, terrified by the madman and crying out to the King 'Help me, +help me,' and the good Kent takes him by the hand and draws him to his +side. A little later he exclaims, 'This cold night will turn us all to +fools and madmen'; and almost from that point he leaves the King to +Edgar, speaking only once again in the remaining hundred lines of the +scene. In the shelter of the 'farm-house' (III. vi.) he revives, and +resumes his office of love; but I think that critic is right who +considers his last words significant. 'We'll go to supper i' the +morning,' says Lear; and the Fool answers 'And I'll go to bed at noon,' +as though he felt he had taken his death. When, a little later, the King +is being carried away on a litter, the Fool sits idle. He is so benumbed +and worn out that he scarcely notices what is going on. Kent has to +rouse him with the words, + + Come, help to bear thy master, + Thou must not stay behind. + +We know no more. For the famous exclamation 'And my poor fool is hanged' +unquestionably refers to Cordelia; and even if it is intended to show a +confused association in Lear's mind between his child and the Fool who +so loved her (as a very old man may confuse two of his children), still +it tells us nothing of the Fool's fate. It seems strange indeed that +Shakespeare should have left us thus in ignorance. But we have seen that +there are many marks of haste and carelessness in _King Lear_; and it +may also be observed that, if the poet imagined the Fool dying on the +way to Dover of the effects of that night upon the heath, he could +perhaps convey this idea to the audience by instructing the actor who +took the part to show, as he left the stage for the last time, the +recognised tokens of approaching death.[179] + +Something has now been said of the four characters, Lear, Edgar, Kent +and the Fool, who are together in the storm upon the heath. I have made +no attempt to analyse the whole effect of these scenes, but one remark +may be added. These scenes, as we observed, suggest the idea of a +convulsion in which Nature herself joins with the forces of evil in man +to overpower the weak; and they are thus one of the main sources of the +more terrible impressions produced by _King Lear_. But they have at the +same time an effect of a totally different kind, because in them are +exhibited also the strength and the beauty of Lear's nature, and, in +Kent and the Fool and Edgar, the ideal of faithful devoted love. Hence +from the beginning to the end of these scenes we have, mingled with pain +and awe and a sense of man's infirmity, an equally strong feeling of his +greatness; and this becomes at times even an exulting sense of the +powerlessness of outward calamity or the malice of others against his +soul. And this is one reason why imagination and emotion are never here +pressed painfully inward, as in the scenes between Lear and his +daughters, but are liberated and dilated. + + +5 + +The character of Cordelia is not a masterpiece of invention or subtlety +like that of Cleopatra; yet in its own way it is a creation as +wonderful. Cordelia appears in only four of the twenty-six scenes of +_King Lear_; she speaks--it is hard to believe it--scarcely more than a +hundred lines; and yet no character in Shakespeare is more absolutely +individual or more ineffaceably stamped on the memory of his readers. +There is a harmony, strange but perhaps the result of intention, between +the character itself and this reserved or parsimonious method of +depicting it. An expressiveness almost inexhaustible gained through +paucity of expression; the suggestion of infinite wealth and beauty +conveyed by the very refusal to reveal this beauty in expansive +speech--this is at once the nature of Cordelia herself and the chief +characteristic of Shakespeare's art in representing it. Perhaps it is +not fanciful to find a parallel in his drawing of a person very +different, Hamlet. It was natural to Hamlet to examine himself minutely, +to discuss himself at large, and yet to remain a mystery to himself; and +Shakespeare's method of drawing the character answers to it; it is +extremely detailed and searching, and yet its effect is to enhance the +sense of mystery. The results in the two cases differ correspondingly. +No one hesitates to enlarge upon Hamlet, who speaks of himself so much; +but to use many words about Cordelia seems to be a kind of impiety. + +I am obliged to speak of her chiefly because the devotion she inspires +almost inevitably obscures her part in the tragedy. This devotion is +composed, so to speak, of two contrary elements, reverence and pity. The +first, because Cordelia's is a higher nature than that of most even of +Shakespeare's heroines. With the tenderness of Viola or Desdemona she +unites something of the resolution, power, and dignity of Hermione, and +reminds us sometimes of Helena, sometimes of Isabella, though she has +none of the traits which prevent Isabella from winning our hearts. Her +assertion of truth and right, her allegiance to them, even the touch of +severity that accompanies it, instead of compelling mere respect or +admiration, become adorable in a nature so loving as Cordelia's. She is +a thing enskyed and sainted, and yet we feel no incongruity in the love +of the King of France for her, as we do in the love of the Duke for +Isabella. + +But with this reverence or worship is combined in the reader's mind a +passion of championship, of pity, even of protecting pity. She is so +deeply wronged, and she appears, for all her strength, so defenceless. +We think of her as unable to speak for herself. We think of her as quite +young, and as slight and small.[180] 'Her voice was ever soft, gentle, +and low'; ever so, whether the tone was that of resolution, or rebuke, +or love.[181] Of all Shakespeare's heroines she knew least of joy. She +grew up with Goneril and Regan for sisters. Even her love for her father +must have been mingled with pain and anxiety. She must early have +learned to school and repress emotion. She never knew the bliss of young +love: there is no trace of such love for the King of France. She had +knowingly to wound most deeply the being dearest to her. He cast her +off; and, after suffering an agony for him, and before she could see him +safe in death, she was brutally murdered. We have to thank the poet for +passing lightly over the circumstances of her death. We do not think of +them. Her image comes before us calm and bright and still. + +The memory of Cordelia thus becomes detached in a manner from the action +of the drama. The reader refuses to admit into it any idea of +imperfection, and is outraged when any share in her father's sufferings +is attributed to the part she plays in the opening scene. Because she +was deeply wronged he is ready to insist that she was wholly right. He +refuses, that is, to take the tragic point of view, and, when it is +taken, he imagines that Cordelia is being attacked, or is being declared +to have 'deserved' all that befell her. But Shakespeare's was the tragic +point of view. He exhibits in the opening scene a situation tragic for +Cordelia as well as for Lear. At a moment where terrible issues join, +Fate makes on her the one demand which she is unable to meet. As I have +already remarked in speaking of Desdemona, it was a demand which other +heroines of Shakespeare could have met. Without loss of self-respect, +and refusing even to appear to compete for a reward, they could have +made the unreasonable old King feel that he was fondly loved. Cordelia +cannot, because she is Cordelia. And so she is not merely rejected and +banished, but her father is left to the mercies of her sisters. And the +cause of her failure--a failure a thousand-fold redeemed--is a compound +in which imperfection appears so intimately mingled with the noblest +qualities that--if we are true to Shakespeare--we do not think either of +justifying her or of blaming her: we feel simply the tragic emotions of +fear and pity. + +In this failure a large part is played by that obvious characteristic to +which I have already referred. Cordelia is not, indeed, always +tongue-tied, as several passages in the drama, and even in this scene, +clearly show. But tender emotion, and especially a tender love for the +person to whom she has to speak, makes her dumb. Her love, as she says, +is more ponderous than her tongue:[182] + + Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave + My heart into my mouth. + +This expressive word 'heave' is repeated in the passage which describes +her reception of Kent's letter: + + Faith, once or twice she heaved the name of 'Father' + Pantingly forth, as if it press'd her heart: + +two or three broken ejaculations escape her lips, and she 'starts' away +'to deal with grief alone.' The same trait reappears with an ineffable +beauty in the stifled repetitions with which she attempts to answer her +father in the moment of his restoration: + + _Lear._ Do not laugh at me; + For, as I am a man, I think this lady + To be my child Cordelia. + + _Cor._ And so I am, I am. + + _Lear._ Be your tears wet? yes, faith. I pray, weep not; + If you have poison for me, I will drink it. + I know you do not love me; for your sisters + Have, as I do remember, done me wrong: + You have some cause, they have not. + + _Cor._ No cause, no cause. + +We see this trait for the last time, marked by Shakespeare with a +decision clearly intentional, in her inability to answer one syllable to +the last words we hear her father speak to her: + + No, no, no, no! Come, let's away to prison: + We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage: + When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, + And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live, + And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh + At gilded butterflies.... + +She stands and weeps, and goes out with him silent. And we see her alive +no more. + +But (I am forced to dwell on the point, because I am sure to slur it +over is to be false to Shakespeare) this dumbness of love was not the +sole source of misunderstanding. If this had been all, even Lear could +have seen the love in Cordelia's eyes when, to his question 'What can +you say to draw a third more opulent than your sisters?' she answered +'Nothing.' But it did not shine there. She is not merely silent, nor +does she merely answer 'Nothing.' She tells him that she loves him +'according to her bond, nor more nor less'; and his answer, + + How now, Cordelia! mend your speech a little, + Lest it may mar your fortunes, + +so intensifies her horror at the hypocrisy of her sisters that she +replies, + + Good my Lord, + You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I + Return those duties back as are right fit, + Obey you, love you, and most honour you. + Why have my sisters husbands, if they say + They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed, + That lord whose hand must take my plight shall carry + Half my love with him, half my care and duty: + Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters, + To love my father all. + +What words for the ear of an old father, unreasonable, despotic, but +fondly loving, indecent in his own expressions of preference, and blind +to the indecency of his appeal for protestations of fondness! Blank +astonishment, anger, wounded love, contend within him; but for the +moment he restrains himself and asks, + + But goes thy heart with this? + +Imagine Imogen's reply! But Cordelia answers, + + Ay, good my lord. + + _Lear._ So young, and so untender? + + _Cor._ So young, my lord, and true. + +Yes, 'heavenly true.' But truth is not the only good in the world, nor +is the obligation to tell truth the only obligation. The matter here was +to keep it inviolate, but also to preserve a father. And even if truth +_were_ the one and only obligation, to tell much less than truth is not +to tell it. And Cordelia's speech not only tells much less than truth +about her love, it actually perverts the truth when it implies that to +give love to a husband is to take it from a father. There surely never +was a more unhappy speech. + +When Isabella goes to plead with Angelo for her brother's life, her +horror of her brother's sin is so intense, and her perception of the +justice of Angelo's reasons for refusing her is so clear and keen, that +she is ready to abandon her appeal before it is well begun; she would +actually do so but that the warm-hearted profligate Lucio reproaches her +for her coldness and urges her on. Cordelia's hatred of hypocrisy and of +the faintest appearance of mercenary professions reminds us of +Isabella's hatred of impurity; but Cordelia's position is infinitely +more difficult, and on the other hand there is mingled with her hatred a +touch of personal antagonism and of pride. Lear's words, + + Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her![183] + +are monstrously unjust, but they contain one grain of truth; and indeed +it was scarcely possible that a nature so strong as Cordelia's, and with +so keen a sense of dignity, should feel here nothing whatever of pride +and resentment. This side of her character is emphatically shown in her +language to her sisters in the first scene--language perfectly just, but +little adapted to soften their hearts towards their father--and again in +the very last words we hear her speak. She and her father are brought +in, prisoners, to the enemy's camp; but she sees only Edmund, not those +'greater' ones on whose pleasure hangs her father's fate and her own. +For her own she is little concerned; she knows how to meet adversity: + + For thee, oppressed king, am I cast down; + Myself could else out-frown false fortune's frown. + +Yes, that is how she would meet fortune, frowning it down, even as +Goneril would have met it; nor, if her father had been already dead, +would there have been any great improbability in the false story that +was to be told of her death, that, like Goneril, she 'fordid herself.' +Then, after those austere words about fortune, she suddenly asks, + + Shall we not see these daughters and these sisters? + +Strange last words for us to hear from a being so worshipped and +beloved; but how characteristic! Their tone is unmistakable. I doubt if +she could have brought herself to plead with her sisters for her +father's life; and if she had attempted the task, she would have +performed it but ill. Nor is our feeling towards her altered one whit by +that. But what is true of Kent and the Fool[184] is, in its measure, +true of her. Any one of them would gladly have died a hundred deaths to +help King Lear; and they do help his soul; but they harm his cause. They +are all involved in tragedy. + + * * * * * + +Why does Cordelia die? I suppose no reader ever failed to ask that +question, and to ask it with something more than pain,--to ask it, if +only for a moment, in bewilderment or dismay, and even perhaps in tones +of protest. These feelings are probably evoked more strongly here than +at the death of any other notable character in Shakespeare; and it may +sound a wilful paradox to assert that the slightest element of +reconciliation is mingled with them or succeeds them. Yet it seems to me +indubitable that such an element is present, though difficult to make +out with certainty what it is or whence it proceeds. And I will try to +make this out, and to state it methodically. + +(_a_) It is not due in any perceptible degree to the fact, which we have +just been examining, that Cordelia through her tragic imperfection +contributes something to the conflict and catastrophe; and I drew +attention to that imperfection without any view to our present problem. +The critics who emphasise it at this point in the drama are surely +untrue to Shakespeare's mind; and still more completely astray are those +who lay stress on the idea that Cordelia, in bringing a foreign army to +help her father, was guilty of treason to her country. When she dies we +regard her, practically speaking, simply as we regard Ophelia or +Desdemona, as an innocent victim swept away in the convulsion caused by +the error or guilt of others. + +(_b_) Now this destruction of the good through the evil of others is one +of the tragic facts of life, and no one can object to the use of it, +within certain limits, in tragic art. And, further, those who because of +it declaim against the nature of things, declaim without thinking. It is +obviously the other side of the fact that the effects of good spread far +and wide beyond the doer of good; and we should ask ourselves whether we +really could wish (supposing it conceivable) to see this double-sided +fact abolished. Nevertheless the touch of reconciliation that we feel in +contemplating the death of Cordelia is not due, or is due only in some +slight degree, to a perception that the event is true to life, +admissible in tragedy, and a case of a law which we cannot seriously +desire to see abrogated. + +(_c_) What then is this feeling, and whence does it come? I believe we +shall find that it is a feeling not confined to _King Lear_, but present +at the close of other tragedies; and that the reason why it has an +exceptional tone or force at the close of _King Lear_, lies in that very +peculiarity of the close which also--at least for the moment--excites +bewilderment, dismay, or protest. The feeling I mean is the impression +that the heroic being, though in one sense and outwardly he has failed, +is yet in another sense superior to the world in which he appears; is, +in some way which we do not seek to define, untouched by the doom that +overtakes him; and is rather set free from life than deprived of it. +Some such feeling as this--some feeling which, from this description of +it, may be recognised as their own even by those who would dissent from +the description--we surely have in various degrees at the deaths of +Hamlet and Othello and Lear, and of Antony and Cleopatra and +Coriolanus.[185] It accompanies the more prominent tragic impressions, +and, regarded alone, could hardly be called tragic. For it seems to +imply (though we are probably quite unconscious of the implication) an +idea which, if developed, would transform the tragic view of things. It +implies that the tragic world, if taken as it is presented, with all its +error, guilt, failure, woe and waste, is no final reality, but only a +part of reality taken for the whole, and, when so taken, illusive; and +that if we could see the whole, and the tragic facts in their true place +in it, we should find them, not abolished, of course, but so transmuted +that they had ceased to be strictly tragic,--find, perhaps, the +suffering and death counting for little or nothing, the greatness of the +soul for much or all, and the heroic spirit, in spite of failure, nearer +to the heart of things than the smaller, more circumspect, and perhaps +even 'better' beings who survived the catastrophe. The feeling which I +have tried to describe, as accompanying the more obvious tragic emotions +at the deaths of heroes, corresponds with some such idea as this.[186] + +Now this feeling is evoked with a quite exceptional strength by the +death of Cordelia.[187] It is not due to the perception that she, like +Lear, has attained through suffering; we know that she had suffered and +attained in his days of prosperity. It is simply the feeling that what +happens to such a being does not matter; all that matters is what she +is. How this can be when, for anything the tragedy tells us, she has +ceased to exist, we do not ask; but the tragedy itself makes us feel +that somehow it is so. And the force with which this impression is +conveyed depends largely on the very fact which excites our bewilderment +and protest, that her death, following on the deaths of all the evil +characters, and brought about by an unexplained delay in Edmund's effort +to save her, comes on us, not as an inevitable conclusion to the +sequence of events, but as the sudden stroke of mere fate or chance. The +force of the impression, that is to say, depends on the very violence of +the contrast between the outward and the inward, Cordelia's death and +Cordelia's soul. The more unmotived, unmerited, senseless, monstrous, +her fate, the more do we feel that it does not concern her. The +extremity of the disproportion between prosperity and goodness first +shocks us, and then flashes on us the conviction that our whole attitude +in asking or expecting that goodness should be prosperous is wrong; +that, if only we could see things as they are, we should see that the +outward is nothing and the inward is all. + +And some such thought as this (which, to bring it clearly out, I have +stated, and still state, in a form both exaggerated and much too +explicit) is really present through the whole play. Whether Shakespeare +knew it or not, it is present. I might almost say that the 'moral' of +_King Lear_ is presented in the irony of this collocation: + + _Albany._ The gods defend her! + _Enter Lear with Cordelia dead in his arms._ + +The 'gods,' it seems, do _not_ show their approval by 'defending' their +own from adversity or death, or by giving them power and prosperity. +These, on the contrary, are worthless, or worse; it is not on them, but +on the renunciation of them, that the gods throw incense. They breed +lust, pride, hardness of heart, the insolence of office, cruelty, scorn, +hypocrisy, contention, war, murder, self-destruction. The whole story +beats this indictment of prosperity into the brain. Lear's great +speeches in his madness proclaim it like the curses of Timon on life and +man. But here, as in _Timon_, the poor and humble are, almost without +exception, sound and sweet at heart, faithful and pitiful.[188] And here +adversity, to the blessed in spirit, is blessed. It wins fragrance from +the crushed flower. It melts in aged hearts sympathies which prosperity +had frozen. It purges the soul's sight by blinding that of the +eyes.[189] Throughout that stupendous Third Act the good are seen +growing better through suffering, and the bad worse through success. The +warm castle is a room in hell, the storm-swept heath a sanctuary. The +judgment of this world is a lie; its goods, which we covet, corrupt us; +its ills, which break our bodies, set our souls free; + + Our means secure us,[190] and our mere defects + Prove our commodities. + +Let us renounce the world, hate it, and lose it gladly. The only real +thing in it is the soul, with its courage, patience, devotion. And +nothing outward can touch that. + +This, if we like to use the word, is Shakespeare's 'pessimism' in _King +Lear_. As we have seen, it is not by any means the whole spirit of the +tragedy, which presents the world as a place where heavenly good grows +side by side with evil, where extreme evil cannot long endure, and where +all that survives the storm is good, if not great. But still this strain +of thought, to which the world appears as the kingdom of evil and +therefore worthless, is in the tragedy, and may well be the record of +many hours of exasperated feeling and troubled brooding. Pursued further +and allowed to dominate, it would destroy the tragedy; for it is +necessary to tragedy that we should feel that suffering and death do +matter greatly, and that happiness and life are not to be renounced as +worthless. Pursued further, again, it leads to the idea that the world, +in that obvious appearance of it which tragedy cannot dissolve without +dissolving itself, is illusive. And its tendency towards this idea is +traceable in _King Lear_, in the shape of the notion that this 'great +world' is transitory, or 'will wear out to nought' like the little world +called 'man' (IV. vi. 137), or that humanity will destroy itself.[191] +In later days, in the drama that was probably Shakespeare's last +complete work, the _Tempest_, this notion of the transitoriness of +things appears, side by side with the simpler feeling that man's life is +an illusion or dream, in some of the most famous lines he ever wrote: + + Our revels now are ended. These our actors, + As I foretold you, were all spirits and + Are melted into air, into thin air: + And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, + The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, + The solemn temples, the great globe itself, + Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve + And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, + Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff + As dreams are made on, and our little life + Is rounded with a sleep. + +These lines, detached from their context, are familiar to everyone; but, +in the _Tempest_, they are dramatic as well as poetical. The sudden +emergence of the thought expressed in them has a specific and most +significant cause; and as I have not seen it remarked I will point it +out. + +Prospero, by means of his spirits, has been exhibiting to Ferdinand and +Miranda a masque in which goddesses appear, and which is so majestic and +harmonious that to the young man, standing beside such a father and such +a wife, the place seems Paradise,--as perhaps the world once seemed to +Shakespeare. Then, at the bidding of Iris, there begins a dance of +Nymphs with Reapers, sunburnt, weary of their August labour, but now in +their holiday garb. But, as this is nearing its end, Prospero 'starts +suddenly, and speaks'; and the visions vanish. And what he 'speaks' is +shown in these lines, which introduce the famous passage just quoted: + + _Pros._ [_Aside_] I had forgot that foul conspiracy + Of the beast Caliban and his confederates + Against my life: the minute of their plot + Is almost come. [_To the Spirits._] Well done! avoid; no more. + + _Fer._ This is strange; your father's in some passion + That works him strongly. + + _Mir._ Never till this day + Saw I him touch'd with anger so distemper'd. + + _Pros._ You do look, my son, in a moved sort, + As if you were dismay'd: be cheerful, sir. + Our revels.... + +And then, after the famous lines, follow these: + + Sir, I am vex'd: + Bear with my weakness; my old brain is troubled; + Be not disturb'd with my infirmity; + If you be pleased, retire into my cell + And there repose: a turn or two I'll walk, + To still my beating mind. + +We seem to see here the whole mind of Shakespeare in his last years. +That which provokes in Prospero first a 'passion' of anger, and, a +moment later, that melancholy and mystical thought that the great world +must perish utterly and that man is but a dream, is the sudden +recollection of gross and apparently incurable evil in the 'monster' +whom he had tried in vain to raise and soften, and in the monster's +human confederates. It is this, which is but the repetition of his +earlier experience of treachery and ingratitude, that troubles his old +brain, makes his mind 'beat,'[192] and forces on him the sense of +unreality and evanescence in the world and the life that are haunted by +such evil. Nor, though Prospero can spare and forgive, is there any sign +to the end that he believes the evil curable either in the monster, the +'born devil,' or in the more monstrous villains, the 'worse than +devils,' whom he so sternly dismisses. But he has learned patience, has +come to regard his anger and loathing as a weakness or infirmity, and +would not have it disturb the young and innocent. And so, in the days of +_King Lear_, it was chiefly the power of 'monstrous' and apparently +cureless evil in the 'great world' that filled Shakespeare's soul with +horror, and perhaps forced him sometimes to yield to the infirmity of +misanthropy and despair, to cry 'No, no, no life,' and to take refuge in +the thought that this fitful fever is a dream that must soon fade into a +dreamless sleep; until, to free himself from the perilous stuff that +weighed upon his heart, he summoned to his aid his 'so potent art,' and +wrought this stuff into the stormy music of his greatest poem, which +seems to cry, + + You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need, + +and, like the _Tempest_, seems to preach to us from end to end, 'Thou +must be patient,' 'Bear free and patient thoughts.'[193] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 158: Of course I do not mean that he is beginning to be +insane, and still less that he _is_ insane (as some medical critics +suggest).] + +[Footnote 159: I must however point out that the modern stage-directions +are most unfortunate in concealing the fact that here Cordelia sees her +father again _for the first time_. See Note W.] + +[Footnote 160: What immediately follows is as striking an illustration +of quite another quality, and of the effects which make us think of Lear +as pursued by a relentless fate. If he could go in and sleep after his +prayer, as he intends, his mind, one feels, might be saved: so far there +has been only the menace of madness. But from within the hovel +Edgar--the last man who would willingly have injured Lear--cries, +'Fathom and half, fathom and half! Poor Tom!'; the Fool runs out +terrified; Edgar, summoned by Kent, follows him; and, at sight of Edgar, +in a moment something gives way in Lear's brain, and he exclaims: + + Hast thou given all + To thy two daughters? And art thou come to this? + +Henceforth he is mad. And they remain out in the storm. + +I have not seen it noticed that this stroke of fate is repeated--surely +intentionally--in the sixth scene. Gloster has succeeded in persuading +Lear to come into the 'house'; he then leaves, and Kent after much +difficulty induces Lear to lie down and rest upon the cushions. Sleep +begins to come to him again, and he murmurs, + + 'Make no noise, make no noise; draw the curtains; so, so, so. + We'll go to supper i' the morning. So, so, so.' + +At that moment Gloster enters with the news that he has discovered a +plot to kill the King; the rest that 'might yet have balm'd his broken +senses' is again interrupted; and he is hurried away on a litter towards +Dover. (His recovery, it will be remembered, is due to a long sleep +artificially induced.)] + +[Footnote 161: III. iv. 49. This is printed as prose in the Globe +edition, but is surely verse. Lear has not yet spoken prose in this +scene, and his next three speeches are in verse. The next is in prose, +and, ending, in his tearing off his clothes, shows the advance of +insanity.] + +[Footnote 162: [Lear's death is thus, I am reminded, like _pere_ +Goriot's.] This interpretation may be condemned as fantastic, but the +text, it appears to me, will bear no other. This is the whole speech (in +the Globe text): + + And my poor fool is hang'd! No, no, no life! + Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, + And thou no breath at all? Thou'lt come no more, + Never, never, never, never, never! + Pray you, undo this button: thank you, sir. + Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips, + Look there, look there! + +The transition at 'Do you see this?' from despair to something more than +hope is exactly the same as in the preceding passage at the word 'Ha!': + + A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all! + I might have saved her; now she's gone for ever! + Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little. + Ha! + What is't thou say'st? Her voice was ever soft, + Gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman. + +As to my other remarks, I will ask the reader to notice that the passage +from Lear's entrance with the body of Cordelia to the stage-direction +_He dies_ (which probably comes a few lines too soon) is 54 lines in +length, and that 30 of them represent the interval during which he has +absolutely forgotten Cordelia. (It begins when he looks up at the +Captain's words, line 275.) To make Lear during this interval turn +continually in anguish to the corpse, is to act the passage in a manner +irreconcilable with the text, and insufferable in its effect. I speak +from experience. I have seen the passage acted thus, and my sympathies +were so exhausted long before Lear's death that his last speech, the +most pathetic speech ever written, left me disappointed and weary.] + +[Footnote 163: The Quartos give the 'Never' only thrice (surely +wrongly), and all the actors I have heard have preferred this easier +task. I ought perhaps to add that the Quartos give the words 'Break, +heart; I prithee, break!' to Lear, not Kent. They and the Folio are at +odds throughout the last sixty lines of King Lear, and all good modern +texts are eclectic.] + +[Footnote 164: The connection of these sufferings with the sin of +earlier days (not, it should be noticed, of youth) is almost thrust upon +our notice by the levity of Gloster's own reference to the subject in +the first scene, and by Edgar's often quoted words 'The gods are just,' +etc. The following collocation, also, may be intentional (III. iv. 116): + + _Fool_. Now a little fire in a wild field were like an old + lecher's heart; a small spark, all the rest on's body cold. + Look, here comes a walking fire. [_Enter_ GLOSTER with a + torch.] + +Pope destroyed the collocation by transferring the stage-direction to a +point some dozen lines later.] + +[Footnote 165: The passages are here printed together (III. iv. 28 ff. +and IV. i. 67 ff.): + + _Lear._ Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, + That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, + How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides, + Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you + From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en + Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp; + Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, + That thou mayst shake the superflux to them, + And show the heavens just. + + _Glo._ Here, take this purse, thou whom the heavens' plagues + Have humbled to all strokes: that I am wretched + Makes thee the happier: heavens, deal so still! + Let the superfluous and lust-dieted man, + That slaves your ordinance, that will not see + Because he doth not feel, feel your power quickly; + So distribution should undo excess, + And each man have enough.] + +[Footnote 166: Schmidt's idea--based partly on the omission from the +Folios at I. ii. 103 (see Furness' Variorum) of the words 'To his father +that so tenderly and entirely loves him'--that Gloster loved neither of +his sons, is surely an entire mistake. See, not to speak of general +impressions, III. iv. 171 ff.] + +[Footnote 167: Imagination demands for Lear, even more than for Othello, +majesty of stature and mien. Tourgenief felt this and made his 'Lear of +the Steppes' a _gigantic_ peasant. If Shakespeare's texts give no +express authority for ideas like these, the reason probably is that he +wrote primarily for the theatre, where the principal actor might not be +a large man.] + +[Footnote 168: He is not present, of course, till France and Burgundy +enter; but while he is present he says not a word beyond 'Here's France +and Burgundy, my noble lord.' For some remarks on the possibility that +Shakespeare imagined him as having encouraged Lear in his idea of +dividing the kingdom see Note T. It must be remembered that Cornwall was +Gloster's 'arch and patron.'] + +[Footnote 169: In this she stands alone among the more notable +characters of the play. Doubtless Regan's exclamation 'O the blest gods' +means nothing, but the fact that it is given to her means something. For +some further remarks on Goneril see Note T. I may add that touches of +Goneril reappear in the heroine of the next tragedy, _Macbeth_; and that +we are sometimes reminded of her again by the character of the Queen in +_Cymbeline_, who bewitched the feeble King by her beauty, and married +him for greatness while she abhorred his person (_Cymbeline_, V. v. 62 +f., 31 f.); who tried to poison her step-daughter and intended to poison +her husband; who died despairing because she could not execute all the +evil she purposed; and who inspirited her husband to defy the Romans by +words that still stir the blood (_Cymbeline_, III. i. 14 f. Cf. _King +Lear_, IV. ii. 50 f.).] + +[Footnote 170: I. ii. 1 f. Shakespeare seems to have in mind the idea +expressed in the speech of Ulysses about the dependence of the world on +degree, order, system, custom, and about the chaos which would result +from the free action of appetite, the 'universal wolf' (_Troilus and +Cr._ I. iii. 83 f.). Cf. the contrast between 'particular will' and 'the +moral laws of nature and of nations,' II. ii. 53, 185 ('nature' here of +course is the opposite of the 'nature' of Edmund's speech).] + +[Footnote 171: The line last quoted is continued by Edmund in the Folios +thus: 'Th' hast spoken right; 'tis true,' but in the Quartos thus: 'Thou +hast spoken truth,' which leaves the line imperfect. This, and the +imperfect line 'Make instruments to plague us,' suggest that Shakespeare +wrote at first simply, + + Make instruments to plague us. + + _Edm._ Th' hast spoken truth. + +The Quartos show other variations which seem to point to the fact that +the MS. was here difficult to make out.] + +[Footnote 172: IV. i. 1-9. I am indebted here to Koppel, +_Verbesserungsvorschlaege zu den Erlaeuterungen und der Textlesung des +Lear_ (1899).] + +[Footnote 173: See I. i. 142 ff. Kent speaks, not of the _injustice_ of +Lear's action, but of its 'folly,' its 'hideous rashness.' When the King +exclaims 'Kent, on thy life, no more,' he answers: + + My life I never held but as a pawn + To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it, + _Thy safety being the motive_. + +(The first Folio omits 'a,' and in the next line reads 'nere' for 'nor.' +Perhaps the first line should read 'My life I ne'er held but as pawn to +wage.')] + +[Footnote 174: See II. ii. 162 to end. The light-heartedness disappears, +of course, as Lear's misfortunes thicken.] + +[Footnote 175: This difference, however, must not be pressed too far; +nor must we take Kent's retort, + + Now by Apollo, king, + Thou swear'st thy gods in vain, + +for a sign of disbelief. He twice speaks of the gods in another manner +(I. i. 185, III. vi. 5), and he was accustomed to think of Lear in his +'prayers' (I. i. 144).] + +[Footnote 176: The 'clown' in _Antony and Cleopatra_ is merely an old +peasant. There is a fool in _Timon of Athens_, however, and he appears +in a scene (II. ii.) generally attributed to Shakespeare. His talk +sometimes reminds one of Lear's fool; and Kent's remark, 'This is not +altogether fool, my lord,' is repeated in _Timon_, II. ii. 122, 'Thou +art not altogether a fool.'] + +[Footnote 177: [This is no obstacle. There could hardly be a stage +tradition hostile to his youth, since he does not appear in Tate's +version, which alone was acted during the century and a half before +Macready's production. I had forgotten this; and my memory must also +have been at fault regarding an engraving to which I referred in the +first edition. Both mistakes were pointed out by Mr. Archer.]] + +[Footnote 178: In parts of what follows I am indebted to remarks by +Cowden Clarke, quoted by Furness on I. iv. 91.] + +[Footnote 179: See also Note T.] + +[Footnote 180: 'Our last and least' (according to the Folio reading). +Lear speaks again of 'this little seeming substance.' He can carry her +dead body in his arms.] + +[Footnote 181: Perhaps then the 'low sound' is not merely metaphorical +in Kent's speech in I. i. 153 f.: + + answer my life my judgment, + Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; + Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound + Reverbs no hollowness.] + +[Footnote 182: I. i. 80. 'More ponderous' is the reading of the Folios, +'more richer' that of the Quartos. The latter is usually preferred, and +Mr. Aldis Wright says 'more ponderous' has the appearance of being a +player's correction to avoid a piece of imaginary bad grammar. Does it +not sound more like the author's improvement of a phrase that he thought +a little flat? And, apart from that, is it not significant that it +expresses the same idea of weight that appears in the phrase 'I cannot +heave my heart into my mouth'?] + +[Footnote 183: Cf. Cornwall's satirical remarks on Kent's 'plainness' in +II. ii. 101 ff.,--a plainness which did no service to Kent's master. (As +a matter of fact, Cordelia had said nothing about 'plainness.')] + +[Footnote 184: Who, like Kent, hastens on the quarrel with Goneril.] + +[Footnote 185: I do not wish to complicate the discussion by examining +the differences, in degree or otherwise, in the various cases, or by +introducing numerous qualifications; and therefore I do not add the +names of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth.] + +[Footnote 186: It follows from the above that, if this idea were made +explicit and accompanied our reading of a tragedy throughout, it would +confuse or even destroy the tragic impression. So would the constant +presence of Christian beliefs. The reader most attached to these beliefs +holds them in temporary suspension while he is immersed in a +Shakespearean tragedy. Such tragedy assumes that the world, as it is +presented, is the truth, though it also provokes feelings which imply +that this world is not the whole truth, and therefore not the truth.] + +[Footnote 187: Though Cordelia, of course, does not occupy the position +of the hero.] + +[Footnote 188: _E.g._ in _King Lear_ the servants, and the old man who +succours Gloster and brings to the naked beggar 'the best 'parel that he +has, come on't what will,' _i.e._ whatever vengeance Regan can inflict. +Cf. the Steward and the Servants in _Timon_. Cf. there also (V. i. 23), +'Promising is the very air o' the time ... performance is ever the +duller for his act; and, _but in the plainer and simpler kind of +people_, the deed of saying [performance of promises] is quite out of +use.' Shakespeare's feeling on this subject, though apparently specially +keen at this time of his life, is much the same throughout (cf. Adam in +_As You Like It_). He has no respect for the plainer and simpler kind of +people as politicians, but a great respect and regard for their hearts.] + +[Footnote 189: 'I stumbled when I saw,' says Gloster.] + +[Footnote 190: Our advantages give us a blind confidence in our +security. Cf. _Timon_, IV. iii. 76, + + _Alc._ I have heard in some sort of thy miseries. + + _Tim._ Thou saw'st them when I had prosperity.] + +[Footnote 191: Biblical ideas seem to have been floating in +Shakespeare's mind. Cf. the words of Kent, when Lear enters with +Cordelia's body, 'Is this the promised end?' and Edgar's answer, 'Or +image of that horror?' The 'promised end' is certainly the end of the +world (cf. with 'image' 'the great doom's image,' _Macbeth_, II. iii. +83); and the next words, Albany's 'Fall and cease,' _may_ be addressed +to the heavens or stars, not to Lear. It seems probable that in writing +Gloster's speech about the predicted horrors to follow 'these late +eclipses' Shakespeare had a vague recollection of the passage in +_Matthew_ xxiv., or of that in _Mark_ xiii., about the tribulations +which were to be the sign of 'the end of the world.' (I do not mean, of +course, that the 'prediction' of I. ii. 119 is the prediction to be +found in one of these passages.)] + +[Footnote 192: Cf. _Hamlet_, III. i. 181: + + This something-settled matter in his heart, + Whereon his brains still beating puts him thus + From fashion of himself.] + +[Footnote 193: I believe the criticism of _King Lear_ which has +influenced me most is that in Prof. Dowden's _Shakspere, his Mind and +Art_ (though, when I wrote my lectures, I had not read that criticism +for many years); and I am glad that this acknowledgment gives me the +opportunity of repeating in print an opinion which I have often +expressed to students, that anyone entering on the study of Shakespeare, +and unable or unwilling to read much criticism, would do best to take +Prof. Dowden for his guide.] + + + + +LECTURE IX + +MACBETH + + +_Macbeth_, it is probable, was the last-written of the four great +tragedies, and immediately preceded _Antony and Cleopatra_.[194] In that +play Shakespeare's final style appears for the first time completely +formed, and the transition to this style is much more decidedly visible +in _Macbeth_ than in _King Lear_. Yet in certain respects _Macbeth_ +recalls _Hamlet_ rather than _Othello_ or _King Lear_. In the heroes of +both plays the passage from thought to a critical resolution and action +is difficult, and excites the keenest interest. In neither play, as in +_Othello_ and _King Lear_, is painful pathos one of the main effects. +Evil, again, though it shows in _Macbeth_ a prodigious energy, is not +the icy or stony inhumanity of Iago or Goneril; and, as in _Hamlet_, it +is pursued by remorse. Finally, Shakespeare no longer restricts the +action to purely human agencies, as in the two preceding tragedies; +portents once more fill the heavens, ghosts rise from their graves, an +unearthly light flickers about the head of the doomed man. The special +popularity of _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_ is due in part to some of these +common characteristics, notably to the fascination of the supernatural, +the absence of the spectacle of extreme undeserved suffering, the +absence of characters which horrify and repel and yet are destitute of +grandeur. The reader who looks unwillingly at Iago gazes at Lady Macbeth +in awe, because though she is dreadful she is also sublime. The whole +tragedy is sublime. + +In this, however, and in other respects, _Macbeth_ makes an impression +quite different from that of _Hamlet_. The dimensions of the principal +characters, the rate of movement in the action, the supernatural effect, +the style, the versification, are all changed; and they are all changed +in much the same manner. In many parts of _Macbeth_ there is in the +language a peculiar compression, pregnancy, energy, even violence; the +harmonious grace and even flow, often conspicuous in _Hamlet_, have +almost disappeared. The cruel characters, built on a scale at least as +large as that of _Othello_, seem to attain at times an almost superhuman +stature. The diction has in places a huge and rugged grandeur, which +degenerates here and there into tumidity. The solemn majesty of the +royal Ghost in _Hamlet_, appearing in armour and standing silent in the +moonlight, is exchanged for shapes of horror, dimly seen in the murky +air or revealed by the glare of the caldron fire in a dark cavern, or +for the ghastly face of Banquo badged with blood and staring with blank +eyes. The other three tragedies all open with conversations which lead +into the action: here the action bursts into wild life amidst the sounds +of a thunder-storm and the echoes of a distant battle. It hurries +through seven very brief scenes of mounting suspense to a terrible +crisis, which is reached, in the murder of Duncan, at the beginning of +the Second Act. Pausing a moment and changing its shape, it hastes again +with scarcely diminished speed to fresh horrors. And even when the speed +of the outward action is slackened, the same effect is continued in +another form: we are shown a soul tortured by an agony which admits not +a moment's repose, and rushing in frenzy towards its doom. _Macbeth_ is +very much shorter than the other three tragedies, but our experience in +traversing it is so crowded and intense that it leaves an impression not +of brevity but of speed. It is the most vehement, the most concentrated, +perhaps we may say the most tremendous, of the tragedies. + + +1 + +A Shakespearean tragedy, as a rule, has a special tone or atmosphere of +its own, quite perceptible, however difficult to describe. The effect of +this atmosphere is marked with unusual strength in _Macbeth_. It is due +to a variety of influences which combine with those just noticed, so +that, acting and reacting, they form a whole; and the desolation of the +blasted heath, the design of the Witches, the guilt in the hero's soul, +the darkness of the night, seem to emanate from one and the same source. +This effect is strengthened by a multitude of small touches, which at +the moment may be little noticed but still leave their mark on the +imagination. We may approach the consideration of the characters and the +action by distinguishing some of the ingredients of this general effect. + +Darkness, we may even say blackness, broods over this tragedy. It is +remarkable that almost all the scenes which at once recur to memory take +place either at night or in some dark spot. The vision of the dagger, +the murder of Duncan, the murder of Banquo, the sleep-walking of Lady +Macbeth, all come in night-scenes. The Witches dance in the thick air of +a storm, or, 'black and midnight hags,' receive Macbeth in a cavern. The +blackness of night is to the hero a thing of fear, even of horror; and +that which he feels becomes the spirit of the play. The faint +glimmerings of the western sky at twilight are here menacing: it is the +hour when the traveller hastens to reach safety in his inn, and when +Banquo rides homeward to meet his assassins; the hour when 'light +thickens,' when 'night's black agents to their prey do rouse,' when the +wolf begins to howl, and the owl to scream, and withered murder steals +forth to his work. Macbeth bids the stars hide their fires that his +'black' desires may be concealed; Lady Macbeth calls on thick night to +come, palled in the dunnest smoke of hell. The moon is down and no stars +shine when Banquo, dreading the dreams of the coming night, goes +unwillingly to bed, and leaves Macbeth to wait for the summons of the +little bell. When the next day should dawn, its light is 'strangled,' +and 'darkness does the face of earth entomb.' In the whole drama the sun +seems to shine only twice: first, in the beautiful but ironical passage +where Duncan sees the swallows flitting round the castle of death; and, +afterwards, when at the close the avenging army gathers to rid the earth +of its shame. Of the many slighter touches which deepen this effect I +notice only one. The failure of nature in Lady Macbeth is marked by her +fear of darkness; 'she has light by her continually.' And in the one +phrase of fear that escapes her lips even in sleep, it is of the +darkness of the place of torment that she speaks.[195] + +The atmosphere of _Macbeth_, however, is not that of unrelieved +blackness. On the contrary, as compared with _King Lear_ and its cold +dim gloom, _Macbeth_ leaves a decided impression of colour; it is really +the impression of a black night broken by flashes of light and colour, +sometimes vivid and even glaring. They are the lights and colours of the +thunder-storm in the first scene; of the dagger hanging before Macbeth's +eyes and glittering alone in the midnight air; of the torch borne by the +servant when he and his lord come upon Banquo crossing the castle-court +to his room; of the torch, again, which Fleance carried to light his +father to death, and which was dashed out by one of the murderers; of +the torches that flared in the hall on the face of the Ghost and the +blanched cheeks of Macbeth; of the flames beneath the boiling caldron +from which the apparitions in the cavern rose; of the taper which showed +to the Doctor and Gentlewoman the wasted face and blank eyes of Lady +Macbeth. And, above all, the colour is the colour of blood. It cannot be +an accident that the image of blood is forced upon us continually, not +merely by the events themselves, but by full descriptions, and even by +reiteration of the word in unlikely parts of the dialogue. The Witches, +after their first wild appearance, have hardly quitted the stage when +there staggers onto it a 'bloody man,' gashed with wounds. His tale is +of a hero whose 'brandished steel smoked with bloody execution,' 'carved +out a passage' to his enemy, and 'unseam'd him from the nave to the +chaps.' And then he tells of a second battle so bloody that the +combatants seemed as if they 'meant to bathe in reeking wounds.' What +metaphors! What a dreadful image is that with which Lady Macbeth greets +us almost as she enters, when she prays the spirits of cruelty so to +thicken her blood that pity cannot flow along her veins! What pictures +are those of the murderer appearing at the door of the banquet-room with +Banquo's 'blood upon his face'; of Banquo himself 'with twenty trenched +gashes on his head,' or 'blood-bolter'd' and smiling in derision at his +murderer; of Macbeth, gazing at his hand, and watching it dye the whole +green ocean red; of Lady Macbeth, gazing at hers, and stretching it away +from her face to escape the smell of blood that all the perfumes of +Arabia will not subdue! The most horrible lines in the whole tragedy are +those of her shuddering cry, 'Yet who would have thought the old man to +have had so much blood in him?' And it is not only at such moments that +these images occur. Even in the quiet conversation of Malcolm and +Macduff, Macbeth is imagined as holding a bloody sceptre, and Scotland +as a country bleeding and receiving every day a new gash added to her +wounds. It is as if the poet saw the whole story through an ensanguined +mist, and as if it stained the very blackness of the night. When +Macbeth, before Banquo's murder, invokes night to scarf up the tender +eye of pitiful day, and to tear in pieces the great bond that keeps him +pale, even the invisible hand that is to tear the bond is imagined as +covered with blood. + +Let us observe another point. The vividness, magnitude, and violence of +the imagery in some of these passages are characteristic of _Macbeth_ +almost throughout; and their influence contributes to form its +atmosphere. Images like those of the babe torn smiling from the breast +and dashed to death; of pouring the sweet milk of concord into hell; of +the earth shaking in fever; of the frame of things disjointed; of +sorrows striking heaven on the face, so that it resounds and yells out +like syllables of dolour; of the mind lying in restless ecstasy on a +rack; of the mind full of scorpions; of the tale told by an idiot, full +of sound and fury;--all keep the imagination moving on a 'wild and +violent sea,' while it is scarcely for a moment permitted to dwell on +thoughts of peace and beauty. In its language, as in its action, the +drama is full of tumult and storm. Whenever the Witches are present we +see and hear a thunder-storm: when they are absent we hear of +ship-wrecking storms and direful thunders; of tempests that blow down +trees and churches, castles, palaces and pyramids; of the frightful +hurricane of the night when Duncan was murdered; of the blast on which +pity rides like a new-born babe, or on which Heaven's cherubim are +horsed. There is thus something magnificently appropriate in the cry +'Blow, wind! Come, wrack!' with which Macbeth, turning from the sight of +the moving wood of Birnam, bursts from his castle. He was borne to his +throne on a whirlwind, and the fate he goes to meet comes on the wings +of storm. + +Now all these agencies--darkness, the lights and colours that illuminate +it, the storm that rushes through it, the violent and gigantic +images--conspire with the appearances of the Witches and the Ghost to +awaken horror, and in some degree also a supernatural dread. And to this +effect other influences contribute. The pictures called up by the mere +words of the Witches stir the same feelings,--those, for example, of the +spell-bound sailor driven tempest-tost for nine times nine weary weeks, +and never visited by sleep night or day; of the drop of poisonous foam +that forms on the moon, and, falling to earth, is collected for +pernicious ends; of the sweltering venom of the toad, the finger of the +babe killed at its birth by its own mother, the tricklings from the +murderer's gibbet. In Nature, again, something is felt to be at work, +sympathetic with human guilt and supernatural malice. She labours with +portents. + + Lamentings heard in the air, strange screams of death, + And prophesying with accents terrible, + +burst from her. The owl clamours all through the night; Duncan's horses +devour each other in frenzy; the dawn comes, but no light with it. +Common sights and sounds, the crying of crickets, the croak of the +raven, the light thickening after sunset, the home-coming of the rooks, +are all ominous. Then, as if to deepen these impressions, Shakespeare +has concentrated attention on the obscurer regions of man's being, on +phenomena which make it seem that he is in the power of secret forces +lurking below, and independent of his consciousness and will: such as +the relapse of Macbeth from conversation into a reverie, during which he +gazes fascinated at the image of murder drawing closer and closer; the +writing on his face of strange things he never meant to show; the +pressure of imagination heightening into illusion, like the vision of a +dagger in the air, at first bright, then suddenly splashed with blood, +or the sound of a voice that cried 'Sleep no more' and would not be +silenced.[196] To these are added other, and constant, allusions to +sleep, man's strange half-conscious life; to the misery of its +withholding; to the terrible dreams of remorse; to the cursed thoughts +from which Banquo is free by day, but which tempt him in his sleep: and +again to abnormal disturbances of sleep; in the two men, of whom one +during the murder of Duncan laughed in his sleep, and the other raised a +cry of murder; and in Lady Macbeth, who rises to re-enact in +somnambulism those scenes the memory of which is pushing her on to +madness or suicide. All this has one effect, to excite supernatural +alarm and, even more, a dread of the presence of evil not only in its +recognised seat but all through and around our mysterious nature. +Perhaps there is no other work equal to _Macbeth_ in the production of +this effect.[197] + +It is enhanced--to take a last point--by the use of a literary +expedient. Not even in _Richard III._, which in this, as in other +respects, has resemblances to _Macbeth_, is there so much of Irony. I do +not refer to irony in the ordinary sense; to speeches, for example, +where the speaker is intentionally ironical, like that of Lennox in III. +vi. I refer to irony on the part of the author himself, to ironical +juxtapositions of persons and events, and especially to the 'Sophoclean +irony' by which a speaker is made to use words bearing to the audience, +in addition to his own meaning, a further and ominous sense, hidden from +himself and, usually, from the other persons on the stage. The very +first words uttered by Macbeth, + + So foul and fair a day I have not seen, + +are an example to which attention has often been drawn; for they startle +the reader by recalling the words of the Witches in the first scene, + + Fair is foul, and foul is fair. + +When Macbeth, emerging from his murderous reverie, turns to the nobles +saying, 'Let us toward the King,' his words are innocent, but to the +reader have a double meaning. Duncan's comment on the treachery of +Cawdor, + + There's no art + To find the mind's construction in the face: + He was a gentleman on whom I built + An absolute trust, + +is interrupted[198] by the entrance of the traitor Macbeth, who is +greeted with effusive gratitude and a like 'absolute trust.' I have +already referred to the ironical effect of the beautiful lines in which +Duncan and Banquo describe the castle they are about to enter. To the +reader Lady Macbeth's light words, + + A little water clears us of this deed: + How easy is it then, + +summon up the picture of the sleep-walking scene. The idea of the +Porter's speech, in which he imagines himself the keeper of hell-gate, +shows the same irony. So does the contrast between the obvious and the +hidden meanings of the apparitions of the armed head, the bloody child, +and the child with the tree in his hand. It would be easy to add further +examples. Perhaps the most striking is the answer which Banquo, as he +rides away, never to return alive, gives to Macbeth's reminder, 'Fail +not our feast.' 'My lord, I will not,' he replies, and he keeps his +promise. It cannot be by accident that Shakespeare so frequently in this +play uses a device which contributes to excite the vague fear of hidden +forces operating on minds unconscious of their influence.[199] + + +2 + +But of course he had for this purpose an agency more potent than any yet +considered. It would be almost an impertinence to attempt to describe +anew the influence of the Witch-scenes on the imagination of the +reader.[200] Nor do I believe that among different readers this +influence differs greatly except in degree. But when critics begin to +analyse the imaginative effect, and still more when, going behind it, +they try to determine the truth which lay for Shakespeare or lies for us +in these creations, they too often offer us results which, either +through perversion or through inadequacy, fail to correspond with that +effect. This happens in opposite ways. On the one hand the Witches, +whose contribution to the 'atmosphere' of Macbeth can hardly be +exaggerated, are credited with far too great an influence upon the +action; sometimes they are described as goddesses, or even as fates, +whom Macbeth is powerless to resist. And this is perversion. On the +other hand, we are told that, great as is their influence on the action, +it is so because they are merely symbolic representations of the +unconscious or half-conscious guilt in Macbeth himself. And this is +inadequate. The few remarks I have to make may take the form of a +criticism on these views. + +(1) As to the former, Shakespeare took, as material for his purposes, +the ideas about witch-craft that he found existing in people around him +and in books like Reginald Scot's _Discovery_ (1584). And he used these +ideas without changing their substance at all. He selected and improved, +avoiding the merely ridiculous, dismissing (unlike Middleton) the +sexually loathsome or stimulating, rehandling and heightening whatever +could touch the imagination with fear, horror, and mysterious +attraction. The Witches, that is to say, are not goddesses, or fates, +or, in any way whatever, supernatural beings. They are old women, poor +and ragged, skinny and hideous, full of vulgar spite, occupied in +killing their neighbours' swine or revenging themselves on sailors' +wives who have refused them chestnuts. If Banquo considers their beards +a proof that they are not women, that only shows his ignorance: Sir Hugh +Evans would have known better.[201] There is not a syllable in _Macbeth_ +to imply that they are anything but women. But, again in accordance with +the popular ideas, they have received from evil spirits certain +supernatural powers. They can 'raise haile, tempests, and hurtfull +weather; as lightening, thunder etc.' They can 'passe from place to +place in the aire invisible.' They can 'keepe divels and spirits in the +likenesse of todes and cats,' Paddock or Graymalkin. They can +'transferre corne in the blade from one place to another.' They can +'manifest unto others things hidden and lost, and foreshew things to +come, and see them as though they were present.' The reader will apply +these phrases and sentences at once to passages in _Macbeth_. They are +all taken from Scot's first chapter, where he is retailing the current +superstitions of his time; and, in regard to the Witches, Shakespeare +mentions scarcely anything, if anything, that was not to be found, of +course in a more prosaic shape, either in Scot or in some other easily +accessible authority.[202] He read, to be sure, in Holinshed, his main +source for the story of Macbeth, that, according to the common opinion, +the 'women' who met Macbeth 'were eyther the weird sisters, that is (as +ye would say) ye Goddesses of destinee, or els some Nimphes or Feiries.' +But what does that matter? What he read in his authority was absolutely +nothing to his audience, and remains nothing to us, unless he _used_ +what he read. And he did not use this idea. He used nothing but the +phrase 'weird sisters,'[203] which certainly no more suggested to a +London audience the Parcae of one mythology or the Norns of another than +it does to-day. His Witches owe all their power to the spirits; they are +'_instruments_ of darkness'; the spirits are their 'masters' (IV. i. +63). Fancy the fates having masters! Even if the passages where Hecate +appears are Shakespeare's,[204] that will not help the Witches; for they +are subject to Hecate, who is herself a goddess or superior devil, not a +fate.[205] + +Next, while the influence of the Witches' prophecies on Macbeth is very +great, it is quite clearly shown to be an influence and nothing more. +There is no sign whatever in the play that Shakespeare meant the actions +of Macbeth to be forced on him by an external power, whether that of the +Witches, or of their 'masters,' or of Hecate. It is needless therefore +to insist that such a conception would be in contradiction with his +whole tragic practice. The prophecies of the Witches are presented +simply as dangerous circumstances with which Macbeth has to deal: they +are dramatically on the same level as the story of the Ghost in +_Hamlet_, or the falsehoods told by Iago to Othello. Macbeth is, in the +ordinary sense, perfectly free in regard to them: and if we speak of +degrees of freedom, he is even more free than Hamlet, who was crippled +by melancholy when the Ghost appeared to him. That the influence of the +first prophecies upon him came as much from himself as from them, is +made abundantly clear by the obviously intentional contrast between him +and Banquo. Banquo, ambitious but perfectly honest, is scarcely even +startled by them, and he remains throughout the scene indifferent to +them. But when Macbeth heard them he was not an innocent man. Precisely +how far his mind was guilty may be a question; but no innocent man would +have started, as he did, with a start of _fear_ at the mere prophecy of +a crown, or have conceived thereupon _immediately_ the thought of +murder. Either this thought was not new to him,[206] or he had cherished +at least some vaguer dishonourable dream, the instantaneous recurrence +of which, at the moment of his hearing the prophecy, revealed to him an +inward and terrifying guilt. In either case not only was he free to +accept or resist the temptation, but the temptation was already within +him. We are admitting too much, therefore, when we compare him with +Othello, for Othello's mind was perfectly free from suspicion when his +temptation came to him. And we are admitting, again, too much when we +use the word 'temptation' in reference to the first prophecies of the +Witches. Speaking strictly we must affirm that he was tempted only by +himself. _He_ speaks indeed of their 'supernatural soliciting'; but in +fact they did not solicit. They merely announced events: they hailed him +as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and King hereafter. No connection +of these announcements with any action of his was even hinted by them. +For all that appears, the natural death of an old man might have +fulfilled the prophecy any day.[207] In any case, the idea of fulfilling +it by murder was entirely his own.[208] + +When Macbeth sees the Witches again, after the murders of Duncan and +Banquo, we observe, however, a striking change. They no longer need to +go and meet him; he seeks them out. He has committed himself to his +course of evil. Now accordingly they do 'solicit.' They prophesy, but +they also give advice: they bid him be bloody, bold, and secure. We have +no hope that he will reject their advice; but so far are they from +having, even now, any power to compel him to accept it, that they make +careful preparations to deceive him into doing so. And, almost as though +to intimate how entirely the responsibility for his deeds still lies +with Macbeth, Shakespeare makes his first act after this interview one +for which his tempters gave him not a hint--the slaughter of Macduff's +wife and children. + +To all this we must add that Macbeth himself nowhere betrays a suspicion +that his action is, or has been, thrust on him by an external power. He +curses the Witches for deceiving him, but he never attempts to shift to +them the burden of his guilt. Neither has Shakespeare placed in the +mouth of any other character in this play such fatalistic expressions as +may be found in _King Lear_ and occasionally elsewhere. He appears +actually to have taken pains to make the natural psychological genesis +of Macbeth's crimes perfectly clear, and it was a most unfortunate +notion of Schlegel's that the Witches were required because natural +agencies would have seemed too weak to drive such a man as Macbeth to +his first murder. + +'Still,' it may be said, 'the Witches did foreknow Macbeth's future; and +what is foreknown is fixed; and how can a man be responsible when his +future is fixed?' With this question, as a speculative one, we have no +concern here; but, in so far as it relates to the play, I answer, first, +that not one of the things foreknown is an action. This is just as true +of the later prophecies as of the first. That Macbeth will be harmed by +none of woman born, and will never be vanquished till Birnam Wood shall +come against him, involves (so far as we are informed) no action of his. +It may be doubted, indeed, whether Shakespeare would have introduced +prophecies of Macbeth's deeds, even if it had been convenient to do so; +he would probably have felt that to do so would interfere with the +interest of the inward struggle and suffering. And, in the second place, +_Macbeth_ was not written for students of metaphysics or theology, but +for people at large; and, however it may be with prophecies of actions, +prophecies of mere events do not suggest to people at large any sort of +difficulty about responsibility. Many people, perhaps most, habitually +think of their 'future' as something fixed, and of themselves as 'free.' +The Witches nowadays take a room in Bond Street and charge a guinea; and +when the victim enters they hail him the possessor of L1000 a year, or +prophesy to him of journeys, wives, and children. But though he is +struck dumb by their prescience, it does not even cross his mind that he +is going to lose his glorious 'freedom'--not though journeys and +marriages imply much more agency on his part than anything foretold to +Macbeth. This whole difficulty is undramatic; and I may add that +Shakespeare nowhere shows, like Chaucer, any interest in speculative +problems concerning foreknowledge, predestination and freedom. + +(2) We may deal more briefly with the opposite interpretation. According +to it the Witches and their prophecies are to be taken merely as +symbolical representations of thoughts and desires which have slumbered +in Macbeth's breast and now rise into consciousness and confront him. +With this idea, which springs from the wish to get rid of a mere +external supernaturalism, and to find a psychological and spiritual +meaning in that which the groundlings probably received as hard facts, +one may feel sympathy. But it is evident that it is rather a +'philosophy' of the Witches than an immediate dramatic apprehension of +them; and even so it will be found both incomplete and, in other +respects, inadequate. + +It is incomplete because it cannot possibly be applied to all the facts. +Let us grant that it will apply to the most important prophecy, that of +the crown; and that the later warning which Macbeth receives, to beware +of Macduff, also answers to something in his own breast and 'harps his +fear aright' But there we have to stop. Macbeth had evidently no +suspicion of that treachery in Cawdor through which he himself became +Thane; and who will suggest that he had any idea, however subconscious, +about Birnam Wood or the man not born of woman? It may be held--and +rightly, I think--that the prophecies which answer to nothing inward, +the prophecies which are merely supernatural, produce, now at any rate, +much less imaginative effect than the others,--even that they are in +_Macbeth_ an element which was of an age and not for all time; but still +they are there, and they are essential to the plot.[209] And as the +theory under consideration will not apply to them at all, it is not +likely that it gives an adequate account even of those prophecies to +which it can in some measure be applied. + +It is inadequate here chiefly because it is much too narrow. The Witches +and their prophecies, if they are to be rationalised or taken +symbolically, must represent not only the evil slumbering in the hero's +soul, but all those obscurer influences of the evil around him in the +world which aid his own ambition and the incitements of his wife. Such +influences, even if we put aside all belief in evil 'spirits,' are as +certain, momentous, and terrifying facts as the presence of inchoate +evil in the soul itself; and if we exclude all reference to these facts +from our idea of the Witches, it will be greatly impoverished and will +certainly fail to correspond with the imaginative effect. The union of +the outward and inward here may be compared with something of the same +kind in Greek poetry.[210] In the first Book of the _Iliad_ we are told +that, when Agamemnon threatened to take Briseis from Achilles, 'grief +came upon Peleus' son, and his heart within his shaggy breast was +divided in counsel, whether to draw his keen blade from his thigh and +set the company aside and so slay Atreides, or to assuage his anger and +curb his soul. While yet he doubted thereof in heart and soul, and was +drawing his great sword from his sheath, Athene came to him from heaven, +sent forth of the white-armed goddess Hera, whose heart loved both alike +and had care for them. She stood behind Peleus' son and caught him by +his golden hair, to him only visible, and of the rest no man beheld +her.' And at her bidding he mastered his wrath, 'and stayed his heavy +hand on the silver hilt, and thrust the great sword back into the +sheath, and was not disobedient to the saying of Athene.'[211] The +succour of the goddess here only strengthens an inward movement in the +mind of Achilles, but we should lose something besides a poetic effect +if for that reason we struck her out of the account. We should lose the +idea that the inward powers of the soul answer in their essence to +vaster powers without, which support them and assure the effect of their +exertion. So it is in _Macbeth_.[212] The words of the Witches are fatal +to the hero only because there is in him something which leaps into +light at the sound of them; but they are at the same time the witness of +forces which never cease to work in the world around him, and, on the +instant of his surrender to them, entangle him inextricably in the web +of Fate. If the inward connection is once realised (and Shakespeare has +left us no excuse for missing it), we need not fear, and indeed shall +scarcely be able, to exaggerate the effect of the Witch-scenes in +heightening and deepening the sense of fear, horror, and mystery which +pervades the atmosphere of the tragedy. + + +3 + +From this murky background stand out the two great terrible figures, who +dwarf all the remaining characters of the drama. Both are sublime, and +both inspire, far more than the other tragic heroes, the feeling of awe. +They are never detached in imagination from the atmosphere which +surrounds them and adds to their grandeur and terror. It is, as it were, +continued into their souls. For within them is all that we felt +without--the darkness of night, lit with the flame of tempest and the +hues of blood, and haunted by wild and direful shapes, 'murdering +ministers,' spirits of remorse, and maddening visions of peace lost and +judgment to come. The way to be untrue to Shakespeare here, as always, +is to relax the tension of imagination, to conventionalise, to conceive +Macbeth, for example, as a half-hearted cowardly criminal, and Lady +Macbeth as a whole-hearted fiend. + +These two characters are fired by one and the same passion of ambition; +and to a considerable extent they are alike. The disposition of each is +high, proud, and commanding. They are born to rule, if not to reign. +They are peremptory or contemptuous to their inferiors. They are not +children of light, like Brutus and Hamlet; they are of the world. We +observe in them no love of country, and no interest in the welfare of +anyone outside their family. Their habitual thoughts and aims are, and, +we imagine, long have been, all of station and power. And though in both +there is something, and in one much, of what is higher--honour, +conscience, humanity--they do not live consciously in the light of these +things or speak their language. Not that they are egoists, like Iago; +or, if they are egoists, theirs is an _egoisme a deux_. They have no +separate ambitions.[213] They support and love one another. They suffer +together. And if, as time goes on, they drift a little apart, they are +not vulgar souls, to be alienated and recriminate when they experience +the fruitlessness of their ambition. They remain to the end tragic, even +grand. + +So far there is much likeness between them. Otherwise they are +contrasted, and the action is built upon this contrast. Their attitudes +towards the projected murder of Duncan are quite different; and it +produces in them equally different effects. In consequence, they appear +in the earlier part of the play as of equal importance, if indeed Lady +Macbeth does not overshadow her husband; but afterwards she retires more +and more into the background, and he becomes unmistakably the leading +figure. His is indeed far the more complex character: and I will speak +of it first. + +Macbeth, the cousin of a King mild, just, and beloved, but now too old +to lead his army, is introduced to us as a general of extraordinary +prowess, who has covered himself with glory in putting down a rebellion +and repelling the invasion of a foreign army. In these conflicts he +showed great personal courage, a quality which he continues to display +throughout the drama in regard to all plain dangers. It is difficult to +be sure of his customary demeanour, for in the play we see him either in +what appears to be an exceptional relation to his wife, or else in the +throes of remorse and desperation; but from his behaviour during his +journey home after the war, from his _later_ conversations with Lady +Macbeth, and from his language to the murderers of Banquo and to others, +we imagine him as a great warrior, somewhat masterful, rough, and +abrupt, a man to inspire some fear and much admiration. He was thought +'honest,' or honourable; he was trusted, apparently, by everyone; +Macduff, a man of the highest integrity, 'loved him well.' And there +was, in fact, much good in him. We have no warrant, I think, for +describing him, with many writers, as of a 'noble' nature, like Hamlet +or Othello;[214] but he had a keen sense both of honour and of the worth +of a good name. The phrase, again, 'too much of the milk of human +kindness,' is applied to him in impatience by his wife, who did not +fully understand him; but certainly he was far from devoid of humanity +and pity. + +At the same time he was exceedingly ambitious. He must have been so by +temper. The tendency must have been greatly strengthened by his +marriage. When we see him, it has been further stimulated by his +remarkable success and by the consciousness of exceptional powers and +merit. It becomes a passion. The course of action suggested by it is +extremely perilous: it sets his good name, his position, and even his +life on the hazard. It is also abhorrent to his better feelings. Their +defeat in the struggle with ambition leaves him utterly wretched, and +would have kept him so, however complete had been his outward success +and security. On the other hand, his passion for power and his instinct +of self-assertion are so vehement that no inward misery could persuade +him to relinquish the fruits of crime, or to advance from remorse to +repentance. + +In the character as so far sketched there is nothing very peculiar, +though the strength of the forces contending in it is unusual. But there +is in Macbeth one marked peculiarity, the true apprehension of which is +the key to Shakespeare's conception.[215] This bold ambitious man of +action has, within certain limits, the imagination of a poet,--an +imagination on the one hand extremely sensitive to impressions of a +certain kind, and, on the other, productive of violent disturbance both +of mind and body. Through it he is kept in contact with supernatural +impressions and is liable to supernatural fears. And through it, +especially, come to him the intimations of conscience and honour. +Macbeth's better nature--to put the matter for clearness' sake too +broadly--instead of speaking to him in the overt language of moral +ideas, commands, and prohibitions, incorporates itself in images which +alarm and horrify. His imagination is thus the best of him, something +usually deeper and higher than his conscious thoughts; and if he had +obeyed it he would have been safe. But his wife quite misunderstands it, +and he himself understands it only in part. The terrifying images which +deter him from crime and follow its commission, and which are really the +protest of his deepest self, seem to his wife the creations of mere +nervous fear, and are sometimes referred by himself to the dread of +vengeance or the restlessness of insecurity.[216] His conscious or +reflective mind, that is, moves chiefly among considerations of outward +success and failure, while his inner being is convulsed by conscience. +And his inability to understand himself is repeated and exaggerated in +the interpretations of actors and critics, who represent him as a +coward, cold-blooded, calculating, and pitiless, who shrinks from crime +simply because it is dangerous, and suffers afterwards simply because he +is not safe. In reality his courage is frightful. He strides from crime +to crime, though his soul never ceases to bar his advance with shapes of +terror, or to clamour in his ears that he is murdering his peace and +casting away his 'eternal jewel.' + +It is of the first importance to realise the strength, and also (what +has not been so clearly recognised) the limits, of Macbeth's +imagination. It is not the universal meditative imagination of Hamlet. +He came to see in man, as Hamlet sometimes did, the 'quintessence of +dust'; but he must always have been incapable of Hamlet's reflections on +man's noble reason and infinite faculty, or of seeing with Hamlet's eyes +'this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with +golden fire.' Nor could he feel, like Othello, the romance of war or the +infinity of love. He shows no sign of any unusual sensitiveness to the +glory or beauty in the world or the soul; and it is partly for this +reason that we have no inclination to love him, and that we regard him +with more of awe than of pity. His imagination is excitable and intense, +but narrow. That which stimulates it is, almost solely, that which +thrills with sudden, startling, and often supernatural fear.[217] There +is a famous passage late in the play (V. v. 10) which is here very +significant, because it refers to a time before his conscience was +burdened, and so shows his native disposition: + + The time has been, my senses would have cool'd + To hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair + Would at a dismal treatise rise and stir + As life were in't. + +This 'time' must have been in his youth, or at least before we see him. +And, in the drama, everything which terrifies him is of this character, +only it has now a deeper and a moral significance. Palpable dangers +leave him unmoved or fill him with fire. He does himself mere justice +when he asserts he 'dare do all that may become a man,' or when he +exclaims to Banquo's ghost, + + What man dare, I dare: + Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear, + The arm'd rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger; + Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves + Shall never tremble. + +What appals him is always the image of his own guilty heart or bloody +deed, or some image which derives from them its terror or gloom. These, +when they arise, hold him spell-bound and possess him wholly, like a +hypnotic trance which is at the same time the ecstasy of a poet. As the +first 'horrid image' of Duncan's murder--of himself murdering +Duncan--rises from unconsciousness and confronts him, his hair stands on +end and the outward scene vanishes from his eyes. Why? For fear of +'consequences'? The idea is ridiculous. Or because the deed is bloody? +The man who with his 'smoking' steel 'carved out his passage' to the +rebel leader, and 'unseam'd him from the nave to the chaps,' would +hardly be frightened by blood. How could fear of consequences make the +dagger he is to use hang suddenly glittering before him in the air, and +then as suddenly dash it with gouts of blood? Even when he _talks_ of +consequences, and declares that if he were safe against them he would +'jump the life to come,' his imagination bears witness against him, and +shows us that what really holds him back is the hideous vileness of the +deed: + + He's here in double trust; + First, as I am his kinsman and his subject, + Strong both against the deed; then, as his host, + Who should against his murderer shut the door, + Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan + Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been + So clear in his great office, that his virtues + Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against + The deep damnation of his taking-off; + And pity, like a naked new-born babe, + Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, horsed + Upon the sightless couriers of the air, + Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye, + That tears shall drown the wind. + +It may be said that he is here thinking of the horror that others will +feel at the deed--thinking therefore of consequences. Yes, but could he +realise thus how horrible the deed would look to others if it were not +equally horrible to himself? + +It is the same when the murder is done. He is well-nigh mad with horror, +but it is not the horror of detection. It is not he who thinks of +washing his hands or getting his nightgown on. He has brought away the +daggers he should have left on the pillows of the grooms, but what does +he care for that? What _he_ thinks of is that, when he heard one of the +men awaked from sleep say 'God bless us,' he could not say 'Amen'; for +his imagination presents to him the parching of his throat as an +immediate judgment from heaven. His wife heard the owl scream and the +crickets cry; but what _he_ heard was the voice that first cried +'Macbeth doth murder sleep,' and then, a minute later, with a change of +tense, denounced on him, as if his three names gave him three +personalities to suffer in, the doom of sleeplessness: + + Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor + Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more. + +There comes a sound of knocking. It should be perfectly familiar to him; +but he knows not whence, or from what world, it comes. He looks down at +his hands, and starts violently: 'What hands are here?' For they seem +alive, they move, they mean to pluck out his eyes. He looks at one of +them again; it does not move; but the blood upon it is enough to dye the +whole ocean red. What has all this to do with fear of 'consequences'? It +is his soul speaking in the only shape in which it can speak freely, +that of imagination. + +So long as Macbeth's imagination is active, we watch him fascinated; we +feel suspense, horror, awe; in which are latent, also, admiration and +sympathy. But so soon as it is quiescent these feelings vanish. He is no +longer 'infirm of purpose': he becomes domineering, even brutal, or he +becomes a cool pitiless hypocrite. He is generally said to be a very bad +actor, but this is not wholly true. Whenever his imagination stirs, he +acts badly. It so possesses him, and is so much stronger than his +reason, that his face betrays him, and his voice utters the most +improbable untruths[218] or the most artificial rhetoric[219] But when +it is asleep he is firm, self-controlled and practical, as in the +conversation where he skilfully elicits from Banquo that information +about his movements which is required for the successful arrangement of +his murder.[220] Here he is hateful; and so he is in the conversation +with the murderers, who are not professional cut-throats but old +soldiers, and whom, without a vestige of remorse, he beguiles with +calumnies against Banquo and with such appeals as his wife had used to +him.[221] On the other hand, we feel much pity as well as anxiety in the +scene (I. vii.) where she overcomes his opposition to the murder; and we +feel it (though his imagination is not specially active) because this +scene shows us how little he understands himself. This is his great +misfortune here. Not that he fails to realise in reflection the baseness +of the deed (the soliloquy with which the scene opens shows that he does +not). But he has never, to put it pedantically, accepted as the +principle of his conduct the morality which takes shape in his +imaginative fears. Had he done so, and said plainly to his wife, 'The +thing is vile, and, however much I have sworn to do it, I will not,' she +would have been helpless; for all her arguments proceed on the +assumption that there is for them no such point of view. Macbeth does +approach this position once, when, resenting the accusation of +cowardice, he answers, + + I dare do all that may become a man; + Who dares do more is none. + +She feels in an instant that everything is at stake, and, ignoring the +point, overwhelms him with indignant and contemptuous personal reproach. +But he yields to it because he is himself half-ashamed of that answer of +his, and because, for want of habit, the simple idea which it expresses +has no hold on him comparable to the force it acquires when it becomes +incarnate in visionary fears and warnings. + +Yet these were so insistent, and they offered to his ambition a +resistance so strong, that it is impossible to regard him as falling +through the blindness or delusion of passion. On the contrary, he +himself feels with such intensity the enormity of his purpose that, it +seems clear, neither his ambition nor yet the prophecy of the Witches +would ever without the aid of Lady Macbeth have overcome this feeling. +As it is, the deed is done in horror and without the faintest desire or +sense of glory,--done, one may almost say, as if it were an appalling +duty; and, the instant it is finished, its futility is revealed to +Macbeth as clearly as its vileness had been revealed beforehand. As he +staggers from the scene he mutters in despair, + + Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou could'st. + +When, half an hour later, he returns with Lennox from the room of the +murder, he breaks out: + + Had I but died an hour before this chance, + I had lived a blessed time; for from this instant + There's nothing serious in mortality: + All is but toys: renown and grace is dead; + The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees + Is left this vault to brag of. + +This is no mere acting. The language here has none of the false +rhetoric of his merely hypocritical speeches. It is meant to deceive, +but it utters at the same time his profoundest feeling. And this he can +henceforth never hide from himself for long. However he may try to drown +it in further enormities, he hears it murmuring, + + Duncan is in his grave: + After life's fitful fever he sleeps well: + +or, + + better be with the dead: + +or, + + I have lived long enough: + +and it speaks its last words on the last day of his life: + + Out, out, brief candle! + Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player + That struts and frets his hour upon the stage + And then is heard no more: it is a tale + Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, + Signifying nothing. + +How strange that this judgment on life, the despair of a man who had +knowingly made mortal war on his own soul, should be frequently quoted +as Shakespeare's own judgment, and should even be adduced, in serious +criticism, as a proof of his pessimism! + +It remains to look a little more fully at the history of Macbeth after +the murder of Duncan. Unlike his first struggle this history excites +little suspense or anxiety on his account: we have now no hope for him. +But it is an engrossing spectacle, and psychologically it is perhaps the +most remarkable exhibition of the _development_ of a character to be +found in Shakespeare's tragedies. + +That heart-sickness which comes from Macbeth's perception of the +futility of his crime, and which never leaves him for long, is not, +however, his habitual state. It could not be so, for two reasons. In the +first place the consciousness of guilt is stronger in him than the +consciousness of failure; and it keeps him in a perpetual agony of +restlessness, and forbids him simply to droop and pine. His mind is +'full of scorpions.' He cannot sleep. He 'keeps alone,' moody and +savage. 'All that is within him does condemn itself for being there.' +There is a fever in his blood which urges him to ceaseless action in the +search for oblivion. And, in the second place, ambition, the love of +power, the instinct of self-assertion, are much too potent in Macbeth to +permit him to resign, even in spirit, the prize for which he has put +rancours in the vessel of his peace. The 'will to live' is mighty in +him. The forces which impelled him to aim at the crown re-assert +themselves. He faces the world, and his own conscience, desperate, but +never dreaming of acknowledging defeat. He will see 'the frame of things +disjoint' first. He challenges fate into the lists. + +The result is frightful. He speaks no more, as before Duncan's murder, +of honour or pity. That sleepless torture, he tells himself, is nothing +but the sense of insecurity and the fear of retaliation. If only he were +safe, it would vanish. And he looks about for the cause of his fear; and +his eye falls on Banquo. Banquo, who cannot fail to suspect him, has not +fled or turned against him: Banquo has become his chief counsellor. Why? +Because, he answers, the kingdom was promised to Banquo's children. +Banquo, then, is waiting to attack him, to make a way for them. The +'bloody instructions' he himself taught when he murdered Duncan, are +about to return, as he said they would, to plague the inventor. _This_ +then, he tells himself, is the fear that will not let him sleep; and it +will die with Banquo. There is no hesitation now, and no remorse: he has +nearly learned his lesson. He hastens feverishly, not to murder Banquo, +but to procure his murder: some strange idea is in his mind that the +thought of the dead man will not haunt him, like the memory of Duncan, +if the deed is done by other hands.[222] The deed is done: but, instead +of peace descending on him, from the depths of his nature his +half-murdered conscience rises; his deed confronts him in the apparition +of Banquo's Ghost, and the horror of the night of his first murder +returns. But, alas, _it_ has less power, and _he_ has more will. +Agonised and trembling, he still faces this rebel image, and it yields: + + Why, so: being gone, + I am a man again. + +Yes, but his secret is in the hands of the assembled lords. And, worse, +this deed is as futile as the first. For, though Banquo is dead and even +his Ghost is conquered, that inner torture is unassuaged. But he will +not bear it. His guests have hardly left him when he turns roughly to +his wife: + + How say'st thou, that Macduff denies his person + At our great bidding? + +Macduff it is that spoils his sleep. He shall perish,--he and aught else +that bars the road to peace. + + For mine own good + All causes shall give way: I am in blood + Stepp'd in so far that, should I wade no more, + Returning were as tedious as go o'er: + Strange things I have in head that will to hand, + Which must be acted ere they may be scann'd. + +She answers, sick at heart, + + You lack the season of all natures, sleep. + +No doubt: but he has found the way to it now: + + Come, we'll to sleep. My strange and self abuse + Is the initiate fear that wants hard use; + We are yet but young in deed. + +What a change from the man who thought of Duncan's virtues, and of pity +like a naked new-born babe! What a frightful clearness of +self-consciousness in this descent to hell, and yet what a furious force +in the instinct of life and self-assertion that drives him on! + +He goes to seek the Witches. He will know, by the worst means, the +worst. He has no longer any awe of them. + + How now, you secret, black and midnight hags! + +--so he greets them, and at once he demands and threatens. They tell him +he is right to fear Macduff. They tell him to fear nothing, for none of +woman born can harm him. He feels that the two statements are at +variance; infatuated, suspects no double meaning; but, that he may +'sleep in spite of thunder,' determines not to spare Macduff. But his +heart throbs to know one thing, and he forces from the Witches the +vision of Banquo's children crowned. The old intolerable thought +returns, 'for Banquo's issue have I filed my mind'; and with it, for all +the absolute security apparently promised him, there returns that inward +fever. Will nothing quiet it? Nothing but destruction. Macduff, one +comes to tell him, has escaped him; but that does not matter: he can +still destroy:[223] + + And even now, + To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done: + The castle of Macduff I will surprise; + Seize upon Fife; give to the edge o' the sword + His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls + That trace him in's line. No boasting like a fool; + This deed I'll do before this purpose cool. + But no more sights! + +No, he need fear no more 'sights.' The Witches have done their work, +and after this purposeless butchery his own imagination will trouble him +no more.[224] He has dealt his last blow at the conscience and pity +which spoke through it. + +The whole flood of evil in his nature is now let loose. He becomes an +open tyrant, dreaded by everyone about him, and a terror to his country. +She 'sinks beneath the yoke.' + + Each new morn + New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows + Strike heaven on the face. + +She weeps, she bleeds, 'and each new day a gash is added to her wounds.' +She is not the mother of her children, but their grave; + + where nothing, + But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile: + Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rend the air + Are made, not mark'd. + +For this wild rage and furious cruelty we are prepared; but vices of +another kind start up as he plunges on his downward way. + + I grant him bloody, + Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, + Sudden, malicious, + +says Malcolm; and two of these epithets surprise us. Who would have +expected avarice or lechery[225] in Macbeth? His ruin seems complete. + +Yet it is never complete. To the end he never totally loses our +sympathy; we never feel towards him as we do to those who appear the +born children of darkness. There remains something sublime in the +defiance with which, even when cheated of his last hope, he faces earth +and hell and heaven. Nor would any soul to whom evil was congenial be +capable of that heart-sickness which overcomes him when he thinks of the +'honour, love, obedience, troops of friends' which 'he must not look to +have' (and which Iago would never have cared to have), and contrasts +with them + + Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath, + Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not, + +(and which Iago would have accepted with indifference). Neither can I +agree with those who find in his reception of the news of his wife's +death proof of alienation or utter carelessness. There is no proof of +these in the words, + + She should have died hereafter; + There would have been a time for such a word, + +spoken as they are by a man already in some measure prepared for such +news, and now transported by the frenzy of his last fight for life. He +has no time now to feel.[226] Only, as he thinks of the morrow when time +to feel will come--if anything comes, the vanity of all hopes and +forward-lookings sinks deep into his soul with an infinite weariness, +and he murmurs, + + To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, + Creeps in this petty pace from day to day + To the last syllable of recorded time, + And all our yesterdays have lighted fools + The way to dusty death. + +In the very depths a gleam of his native love of goodness, and with it a +touch of tragic grandeur, rests upon him. The evil he has desperately +embraced continues to madden or to wither his inmost heart. No +experience in the world could bring him to glory in it or make his peace +with it, or to forget what he once was and Iago and Goneril never were. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 194: See note BB.] + +[Footnote 195: 'Hell is murky' (V. i. 35). This, surely, is not meant +for a scornful repetition of something said long ago by Macbeth. He +would hardly in those days have used an argument or expressed a fear +that could provoke nothing but contempt.] + +[Footnote 196: Whether Banquo's ghost is a mere illusion, like the +dagger, is discussed in Note FF.] + +[Footnote 197: In parts of this paragraph I am indebted to Hunter's +_Illustrations of Shakespeare_.] + +[Footnote 198: The line is a foot short.] + +[Footnote 199: It should be observed that in some cases the irony would +escape an audience ignorant of the story and watching the play for the +first time,--another indication that Shakespeare did not write solely +for immediate stage purposes.] + +[Footnote 200: Their influence on spectators is, I believe, very +inferior. These scenes, like the Storm-scenes in _King Lear_, belong +properly to the world of imagination.] + +[Footnote 201: 'By yea and no, I think the 'oman is a witch indeed: I +like not when a 'oman has a great peard' (_Merry Wives_, IV. ii. 202).] + +[Footnote 202: Even the metaphor in the lines (II. iii. 127), + + What should be spoken here, where our fate, + Hid in an auger-hole, may rush and seize us? + +was probably suggested by the words in Scot's first chapter, 'They can +go in and out at awger-holes.'] + +[Footnote 203: Once, 'weird women.' Whether Shakespeare knew that +'weird' signified 'fate' we cannot tell, but it is probable that he did. +The word occurs six times in _Macbeth_ (it does not occur elsewhere in +Shakespeare). The first three times it is spelt in the Folio _weyward_, +the last three _weyard_. This may suggest a miswriting or misprinting of +_wayward_; but, as that word is always spelt in the Folio either rightly +or _waiward_, it is more likely that the _weyward_ and _weyard_ of +_Macbeth_ are the copyist's or printer's misreading of Shakespeare's +_weird_ or _weyrd_.] + +[Footnote 204: The doubt as to these passages (see Note Z) does not +arise from the mere appearance of this figure. The idea of Hecate's +connection with witches appears also at II. i. 52, and she is mentioned +again at III. ii. 41 (cf. _Mid. Night's Dream_, V. i. 391, for her +connection with fairies). It is part of the common traditional notion of +the heathen gods being now devils. Scot refers to it several times. See +the notes in the Clarendon Press edition on III. v. 1, or those in +Furness's Variorum. + +Of course in the popular notion the witch's spirits are devils or +servants of Satan. If Shakespeare openly introduces this idea only in +such phrases as 'the instruments of darkness' and 'what! can the devil +speak true?' the reason is probably his unwillingness to give too much +prominence to distinctively religious ideas.] + +[Footnote 205: If this paragraph is true, some of the statements even of +Lamb and of Coleridge about the Witches are, taken literally, incorrect. +What these critics, and notably the former, describe so well is the +poetic aspect abstracted from the remainder; and in describing this they +attribute to the Witches themselves what belongs really to the complex +of Witches, Spirits, and Hecate. For the purposes of imagination, no +doubt, this inaccuracy is of small consequence; and it is these purposes +that matter. [I have not attempted to fulfil them.]] + +[Footnote 206: See Note CC.] + +[Footnote 207: The proclamation of Malcolm as Duncan's successor (I. +iv.) changes the position, but the design of murder is prior to this.] + +[Footnote 208: Schlegel's assertion that the first thought of the murder +comes from the Witches is thus in flat contradiction with the text. (The +sentence in which he asserts this is, I may observe, badly mistranslated +in the English version, which, wherever I have consulted the original, +shows itself untrustworthy. It ought to be revised, for Schlegel is well +worth reading.)] + +[Footnote 209: It is noticeable that Dr. Forman, who saw the play in +1610 and wrote a sketch of it in his journal, says nothing about the +later prophecies. Perhaps he despised them as mere stuff for the +groundlings. The reader will find, I think, that the great poetic effect +of Act IV. Sc. i. depends much more on the 'charm' which precedes +Macbeth's entrance, and on Macbeth himself, than on the predictions.] + +[Footnote 210: This comparison was suggested by a passage in Hegel's +_Aesthetik_, i. 291 ff.] + +[Footnote 211: _Il._ i. 188 ff. (Leaf's translation).] + +[Footnote 212: The supernaturalism of the modern poet, indeed, is more +'external' than that of the ancient. We have already had evidence of +this, and shall find more when we come to the character of Banquo.] + +[Footnote 213: The assertion that Lady Macbeth sought a crown for +herself, or sought anything for herself, apart from her husband, is +absolutely unjustified by anything in the play. It is based on a +sentence of Holinshed's which Shakespeare did _not_ use.] + +[Footnote 214: The word is used of him (I. ii. 67), but not in a way +that decides this question or even bears on it.] + +[Footnote 215: This view, thus generally stated, is not original, but I +cannot say who first stated it.] + +[Footnote 216: The latter, and more important, point was put quite +clearly by Coleridge.] + +[Footnote 217: It is the consequent insistence on the idea of fear, and +the frequent repetition of the word, that have principally led to +misinterpretation.] + +[Footnote 218: _E.g._ I. iii. 149, where he excuses his abstraction by +saying that his 'dull brain was wrought with things forgotten,' when +nothing could be more natural than that he should be thinking of his new +honour.] + +[Footnote 219: _E.g._ in I. iv. This is so also in II. iii. 114 ff., +though here there is some real imaginative excitement mingled with the +rhetorical antitheses and balanced clauses and forced bombast.] + +[Footnote 220: III. i. Lady Macbeth herself could not more naturally +have introduced at intervals the questions 'Ride you this afternoon?' +(l. 19), 'Is't far you ride?' (l. 24), 'Goes Fleance with you?' (l. +36).] + +[Footnote 221: We feel here, however, an underlying subdued frenzy which +awakes some sympathy. There is an almost unendurable impatience +expressed even in the rhythm of many of the lines; _e.g._: + + Well then, now + Have you consider'd of my speeches? Know + That it was he in the times past which held you + So under fortune, which you thought had been + Our innocent self: this I made good to you + In our last conference, pass'd in probation with you, + How you were borne in hand, how cross'd, the instruments, + Who wrought with them, and all things else that might + To half a soul and to a notion crazed + Say, 'Thus did Banquo.' + +This effect is heard to the end of the play in Macbeth's less poetic +speeches, and leaves the same impression of burning energy, though not +of imaginative exaltation, as his great speeches. In these we find +either violent, huge, sublime imagery, or a torrent of figurative +expressions (as in the famous lines about 'the innocent sleep'). Our +impressions as to the diction of the play are largely derived from these +speeches of the hero, but not wholly so. The writing almost throughout +leaves an impression of intense, almost feverish, activity.] + +[Footnote 222: See his first words to the Ghost: 'Thou canst not say I +did it.'] + +[Footnote 223: + + For only in destroying I find ease + To my relentless thoughts.--_Paradise Lost_, ix. 129. + +Milton's portrait of Satan's misery here, and at the beginning of Book +IV., might well have been suggested by _Macbeth_. Coleridge, after +quoting Duncan's speech, I. iv. 35 ff., says: 'It is a fancy; but I can +never read this, and the following speeches of Macbeth, without +involuntarily thinking of the Miltonic Messiah and Satan.' I doubt if it +was a mere fancy. (It will be remembered that Milton thought at one time +of writing a tragedy on Macbeth.)] + +[Footnote 224: The immediate reference in 'But no more sights' is +doubtless to the visions called up by the Witches; but one of these, the +'blood-bolter'd Banquo,' recalls to him the vision of the preceding +night, of which he had said, + + You make me strange + Even to the disposition that I owe, + When now I think you can behold such _sights_, + And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks, + When mine is blanch'd with fear.] + +[Footnote 225: 'Luxurious' and 'luxury' are used by Shakespeare only in +this older sense. It must be remembered that these lines are spoken by +Malcolm, but it seems likely that they are meant to be taken as true +throughout.] + +[Footnote 226: I do not at all suggest that his love for his wife +remains what it was when he greeted her with the words 'My dearest love, +Duncan comes here to-night.' He has greatly changed; she has ceased to +help him, sunk in her own despair; and there is no intensity of anxiety +in the questions he puts to the doctor about her. But his love for her +was probably never unselfish, never the love of Brutus, who, in somewhat +similar circumstances, uses, on the death of Cassius, words which remind +us of Macbeth's: + + I shall find time, Cassius, I shall find time. + +For the opposite strain of feeling cf. Sonnet 90: + + Then hate me if thou wilt; if ever, now, + Now while the world is bent my deeds to cross.] + + + + +LECTURE X + +MACBETH + + +1 + +To regard _Macbeth_ as a play, like the love-tragedies _Romeo and +Juliet_ and _Antony and Cleopatra_, in which there are two central +characters of equal importance, is certainly a mistake. But Shakespeare +himself is in a measure responsible for it, because the first half of +_Macbeth_ is greater than the second, and in the first half Lady Macbeth +not only appears more than in the second but exerts the ultimate +deciding influence on the action. And, in the opening Act at least, Lady +Macbeth is the most commanding and perhaps the most awe-inspiring figure +that Shakespeare drew. Sharing, as we have seen, certain traits with her +husband, she is at once clearly distinguished from him by an +inflexibility of will, which appears to hold imagination, feeling, and +conscience completely in check. To her the prophecy of things that will +be becomes instantaneously the determination that they shall be: + + Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be + That thou art promised. + +She knows her husband's weakness, how he scruples 'to catch the nearest +way' to the object he desires; and she sets herself without a trace of +doubt or conflict to counteract this weakness. To her there is no +separation between will and deed; and, as the deed falls in part to her, +she is sure it will be done: + + The raven himself is hoarse + That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan + Under my battlements. + +On the moment of Macbeth's rejoining her, after braving infinite dangers +and winning infinite praise, without a syllable on these subjects or a +word of affection, she goes straight to her purpose and permits him to +speak of nothing else. She takes the superior position and assumes the +direction of affairs,--appears to assume it even more than she really +can, that she may spur him on. She animates him by picturing the deed as +heroic, 'this night's _great_ business,' or 'our _great_ quell,' while +she ignores its cruelty and faithlessness. She bears down his faint +resistance by presenting him with a prepared scheme which may remove +from him the terror and danger of deliberation. She rouses him with a +taunt no man can bear, and least of all a soldier,--the word 'coward.' +She appeals even to his love for her: + + from this time + Such I account thy love; + +--such, that is, as the protestations of a drunkard. Her reasonings are +mere sophisms; they could persuade no man. It is not by them, it is by +personal appeals, through the admiration she extorts from him, and +through sheer force of will, that she impels him to the deed. Her eyes +are fixed upon the crown and the means to it; she does not attend to the +consequences. Her plan of laying the guilt upon the chamberlains is +invented on the spur of the moment, and simply to satisfy her husband. +Her true mind is heard in the ringing cry with which she answers his +question, 'Will it not be received ... that they have done it?' + + Who _dares_ receive it other? + +And this is repeated in the sleep-walking scene: 'What need we fear who +knows it, when none can call our power to account?' Her passionate +courage sweeps him off his feet. His decision is taken in a moment of +enthusiasm: + + Bring forth men-children only; + For thy undaunted mettle should compose + Nothing but males. + +And even when passion has quite died away her will remains supreme. In +presence of overwhelming horror and danger, in the murder scene and the +banquet scene, her self-control is perfect. When the truth of what she +has done dawns on her, no word of complaint, scarcely a word of her own +suffering, not a single word of her own as apart from his, escapes her +when others are by. She helps him, but never asks his help. She leans on +nothing but herself. And from the beginning to the end--though she makes +once or twice a slip in acting her part--her will never fails her. Its +grasp upon her nature may destroy her, but it is never relaxed. We are +sure that she never betrayed her husband or herself by a word or even a +look, save in sleep. However appalling she may be, she is sublime. + +In the earlier scenes of the play this aspect of Lady Macbeth's +character is far the most prominent. And if she seems invincible she +seems also inhuman. We find no trace of pity for the kind old king; no +consciousness of the treachery and baseness of the murder; no sense of +the value of the lives of the wretched men on whom the guilt is to be +laid; no shrinking even from the condemnation or hatred of the world. +Yet if the Lady Macbeth of these scenes were really utterly inhuman, or +a 'fiend-like queen,' as Malcolm calls her, the Lady Macbeth of the +sleep-walking scene would be an impossibility. The one woman could never +become the other. And in fact, if we look below the surface, there is +evidence enough in the earlier scenes of preparation for the later. I do +not mean that Lady Macbeth was naturally humane. There is nothing in the +play to show this, and several passages subsequent to the murder-scene +supply proof to the contrary. One is that where she exclaims, on being +informed of Duncan's murder, + + Woe, alas! + What, in our house? + +This mistake in acting shows that she does not even know what the +natural feeling in such circumstances would be; and Banquo's curt +answer, 'Too cruel anywhere,' is almost a reproof of her insensibility. +But, admitting this, we have in the first place to remember, in +imagining the opening scenes, that she is deliberately bent on +counteracting the 'human kindness' of her husband, and also that she is +evidently not merely inflexibly determined but in a condition of +abnormal excitability. That exaltation in the project which is so +entirely lacking in Macbeth is strongly marked in her. When she tries to +help him by representing their enterprise as heroic, she is deceiving +herself as much as him. Their attainment of the crown presents itself to +her, perhaps has long presented itself, as something so glorious, and +she has fixed her will upon it so completely, that for the time she sees +the enterprise in no other light than that of its greatness. When she +soliloquises, + + Yet do I fear thy nature: + It is too full o' the milk of human kindness + To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; + Art not without ambition, but without + The illness should attend it; what thou wouldst highly, + That wouldst thou holily, + +one sees that 'ambition' and 'great' and 'highly' and even 'illness' are +to her simply terms of praise, and 'holily' and 'human kindness' simply +terms of blame. Moral distinctions do not in this exaltation exist for +her; or rather they are inverted: 'good' means to her the crown and +whatever is required to obtain it, 'evil' whatever stands in the way of +its attainment. This attitude of mind is evident even when she is alone, +though it becomes still more pronounced when she has to work upon her +husband. And it persists until her end is attained. But, without being +exactly forced, it betrays a strain which could not long endure. + +Besides this, in these earlier scenes the traces of feminine weakness +and human feeling, which account for her later failure, are not absent. +Her will, it is clear, was exerted to overpower not only her husband's +resistance but some resistance in herself. Imagine Goneril uttering the +famous words, + + Had he not resembled + My father as he slept, I had done 't. + +They are spoken, I think, without any sentiment--impatiently, as though +she regretted her weakness: but it was there. And in reality, quite +apart from this recollection of her father, she could never have done +the murder if her husband had failed. She had to nerve herself with wine +to give her 'boldness' enough to go through her minor part. That +appalling invocation to the spirits of evil, to unsex her and fill her +from the crown to the toe topfull of direst cruelty, tells the same tale +of determination to crush the inward protest. Goneril had no need of +such a prayer. In the utterance of the frightful lines, + + I have given suck, and know + How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me: + I would, while it was smiling in my face, + Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums, + And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you + Have done to this, + +her voice should doubtless rise until it reaches, in 'dash'd the brains +out,' an almost hysterical scream.[227] These lines show unmistakably +that strained exaltation which, as soon as the end is reached, vanishes, +never to return. + +The greatness of Lady Macbeth lies almost wholly in courage and force of +will. It is an error to regard her as remarkable on the intellectual +side. In acting a part she shows immense self-control, but not much +skill. Whatever may be thought of the plan of attributing the murder of +Duncan to the chamberlains, to lay their bloody daggers on their +pillows, as if they were determined to advertise their guilt, was a +mistake which can be accounted for only by the excitement of the moment. +But the limitations of her mind appear most in the point where she is +most strongly contrasted with Macbeth,--in her comparative dulness of +imagination. I say 'comparative,' for she sometimes uses highly poetic +language, as indeed does everyone in Shakespeare who has any greatness +of soul. Nor is she perhaps less imaginative than the majority of his +heroines. But as compared with her husband she has little imagination. +It is not _simply_ that she suppresses what she has. To her, things +remain at the most terrible moment precisely what they were at the +calmest, plain facts which stand in a given relation to a certain deed, +not visions which tremble and flicker in the light of other worlds. The +probability that the old king will sleep soundly after his long journey +to Inverness is to her simply a fortunate circumstance; but one can +fancy the shoot of horror across Macbeth's face as she mentions it. She +uses familiar and prosaic illustrations, like + + Letting 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would,' + Like the poor cat i' the adage, + +(the cat who wanted fish but did not like to wet her feet); or, + + We fail? + But screw your courage to the sticking-place, + And we'll not fail;[228] + +or, + + Was the hope drunk + Wherein you dress'd yourself? hath it slept since? + And wakes it now, to look so green and pale + At what it did so freely? + +The Witches are practically nothing to her. She feels no sympathy in +Nature with her guilty purpose, and would never bid the earth not hear +her steps, which way they walk. The noises before the murder, and during +it, are heard by her as simple facts, and are referred to their true +sources. The knocking has no mystery for her: it comes from 'the south +entry.' She calculates on the drunkenness of the grooms, compares the +different effects of wine on herself and on them, and listens to their +snoring. To her the blood upon her husband's hands suggests only the +taunt, + + My hands are of your colour, but I shame + To wear a heart so white; + +and the blood to her is merely 'this filthy witness,'--words impossible +to her husband, to whom it suggested something quite other than sensuous +disgust or practical danger. The literalism of her mind appears fully in +two contemptuous speeches where she dismisses his imaginings; in the +murder scene: + + Infirm of purpose! + Give me the daggers! The sleeping and the dead + Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood + That fears a painted devil; + +and in the banquet scene: + + O these flaws and starts, + Impostors to true fear, would well become + A woman's story at a winter's fire, + Authorised by her grandam. Shame itself! + Why do you make such faces? When all's done, + You look but on a stool. + +Even in the awful scene where her imagination breaks loose in sleep she +uses no such images as Macbeth's. It is the direct appeal of the facts +to sense that has fastened on her memory. The ghastly realism of 'Yet +who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?' or +'Here's the smell of the blood still,' is wholly unlike him. Her most +poetical words, 'All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little +hand,' are equally unlike his words about great Neptune's ocean. Hers, +like some of her other speeches, are the more moving, from their greater +simplicity and because they seem to tell of that self-restraint in +suffering which is so totally lacking in him; but there is in them +comparatively little of imagination. If we consider most of the passages +to which I have referred, we shall find that the quality which moves our +admiration is courage or force of will. + +This want of imagination, though it helps to make Lady Macbeth strong +for immediate action, is fatal to her. If she does not feel beforehand +the cruelty of Duncan's murder, this is mainly because she hardly +imagines the act, or at most imagines its outward show, 'the motion of a +muscle this way or that.' Nor does she in the least foresee those inward +consequences which reveal themselves immediately in her husband, and +less quickly in herself. It is often said that she understands him well. +Had she done so, she never would have urged him on. She knows that he is +given to strange fancies; but, not realising what they spring from, she +has no idea either that they may gain such power as to ruin the scheme, +or that, while they mean present weakness, they mean also perception of +the future. At one point in the murder scene the force of his +imagination impresses her, and for a moment she is startled; a light +threatens to break on her: + + These deeds must not be thought + After these ways: so, it will make us mad, + +she says, with a sudden and great seriousness. And when he goes panting +on, 'Methought I heard a voice cry, "Sleep no more,"' ... she breaks in, +'What do you mean?' half-doubting whether this was not a real voice that +he heard. Then, almost directly, she recovers herself, convinced of the +vanity of his fancy. Nor does she understand herself any better than +him. She never suspects that these deeds _must_ be thought after these +ways; that her facile realism, + + A little water clears us of this deed, + +will one day be answered by herself, 'Will these hands ne'er be clean?' +or that the fatal commonplace, 'What's done is done,' will make way for +her last despairing sentence, 'What's done cannot be undone.' + +Hence the development of her character--perhaps it would be more +strictly accurate to say, the change in her state of mind--is both +inevitable, and the opposite of the development we traced in Macbeth. +When the murder has been done, the discovery of its hideousness, first +reflected in the faces of her guests, comes to Lady Macbeth with the +shock of a sudden disclosure, and at once her nature begins to sink. The +first intimation of the change is given when, in the scene of the +discovery, she faints.[229] When next we see her, Queen of Scotland, the +glory of her dream has faded. She enters, disillusioned, and weary with +want of sleep: she has thrown away everything and gained nothing: + + Nought's had, all's spent, + Where our desire is got without content: + 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy + Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy. + +Henceforth she has no initiative: the stem of her being seems to be cut +through. Her husband, physically the stronger, maddened by pangs he had +foreseen, but still flaming with life, comes into the foreground, and +she retires. Her will remains, and she does her best to help him; but he +rarely needs her help. Her chief anxiety appears to be that he should +not betray his misery. He plans the murder of Banquo without her +knowledge (not in order to spare her, I think, for he never shows love +of this quality, but merely because he does not need her now); and even +when she is told vaguely of his intention she appears but little +interested. In the sudden emergency of the banquet scene she makes a +prodigious and magnificent effort; her strength, and with it her +ascendancy, returns, and she saves her husband at least from an open +disclosure. But after this she takes no part whatever in the action. We +only know from her shuddering words in the sleep-walking scene, 'The +Thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?' that she has even learned +of her husband's worst crime; and in all the horrors of his tyranny over +Scotland she has, so far as we hear, no part. Disillusionment and +despair prey upon her more and more. That she should seek any relief in +speech, or should ask for sympathy, would seem to her mere weakness, and +would be to Macbeth's defiant fury an irritation. Thinking of the change +in him, we imagine the bond between them slackened, and Lady Macbeth +left much alone. She sinks slowly downward. She cannot bear darkness, +and has light by her continually: 'tis her command. At last her nature, +not her will, gives way. The secrets of the past find vent in a disorder +of sleep, the beginning perhaps of madness. What the doctor fears is +clear. He reports to her husband no great physical mischief, but bids +her attendant to remove from her all means by which she could harm +herself, and to keep eyes on her constantly. It is in vain. Her death is +announced by a cry from her women so sudden and direful that it would +thrill her husband with horror if he were any longer capable of fear. In +the last words of the play Malcolm tells us it is believed in the +hostile army that she died by her own hand. And (not to speak of the +indications just referred to) it is in accordance with her character +that even in her weakest hour she should cut short by one determined +stroke the agony of her life. + +The sinking of Lady Macbeth's nature, and the marked change in her +demeanour to her husband, are most strikingly shown in the conclusion of +the banquet scene; and from this point pathos is mingled with awe. The +guests are gone. She is completely exhausted, and answers Macbeth in +listless, submissive words which seem to come with difficulty. How +strange sounds the reply 'Did you send to him, sir?' to his imperious +question about Macduff! And when he goes on, 'waxing desperate in +imagination,' to speak of new deeds of blood, she seems to sicken at the +thought, and there is a deep pathos in that answer which tells at once +of her care for him and of the misery she herself has silently endured, + + You lack the season of all natures, sleep. + +We begin to think of her now less as the awful instigator of murder than +as a woman with much that is grand in her, and much that is piteous. +Strange and almost ludicrous as the statement may sound,[230] she is, up +to her light, a perfect wife. She gives her husband the best she has; +and the fact that she never uses to him the terms of affection which, up +to this point in the play, he employs to her, is certainly no indication +of want of love. She urges, appeals, reproaches, for a practical end, +but she never recriminates. The harshness of her taunts is free from +mere personal feeling, and also from any deep or more than momentary +contempt. She despises what she thinks the weakness which stands in the +way of her husband's ambition; but she does not despise _him_. She +evidently admires him and thinks him a great man, for whom the throne is +the proper place. Her commanding attitude in the moments of his +hesitation or fear is probably confined to them. If we consider the +peculiar circumstances of the earlier scenes and the banquet scene, and +if we examine the language of the wife and husband at other times, we +shall come, I think, to the conclusion that their habitual relations are +better represented by the later scenes than by the earlier, though +naturally they are not truly represented by either. Her ambition for her +husband and herself (there was no distinction to her mind) proved fatal +to him, far more so than the prophecies of the Witches; but even when +she pushed him into murder she believed she was helping him to do what +he merely lacked the nerve to attempt; and her part in the crime was so +much less open-eyed than his, that, if the impossible and undramatic +task of estimating degrees of culpability were forced on us, we should +surely have to assign the larger share to Macbeth. + +'Lady Macbeth,' says Dr. Johnson, 'is merely detested'; and for a long +time critics generally spoke of her as though she were Malcolm's +'fiend-like queen.' In natural reaction we tend to insist, as I have +been doing, on the other and less obvious side; and in the criticism of +the last century there is even a tendency to sentimentalise the +character. But it can hardly be doubted that Shakespeare meant the +predominant impression to be one of awe, grandeur, and horror, and that +he never meant this impression to be lost, however it might be modified, +as Lady Macbeth's activity diminishes and her misery increases. I cannot +believe that, when she said of Banquo and Fleance, + + But in them nature's copy's not eterne, + +she meant only that they would some day die; or that she felt any +surprise when Macbeth replied, + + There's comfort yet: they are assailable; + +though I am sure no light came into her eyes when he added those +dreadful words, 'Then be thou jocund.' She was listless. She herself +would not have moved a finger against Banquo. But she thought his death, +and his son's death, might ease her husband's mind, and she suggested +the murders indifferently and without remorse. The sleep-walking scene, +again, inspires pity, but its main effect is one of awe. There is great +horror in the references to blood, but it cannot be said that there is +more than horror; and Campbell was surely right when, in alluding to +Mrs. Jameson's analysis, he insisted that in Lady Macbeth's misery there +is no trace of contrition.[231] Doubtless she would have given the world +to undo what she had done; and the thought of it killed her; but, +regarding her from the tragic point of view, we may truly say she was +too great to repent.[232] + + +2 + +The main interest of the character of Banquo arises from the changes +that take place in him, and from the influence of the Witches upon him. +And it is curious that Shakespeare's intention here is so frequently +missed. Banquo being at first strongly contrasted with Macbeth, as an +innocent man with a guilty, it seems to be supposed that this contrast +must be continued to his death; while, in reality, though it is never +removed, it is gradually diminished. Banquo in fact may be described +much more truly than Macbeth as the victim of the Witches. If we follow +his story this will be evident. + +He bore a part only less distinguished than Macbeth's in the battles +against Sweno and Macdonwald. He and Macbeth are called 'our captains,' +and when they meet the Witches they are traversing the 'blasted +heath'[233] alone together. Banquo accosts the strange shapes without +the slightest fear. They lay their fingers on their lips, as if to +signify that they will not, or must not, speak to _him_. To Macbeth's +brief appeal, 'Speak, if you can: what are you?' they at once reply, not +by saying what they are, but by hailing him Thane of Glamis, Thane of +Cawdor, and King hereafter. Banquo is greatly surprised that his partner +should start as if in fear, and observes that he is at once 'rapt'; and +he bids the Witches, if they know the future, to prophesy to _him_, who +neither begs their favour nor fears their hate. Macbeth, looking back at +a later time, remembers Banquo's daring, and how + + he chid the sisters, + When first they put the name of king upon me, + And bade them speak to him. + +'Chid' is an exaggeration; but Banquo is evidently a bold man, probably +an ambitious one, and certainly has no lurking guilt in his ambition. On +hearing the predictions concerning himself and his descendants he makes +no answer, and when the Witches are about to vanish he shows none of +Macbeth's feverish anxiety to know more. On their vanishing he is simply +amazed, wonders if they were anything but hallucinations, makes no +reference to the predictions till Macbeth mentions them, and then +answers lightly. + +When Ross and Angus, entering, announce to Macbeth that he has been made +Thane of Cawdor, Banquo exclaims, aside, to himself or Macbeth, 'What! +can the devil speak true?' He now believes that the Witches were real +beings and the 'instruments of darkness.' When Macbeth, turning to him, +whispers, + + Do you not hope your children shall be kings, + When those that gave the Thane of Cawdor to me + Promised no less to them? + +he draws with the boldness of innocence the inference which is really +occupying Macbeth, and answers, + + That, trusted home, + Might yet enkindle you unto the crown + Besides the thane of Cawdor. + +Here he still speaks, I think, in a free, off-hand, even jesting,[234] +manner ('enkindle' meaning merely 'excite you to _hope_ for'). But then, +possibly from noticing something in Macbeth's face, he becomes graver, +and goes on, with a significant 'but,' + + But 'tis strange: + And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, + The instruments of darkness tell us truths, + Win us with honest trifles, to betray's + In deepest consequence. + +He afterwards observes for the second time that his partner is 'rapt'; +but he explains his abstraction naturally and sincerely by referring to +the surprise of his new honours; and at the close of the scene, when +Macbeth proposes that they shall discuss the predictions together at +some later time, he answers in the cheerful, rather bluff manner, which +he has used almost throughout, 'Very gladly.' Nor was there any reason +why Macbeth's rejoinder, 'Till then, enough,' should excite misgivings +in him, though it implied a request for silence, and though the whole +behaviour of his partner during the scene must have looked very +suspicious to him when the prediction of the crown was made good through +the murder of Duncan. + +In the next scene Macbeth and Banquo join the King, who welcomes them +both with the kindest expressions of gratitude and with promises of +favours to come. Macbeth has indeed already received a noble reward. +Banquo, who is said by the King to have 'no less deserved,' receives as +yet mere thanks. His brief and frank acknowledgment is contrasted with +Macbeth's laboured rhetoric; and, as Macbeth goes out, Banquo turns with +hearty praises of him to the King. + +And when next we see him, approaching Macbeth's castle in company with +Duncan, there is still no sign of change. Indeed he gains on us. It is +he who speaks the beautiful lines, + + This guest of summer, + The temple-haunting martlet, does approve, + By his loved mansionry, that the heaven's breath + Smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze, + Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird + Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle: + Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed, + The air is delicate; + +--lines which tell of that freedom of heart, and that sympathetic sense +of peace and beauty, which the Macbeth of the tragedy could never feel. + +But now Banquo's sky begins to darken. At the opening of the Second Act +we see him with Fleance crossing the court of the castle on his way to +bed. The blackness of the moonless, starless night seems to oppress him. +And he is oppressed by something else. + + A heavy summons lies like lead upon me, + And yet I would not sleep: merciful powers, + Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature + Gives way to in repose! + +On Macbeth's entrance we know what Banquo means: he says to +Macbeth--and it is the first time he refers to the subject unprovoked, + + I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters. + +His will is still untouched: he would repel the 'cursed thoughts'; and +they are mere thoughts, not intentions. But still they are 'thoughts,' +something more, probably, than mere recollections; and they bring with +them an undefined sense of guilt. The poison has begun to work. + +The passage that follows Banquo's words to Macbeth is difficult to +interpret: + + I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters: + To you they have show'd some truth. + + _Macb._ I think not of them: + Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve, + We would spend it in some words upon that business, + If you would grant the time. + + _Ban._ At your kind'st leisure. + + _Macb._ If you shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis, + It shall make honour for you. + + _Ban._ So I lose none + In seeking to augment it, but still keep + My bosom franchised and allegiance clear, + I shall be counsell'd. + + _Macb._ Good repose the while! + + _Ban._ Thanks, sir: the like to you! + +Macbeth's first idea is, apparently, simply to free himself from any +suspicion which the discovery of the murder might suggest, by showing +himself, just before it, quite indifferent to the predictions, and +merely looking forward to a conversation about them at some future time. +But why does he go on, 'If you shall cleave,' etc.? Perhaps he foresees +that, on the discovery, Banquo cannot fail to suspect him, and thinks it +safest to prepare the way at once for an understanding with him (in the +original story he makes Banquo his accomplice _before_ the murder). +Banquo's answer shows three things,--that he fears a treasonable +proposal, that he has no idea of accepting it, and that he has no fear +of Macbeth to restrain him from showing what is in his mind. + +Duncan is murdered. In the scene of discovery Banquo of course appears, +and his behaviour is significant. When he enters, and Macduff cries out +to him, + + O Banquo, Banquo, + Our royal master's murdered, + +and Lady Macbeth, who has entered a moment before, exclaims, + + Woe, alas! + What, in our house? + +his answer, + + Too cruel anywhere, + +shows, as I have pointed out, repulsion, and we may be pretty sure that +he suspects the truth at once. After a few words to Macduff he remains +absolutely silent while the scene is continued for nearly forty lines. +He is watching Macbeth and listening as he tells how he put the +chamberlains to death in a frenzy of loyal rage. At last Banquo appears +to have made up his mind. On Lady Macbeth's fainting he proposes that +they shall all retire, and that they shall afterwards meet, + + And question this most bloody piece of work + To know it further. Fears and scruples[235] shake us: + In the great hand of God I stand, and thence + Against the undivulged pretence[236] I fight + Of treasonous malice. + +His solemn language here reminds us of his grave words about 'the +instruments of darkness,' and of his later prayer to the 'merciful +powers.' He is profoundly shocked, full of indignation, and determined +to play the part of a brave and honest man. + +But he plays no such part. When next we see him, on the last day of his +life, we find that he has yielded to evil. The Witches and his own +ambition have conquered him. He alone of the lords knew of the +prophecies, but he has said nothing of them. He has acquiesced in +Macbeth's accession, and in the official theory that Duncan's sons had +suborned the chamberlains to murder him. Doubtless, unlike Macduff, he +was present at Scone to see the new king invested. He has, not formally +but in effect, 'cloven to' Macbeth's 'consent'; he is knit to him by 'a +most indissoluble tie'; his advice in council has been 'most grave and +prosperous'; he is to be the 'chief guest' at that night's supper. And +his soliloquy tells us why: + + Thou hast it now: king, Cawdor, Glamis, all, + As the weird women promised, and, I fear, + Thou play'dst most foully for't: yet it was said + It should not stand in thy posterity, + But that myself should be the root and father + Of many kings. If there come truth from them-- + As upon thee, Macbeth, their speeches shine-- + Why, by the verities on thee made good, + May they not be my oracles as well, + And set me up in hope? But hush! no more. + +This 'hush! no more' is not the dismissal of 'cursed thoughts': it only +means that he hears the trumpets announcing the entrance of the King and +Queen. + +His punishment comes swiftly, much more swiftly than Macbeth's, and +saves him from any further fall. He is a very fearless man, and still so +far honourable that he has no thought of acting to bring about the +fulfilment of the prophecy which has beguiled him. And therefore he has +no fear of Macbeth. But he little understands him. To Macbeth's +tormented mind Banquo's conduct appears highly suspicious. _Why_ has +this bold and circumspect[237] man kept his secret and become his chief +adviser? In order to make good _his_ part of the predictions after +Macbeth's own precedent. Banquo, he is sure, will suddenly and secretly +attack him. It is not the far-off accession of Banquo's descendants that +he fears; it is (so he tells himself) swift murder; not that the 'barren +sceptre' will some day droop from his dying hand, but that it will be +'wrenched' away now (III. i. 62).[238] So he kills Banquo. But the +Banquo he kills is not the innocent soldier who met the Witches and +daffed their prophecies aside, nor the man who prayed to be delivered +from the temptation of his dreams. + +_Macbeth_ leaves on most readers a profound impression of the misery of +a guilty conscience and the retribution of crime. And the strength of +this impression is one of the reasons why the tragedy is admired by +readers who shrink from _Othello_ and are made unhappy by _Lear_. But +what Shakespeare perhaps felt even more deeply, when he wrote this play, +was the _incalculability_ of evil,--that in meddling with it human +beings do they know not what. The soul, he seems to feel, is a thing of +such inconceivable depth, complexity, and delicacy, that when you +introduce into it, or suffer to develop in it, any change, and +particularly the change called evil, you can form only the vaguest idea +of the reaction you will provoke. All you can be sure of is that it will +not be what you expected, and that you cannot possibly escape it. +Banquo's story, if truly apprehended, produces this impression quite as +strongly as the more terrific stories of the chief characters, and +perhaps even more clearly, inasmuch as he is nearer to average human +nature, has obviously at first a quiet conscience, and uses with evident +sincerity the language of religion. + + +3 + +Apart from his story Banquo's character is not very interesting, nor is +it, I think, perfectly individual. And this holds good of the rest of +the minor characters. They are sketched lightly, and are seldom +developed further than the strict purposes of the action required. From +this point of view they are inferior to several of the less important +figures in each of the other three tragedies. The scene in which Lady +Macduff and her child appear, and the passage where their slaughter is +reported to Macduff, have much dramatic value, but in neither case is +the effect due to any great extent to the special characters of the +persons concerned. Neither they, nor Duncan, nor Malcolm, nor even +Banquo himself, have been imagined intensely, and therefore they do not +produce that sense of unique personality which Shakespeare could convey +in a much smaller number of lines than he gives to most of them.[239] +And this is of course even more the case with persons like Ross, Angus, +and Lennox, though each of these has distinguishable features. I doubt +if any other great play of Shakespeare's contains so many speeches which +a student of the play, if they were quoted to him, would be puzzled to +assign to the speakers. Let the reader turn, for instance, to the second +scene of the Fifth Act, and ask himself why the names of the persons +should not be interchanged in all the ways mathematically possible. Can +he find, again, any signs of character by which to distinguish the +speeches of Ross and Angus in Act I. scenes ii. and iii., or to +determine that Malcolm must have spoken I. iv. 2-11? Most of this +writing, we may almost say, is simply Shakespeare's writing, not that of +Shakespeare become another person. And can anything like the same +proportion of such writing be found in _Hamlet_, _Othello_, or _King +Lear_? + +Is it possible to guess the reason of this characteristic of _Macbeth_? +I cannot believe it is due to the presence of a second hand. The +writing, mangled by the printer and perhaps by 'the players,' seems to +be sometimes obviously Shakespeare's, sometimes sufficiently +Shakespearean to repel any attack not based on external evidence. It may +be, as the shortness of the play has suggested to some, that Shakespeare +was hurried, and, throwing all his weight on the principal characters, +did not exert himself in dealing with the rest. But there is another +possibility which may be worth considering. _Macbeth_ is distinguished +by its simplicity,--by grandeur in simplicity, no doubt, but still by +simplicity. The two great figures indeed can hardly be called simple, +except in comparison with such characters as Hamlet and Iago; but in +almost every other respect the tragedy has this quality. Its plot is +quite plain. It has very little intermixture of humour. It has little +pathos except of the sternest kind. The style, for Shakespeare, has not +much variety, being generally kept at a higher pitch than in the other +three tragedies; and there is much less than usual of the interchange of +verse and prose.[240] All this makes for simplicity of effect. And, this +being so, is it not possible that Shakespeare instinctively felt, or +consciously feared, that to give much individuality or attraction to the +subordinate figures would diminish this effect, and so, like a good +artist, sacrificed a part to the whole? And was he wrong? He has +certainly avoided the overloading which distresses us in _King Lear_, +and has produced a tragedy utterly unlike it, not much less great as a +dramatic poem, and as a drama superior. + +I would add, though without much confidence, another suggestion. The +simplicity of _Macbeth_ is one of the reasons why many readers feel +that, in spite of its being intensely 'romantic,' it is less unlike a +classical tragedy than _Hamlet_ or _Othello_ or _King Lear_. And it is +possible that this effect is, in a sense, the result of design. I do not +mean that Shakespeare intended to imitate a classical tragedy; I mean +only that he may have seen in the bloody story of Macbeth a subject +suitable for treatment in a manner somewhat nearer to that of Seneca, or +of the English Senecan plays familiar to him in his youth, than was the +manner of his own mature tragedies. The Witches doubtless are +'romantic,' but so is the witch-craft in Seneca's _Medea_ and _Hercules +Oetaeus_; indeed it is difficult to read the account of Medea's +preparations (670-739) without being reminded of the incantations in +_Macbeth_. Banquo's Ghost again is 'romantic,' but so are Seneca's +ghosts. For the swelling of the style in some of the great +passages--however immeasurably superior these may be to anything in +Seneca--and certainly for the turgid bombast which occasionally appears +in _Macbeth_, and which seems to have horrified Jonson, Shakespeare +might easily have found a model in Seneca. Did he not think that this +was the high Roman manner? Does not the Sergeant's speech, as Coleridge +observed, recall the style of the 'passionate speech' of the Player in +_Hamlet_,--a speech, be it observed, on a Roman subject?[241] And is it +entirely an accident that parallels between Seneca and Shakespeare seem +to be more frequent in _Macbeth_ than in any other of his undoubtedly +genuine works except perhaps _Richard III._, a tragedy unquestionably +influenced either by Seneca or by English Senecan plays?[242] If there +is anything in these suggestions, and if we suppose that Shakespeare +meant to give to his play a certain classical tinge, he might naturally +carry out this idea in respect to the characters, as well as in other +respects, by concentrating almost the whole interest on the important +figures and leaving the others comparatively shadowy. + + +4 + +_Macbeth_ being more simple than the other tragedies, and broader and +more massive in effect, three passages in it are of great importance as +securing variety in tone, and also as affording relief from the feelings +excited by the Witch-scenes and the principal characters. They are the +passage where the Porter appears, the conversation between Lady Macduff +and her little boy, and the passage where Macduff receives the news of +the slaughter of his wife and babes. Yet the first of these, we are told +even by Coleridge, is unworthy of Shakespeare and is not his; and the +second, with the rest of the scene which contains it, appears to be +usually omitted in stage representations of _Macbeth_. + +I question if either this scene or the exhibition of Macduff's grief is +required to heighten our abhorrence of Macbeth's cruelty. They have a +technical value in helping to give the last stage of the action the form +of a conflict between Macbeth and Macduff. But their chief function is +of another kind. It is to touch the heart with a sense of beauty and +pathos, to open the springs of love and of tears. Shakespeare is loved +for the sweetness of his humanity, and because he makes this kind of +appeal with such irresistible persuasion; and the reason why _Macbeth_, +though admired as much as any work of his, is scarcely loved, is that +the characters who predominate cannot make this kind of appeal, and at +no point are able to inspire unmingled sympathy. The two passages in +question supply this want in such measure as Shakespeare thought +advisable in _Macbeth_, and the play would suffer greatly from their +excision. The second, on the stage, is extremely moving, and Macbeth's +reception of the news of his wife's death may be intended to recall it +by way of contrast. The first brings a relief even greater, because here +the element of beauty is more marked, and because humour is mingled with +pathos. In both we escape from the oppression of huge sins and +sufferings into the presence of the wholesome affections of unambitious +hearts; and, though both scenes are painful and one dreadful, our +sympathies can flow unchecked.[243] + +Lady Macduff is a simple wife and mother, who has no thought for +anything beyond her home. Her love for her children shows her at once +that her husband's flight exposes them to terrible danger. She is in an +agony of fear for them, and full of indignation against him. It does not +even occur to her that he has acted from public spirit, or that there is +such a thing. + + What had he done to make him fly the land? + +He must have been mad to do it. He fled for fear. He does not love his +wife and children. He is a traitor. The poor soul is almost beside +herself--and with too good reason. But when the murderer bursts in with +the question 'Where is your husband?' she becomes in a moment the wife, +and the great noble's wife: + + I hope, in no place so unsanctified + Where such as thou may'st find him. + +What did Shakespeare mean us to think of Macduff's flight, for which +Macduff has been much blamed by others beside his wife? Certainly not +that fear for himself, or want of love for his family, had anything to +do with it. His love for his country, so strongly marked in the scene +with Malcolm, is evidently his one motive. + + He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows + The fits o' the season, + +says Ross. That his flight was 'noble' is beyond doubt. That it was not +wise or judicious in the interest of his family is no less clear. But +that does not show that it was wrong; and, even if it were, to represent +its consequences as a judgment on him for his want of due consideration +is equally monstrous and ludicrous.[244] The further question whether he +did fail in due consideration, or whether for his country's sake he +deliberately risked a danger which he fully realised, would in +Shakespeare's theatre have been answered at once by Macduff's expression +and demeanour on hearing Malcolm's words, + + Why in that rawness left you wife and child, + Those precious motives, those strong knots of love, + Without leave-taking? + +It cannot be decided with certainty from the mere text; but, without +going into the considerations on each side, I may express the opinion +that Macduff knew well what he was doing, and that he fled without +leave-taking for fear his purpose should give way. Perhaps he said to +himself, with Coriolanus, + + Not of a woman's tenderness to be, + Requires nor child nor woman's face to see. + +Little Macduff suggests a few words on Shakespeare's boys (there are +scarcely any little girls). It is somewhat curious that nearly all of +them appear in tragic or semi-tragic dramas. I remember but two +exceptions: little William Page, who said his _Hic, haec, hoc_ to Sir +Hugh Evans; and the page before whom Falstaff walked like a sow that +hath overwhelmed all her litter but one; and it is to be feared that +even this page, if he is the Boy of _Henry V._, came to an ill end, +being killed with the luggage. + + So wise so young, they say, do ne'er live long, + +as Richard observed of the little Prince of Wales. Of too many of these +children (some of the 'boys,' _e.g._ those in _Cymbeline_, are lads, not +children) the saying comes true. They are pathetic figures, the more so +because they so often appear in company with their unhappy mothers, and +can never be thought of apart from them. Perhaps Arthur is even the +first creation in which Shakespeare's power of pathos showed itself +mature;[245] and the last of his children, Mamillius, assuredly proves +that it never decayed. They are almost all of them noble figures, +too,--affectionate, frank, brave, high-spirited, 'of an open and free +nature' like Shakespeare's best men. And almost all of them, again, are +amusing and charming as well as pathetic; comical in their mingled +acuteness and _naivete_, charming in their confidence in themselves and +the world, and in the seriousness with which they receive the jocosity +of their elders, who commonly address them as strong men, great +warriors, or profound politicians. + +Little Macduff exemplifies most of these remarks. There is nothing in +the scene of a transcendent kind, like the passage about Mamillius' +never-finished 'Winter's Tale' of the man who dwelt by a churchyard, or +the passage about his death, or that about little Marcius and the +butterfly, or the audacity which introduces him, at the supreme moment +of the tragedy, outdoing the appeals of Volumnia and Virgilia by the +statement, + + 'A shall not tread on me: + I'll run away till I'm bigger, but then I'll fight. + +Still one does not easily forget little Macduff's delightful and +well-justified confidence in his ability to defeat his mother in +argument; or the deep impression she made on him when she spoke of his +father as a 'traitor'; or his immediate response when he heard the +murderer call his father by the same name,-- + + Thou liest, thou shag-haired villain. + +Nor am I sure that, if the son of Coriolanus had been murdered, his last +words to his mother would have been, 'Run away, I pray you.' + +I may add two remarks. The presence of this child is one of the things +in which _Macbeth_ reminds us of _Richard III._ And he is perhaps the +only person in the tragedy who provokes a smile. I say 'perhaps,' for +though the anxiety of the Doctor to escape from the company of his +patient's husband makes one smile, I am not sure that it was meant to. + + +5 + +The Porter does not make me smile: the moment is too terrific. He is +grotesque; no doubt the contrast he affords is humorous as well as +ghastly; I dare say the groundlings roared with laughter at his coarsest +remarks. But they are not comic enough to allow one to forget for a +moment what has preceded and what must follow. And I am far from +complaining of this. I believe that it is what Shakespeare intended, and +that he despised the groundlings if they laughed. Of course he could +have written without the least difficulty speeches five times as +humorous; but he knew better. The Grave-diggers make us laugh: the old +Countryman who brings the asps to Cleopatra makes us smile at least. But +the Grave-digger scene does not come at a moment of extreme tension; and +it is long. Our distress for Ophelia is not so absorbing that we refuse +to be interested in the man who digs her grave, or even continue +throughout the long conversation to remember always with pain that the +grave is hers. It is fitting, therefore, that he should be made +decidedly humorous. The passage in _Antony and Cleopatra_ is much nearer +to the passage in _Macbeth_, and seems to have been forgotten by those +who say that there is nothing in Shakespeare resembling that +passage.[246] The old Countryman comes at a moment of tragic exaltation, +and the dialogue is appropriately brief. But the moment, though tragic, +is emphatically one of exaltation. We have not been feeling horror, nor +are we feeling a dreadful suspense. We are going to see Cleopatra die, +but she is to die gloriously and to triumph over Octavius. And therefore +our amusement at the old Countryman and the contrast he affords to these +high passions, is untroubled, and it was right to make him really comic. +But the Porter's case is quite different. We cannot forget how the +knocking that makes him grumble sounded to Macbeth, or that within a few +minutes of his opening the gate Duncan will be discovered in his blood; +nor can we help feeling that in pretending to be porter of hell-gate he +is terribly near the truth. To give him language so humorous that it +would ask us almost to lose the sense of these things would have been a +fatal mistake,--the kind of mistake that means want of dramatic +imagination. And that was not the sort of error into which Shakespeare +fell. + +To doubt the genuineness of the passage, then, on the ground that it is +not humorous enough for Shakespeare, seems to me to show this want. It +is to judge the passage as though it were a separate composition, +instead of conceiving it in the fulness of its relations to its +surroundings in a stage-play. Taken by itself, I admit, it would bear no +indubitable mark of Shakespeare's authorship, not even in the phrase +'the primrose way to the everlasting bonfire,' which Coleridge thought +Shakespeare might have added to an interpolation of 'the players.' And +if there were reason (as in my judgment there is not) to suppose that +Shakespeare thus permitted an interpolation, or that he collaborated +with another author, I could believe that he left 'the players' or his +collaborator to write the words of the passage. But that anyone except +the author of the scene of Duncan's murder _conceived_ the passage, is +incredible.[247] + + * * * * * + +The speeches of the Porter, a low comic character, are in prose. So is +the letter of Macbeth to his wife. In both these cases Shakespeare +follows his general rule or custom. The only other prose-speeches occur +in the sleep-walking scene, and here the use of prose may seem strange. +For in great tragic scenes we expect the more poetic medium of +expression, and this is one of the most famous of such scenes. Besides, +unless I mistake, Lady Macbeth is the only one of Shakespeare's great +tragic characters who on a last appearance is denied the dignity of +verse. + +Yet in this scene also he adheres to his custom. Somnambulism is an +abnormal condition, and it is his general rule to assign prose to +persons whose state of mind is abnormal. Thus, to illustrate from these +four plays, Hamlet when playing the madman speaks prose, but in +soliloquy, in talking with Horatio, and in pleading with his mother, he +speaks verse.[248] Ophelia in her madness either sings snatches of songs +or speaks prose. Almost all Lear's speeches, after he has become +definitely insane, are in prose: where he wakes from sleep recovered, +the verse returns. The prose enters with that speech which closes with +his trying to tear off his clothes; but he speaks in verse--some of it +very irregular--in the Timon-like speeches where his intellect suddenly +in his madness seems to regain the force of his best days (IV. vi.). +Othello, in IV. i., speaks in verse till the moment when Iago tells him +that Cassio has confessed. There follow ten lines of prose--exclamations +and mutterings of bewildered horror--and he falls to the ground +unconscious. + +The idea underlying this custom of Shakespeare's evidently is that the +regular rhythm of verse would be inappropriate where the mind is +supposed to have lost its balance and to be at the mercy of chance +impressions coming from without (as sometimes with Lear), or of ideas +emerging from its unconscious depths and pursuing one another across its +passive surface. The somnambulism of Lady Macbeth is such a condition. +There is no rational connection in the sequence of images and ideas. The +sight of blood on her hand, the sound of the clock striking the hour for +Duncan's murder, the hesitation of her husband before that hour came, +the vision of the old man in his blood, the idea of the murdered wife of +Macduff, the sight of the hand again, Macbeth's 'flaws and starts' at +the sight of Banquo's ghost, the smell on her hand, the washing of hands +after Duncan's murder again, her husband's fear of the buried Banquo, +the sound of the knocking at the gate--these possess her, one after +another, in this chance order. It is not much less accidental than the +order of Ophelia's ideas; the great difference is that with Ophelia +total insanity has effaced or greatly weakened the emotional force of +the ideas, whereas to Lady Macbeth each new image or perception comes +laden with anguish. There is, again, scarcely a sign of the exaltation +of disordered imagination; we are conscious rather of an intense +suffering which forces its way into light against resistance, and speaks +a language for the most part strikingly bare in its diction and simple +in its construction. This language stands in strong contrast with that +of Macbeth in the surrounding scenes, full of a feverish and almost +furious excitement, and seems to express a far more desolating misery. + +The effect is extraordinarily impressive. The soaring pride and power of +Lady Macbeth's first speeches return on our memory, and the change is +felt with a breathless awe. Any attempt, even by Shakespeare, to draw +out the moral enfolded in this awe, would but weaken it. For the moment, +too, all the language of poetry--even of Macbeth's poetry--seems to be +touched with unreality, and these brief toneless sentences seem the only +voice of truth.[249] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 227: So Mrs. Siddons is said to have given the passage.] + +[Footnote 228: Surely the usual interpretation of 'We fail?' as a +question of contemptuous astonishment, is right. 'We fail!' gives +practically the same sense, but alters the punctuation of the first two +Folios. In either case, 'But,' I think, means 'Only.' On the other hand +the proposal to read 'We fail.' with a full stop, as expressive of +sublime acceptance of the possibility, seems to me, however attractive +at first sight, quite out of harmony with Lady Macbeth's mood throughout +these scenes.] + +[Footnote 229: See Note DD.] + +[Footnote 230: It is not new.] + +[Footnote 231: The words about Lady Macduff are of course significant of +natural human feeling, and may have been introduced expressly to mark +it, but they do not, I think, show any fundamental change in Lady +Macbeth, for at no time would she have suggested or approved a +_purposeless_ atrocity. It is perhaps characteristic that this human +feeling should show itself most clearly in reference to an act for which +she was not directly responsible, and in regard to which therefore she +does not feel the instinct of self-assertion.] + +[Footnote 232: The tendency to sentimentalise Lady Macbeth is partly due +to Mrs. Siddons's fancy that she was a small, fair, blue-eyed woman, +'perhaps even fragile.' Dr. Bucknill, who was unaquainted with this +fancy, independently determined that she was 'beautiful and delicate,' +'unoppressed by weight of flesh,' 'probably small,' but 'a tawny or +brown blonde,' with grey eyes: and Brandes affirms that she was lean, +slight, and hard. They know much more than Shakespeare, who tells us +absolutely nothing on these subjects. That Lady Macbeth, after taking +part in a murder, was so exhausted as to faint, will hardly demonstrate +her fragility. That she must have been blue-eyed, fair, or red-haired, +because she was a Celt, is a bold inference, and it is an idle dream +that Shakespeare had any idea of making her or her husband +characteristically Celtic. The only evidence ever offered to prove that +she was small is the sentence, 'All the perfumes of Arabia will not +sweeten this little hand'; and Goliath might have called his hand +'little' in contrast with all the perfumes of Arabia. One might as well +propose to prove that Othello was a small man by quoting, + + I have seen the day, + That, with this little arm and this good sword, + I have made my way through more impediments + Than twenty times your stop. + +The reader is at liberty to imagine Lady Macbeth's person in the way +that pleases him best, or to leave it, as Shakespeare very likely did, +unimagined. + +Perhaps it may be well to add that there is not the faintest trace in +the play of the idea occasionally met with, and to some extent embodied +in Madame Bernhardt's impersonation of Lady Macbeth, that her hold upon +her husband lay in seductive attractions deliberately exercised. +Shakespeare was not unskilled or squeamish in indicating such ideas.] + +[Footnote 233: That it is Macbeth who feels the harmony between the +desolation of the heath and the figures who appear on it is a +characteristic touch.] + +[Footnote 234: So, in Holinshed, 'Banquho jested with him and sayde, now +Makbeth thou haste obtayned those things which the twoo former sisters +prophesied, there remayneth onely for thee to purchase that which the +third sayd should come to passe.'] + +[Footnote 235: =doubts.] + +[Footnote 236: =design.] + +[Footnote 237: + + 'tis much he dares, + And, to that dauntless temper of his mind, + He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour + To act in safety.] + +[Footnote 238: So when he hears that Fleance has escaped he is not much +troubled (III. iv. 29): + + the worm that's fled + Hath nature that in time will venom breed, + No teeth for the present. + +I have repeated above what I have said before, because the meaning of +Macbeth's soliloquy is frequently misconceived.] + +[Footnote 239: Virgilia in _Coriolanus_ is a famous example. She speaks +about thirty-five lines.] + +[Footnote 240: The percentage of prose is, roughly, in _Hamlet_ 30-2/3, +in _Othello_ 16-1/3, in _King Lear_ 27-1/2, in _Macbeth_ 8-1/2.] + +[Footnote 241: Cf. Note F. There are also in _Macbeth_ several shorter +passages which recall the Player's speech. Cf. 'Fortune ... showed like +a rebel's whore' (I. ii. 14) with 'Out! out! thou strumpet Fortune!' The +form 'eterne' occurs in Shakespeare only in _Macbeth_, III. ii. 38, and +in the 'proof eterne' of the Player's speech. Cf. 'So, as a painted +tyrant, Pyrrhus stood,' with _Macbeth_, V. viii. 26; 'the rugged +Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,' with 'the rugged Russian bear ... or +the Hyrcan tiger' (_Macbeth_, III. iv. 100); 'like a neutral to his will +and matter' with _Macbeth_, I. v. 47. The words 'Till he unseam'd him +from the nave to the chaps,' in the Serjeant's speech, recall the words +'Then from the navel to the throat at once He ript old Priam,' in _Dido +Queen of Carthage_, where these words follow those others, about Priam +falling with the mere wind of Pyrrhus' sword, which seem to have +suggested 'the whiff and wind of his fell sword' in the Player's +speech.] + +[Footnote 242: See Cunliffe, _The Influence of Seneca on Elizabethan +Tragedy_. The most famous of these parallels is that between 'Will all +great Neptune's Ocean,' etc., and the following passages: + + Quis eluet me Tanais? aut quae barbaris + Maeotis undis Pontico incumbens mari? + Non ipse toto magnus Oceano pater + Tantum expiarit sceleris. (_Hipp._ 715.) + + Quis Tanais, aut quis Nilus, aut quis Persica + Violentus unda Tigris, aut Rhenus ferox, + Tagusve Ibera turbidus gaza fluens, + Abluere dextram poterit? Arctoum licet + Maeotis in me gelida transfundat mare, + Et tota Tethys per meas currat manus, + Haerebit altum facinus. (_Herc. Furens_, 1323.) + +(The reader will remember Othello's 'Pontic sea' with its 'violent +pace.') Medea's incantation in Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, vii. 197 ff., +which certainly suggested Prospero's speech, _Tempest_, V. i. 33 ff., +should be compared with Seneca, _Herc. Oet._, 452 ff., 'Artibus +magicis,' etc. It is of course highly probable that Shakespeare read +some Seneca at school. I may add that in the _Hippolytus_, beside the +passage quoted above, there are others which might have furnished him +with suggestions. Cf. for instance _Hipp._, 30 ff., with the lines about +the Spartan hounds in _Mids. Night's Dream_, IV. i. 117 ff., and +Hippolytus' speech, beginning 483, with the Duke's speech in _As You +Like It_, II. i.] + +[Footnote 243: Cf. Coleridge's note on the Lady Macduff scene.] + +[Footnote 244: It is nothing to the purpose that Macduff himself says, + + Sinful Macduff, + They were all struck for thee! naught that I am, + Not for their own demerits, but for mine, + Fell slaughter on their souls. + +There is no reason to suppose that the sin and demerit he speaks of is +that of leaving his home. And even if it were, it is Macduff that +speaks, not Shakespeare, any more than Shakespeare speaks in the +preceding sentence, + + Did heaven look on, + And would not take their part? + +And yet Brandes (ii. 104) hears in these words 'the voice of revolt ... +that sounds later through the despairing philosophy of _King Lear_.' It +sounds a good deal earlier too; _e.g._ in _Tit. And._, IV. i. 81, and _2 +Henry VI._, II. i. 154. The idea is a commonplace of Elizabethan +tragedy.] + +[Footnote 245: And the idea that it was the death of his son Hamnet, +aged eleven, that brought this power to maturity is one of the more +plausible attempts to find in his dramas a reflection of his private +history. It implies however as late a date as 1596 for _King John_.] + +[Footnote 246: Even if this were true, the retort is obvious that +neither is there anything resembling the murder-scene in _Macbeth_.] + +[Footnote 247: I have confined myself to the single aspect of this +question on which I had what seemed something new to say. Professor +Hales's defence of the passage on fuller grounds, in the admirable paper +reprinted in his _Notes and Essays on Shakespeare_, seems to me quite +conclusive. I may add two notes. (1) The references in the Porter's +speeches to 'equivocation,' which have naturally, and probably rightly, +been taken as allusions to the Jesuit Garnet's appeal to the doctrine of +equivocation in defence of his perjury when, on trial for participation +in the Gunpowder Plot, do not stand alone in _Macbeth_. The later +prophecies of the Witches Macbeth calls 'the equivocation of the fiend +That lies like truth' (V. v. 43); and the Porter's remarks about the +equivocator who 'could swear in both the scales against either scale, +who committed treason enough for God's sake, yet could not equivocate to +heaven,' may be compared with the following dialogue (IV. ii. 45): + + _Son._ What is a traitor? + + _Lady Macduff._ Why, one that swears and lies. + + _Son._ And be all traitors that do so? + + _Lady Macduff._ Everyone that does so is a traitor, and must + be hanged. + +Garnet, as a matter of fact, _was_ hanged in May, 1606; and it is to be +feared that the audience applauded this passage. + +(2) The Porter's soliloquy on the different applicants for admittance +has, in idea and manner, a marked resemblance to Pompey's soliloquy on +the inhabitants of the prison, in _Measure for Measure_, IV. iii. 1 ff.; +and the dialogue between him and Abhorson on the 'mystery' of hanging +(IV. ii. 22 ff.) is of just the same kind as the Porter's dialogue with +Macduff about drink.] + +[Footnote 248: In the last Act, however, he speaks in verse even in the +quarrel with Laertes at Ophelia's grave. It would be plausible to +explain this either from his imitating what he thinks the rant of +Laertes, or by supposing that his 'towering passion' made him forget to +act the madman. But in the final scene also he speaks in verse in the +presence of all. This again might be accounted for by saying that he is +supposed to be in a lucid interval, as indeed his own language at 239 +ff. implies. But the probability is that Shakespeare's real reason for +breaking his rule here was simply that he did not choose to deprive +Hamlet of verse on his last appearance. I wonder the disuse of prose in +these two scenes has not been observed, and used as an argument, by +those who think that Hamlet, with the commission in his pocket, is now +resolute.] + +[Footnote 249: The verse-speech of the Doctor, which closes this scene, +lowers the tension towards that of the next scene. His introductory +conversation with the Gentlewoman is written in prose (sometimes very +near verse), partly, perhaps, from its familiar character, but chiefly +because Lady Macbeth is to speak in prose.] + + + + +NOTE A. + +EVENTS BEFORE THE OPENING OF THE ACTION IN _HAMLET_. + + +In Hamlet's first soliloquy he speaks of his father as being 'but two +months dead,--nay, not so much, not two.' He goes on to refer to the +love between his father and mother, and then says (I. ii. 145): + + and yet, within a month-- + Let me not think on't--Frailty, thy name is woman!-- + A little month, or ere those shoes were old + With which she follow'd my poor father's body, + Like Niobe, all tears, why she, even she-- + O God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason, + Would have mourn'd longer--married with my uncle. + +It seems hence to be usually assumed that at this time--the time when +the action begins--Hamlet's mother has been married a little less than a +month. + +On this assumption difficulties, however, arise, though I have not found +them referred to. Why has the Ghost waited nearly a month since the +marriage before showing itself? Why has the King waited nearly a month +before appearing in public for the first time, as he evidently does in +this scene? And why has Laertes waited nearly a month since the +coronation before asking leave to return to France (I. ii. 53)? + +To this it might be replied that the marriage and the coronation were +separated by some weeks; that, while the former occurred nearly a month +before the time of this scene, the latter has only just taken place; and +that what the Ghost cannot bear is, not the mere marriage, but the +accession of an incestuous murderer to the throne. But anyone who will +read the King's speech at the opening of the scene will certainly +conclude that the marriage has only just been celebrated, and also that +it is conceived as involving the accession of Claudius to the throne. +Gertrude is described as the 'imperial jointress' of the State, and the +King says that the lords consented to the marriage, but makes no +separate mention of his election. + +The solution of the difficulty is to be found in the lines quoted above. +The marriage followed, within a month, not the _death_ of Hamlet's +father, but the _funeral_. And this makes all clear. The death happened +nearly two months ago. The funeral did not succeed it immediately, but +(say) in a fortnight or three weeks. And the marriage and coronation, +coming rather less than a month after the funeral, have just taken +place. So that the Ghost has not waited at all; nor has the King, nor +Laertes. + +On this hypothesis it follows that Hamlet's agonised soliloquy is not +uttered nearly a month after the marriage which has so horrified him, +but quite soon after it (though presumably he would know rather earlier +what was coming). And from this hypothesis we get also a partial +explanation of two other difficulties, (_a_) When Horatio, at the end of +the soliloquy, enters and greets Hamlet, it is evident that he and +Hamlet have not recently met at Elsinore. Yet Horatio came to Elsinore +for the funeral (I. ii. 176). Now even if the funeral took place some +three weeks ago, it seems rather strange that Hamlet, however absorbed +in grief and however withdrawn from the Court, has not met Horatio; but +if the funeral took place some seven weeks ago, the difficulty is +considerably greater. (_b_) We are twice told that Hamlet has '_of +late_' been seeking the society of Ophelia and protesting his love for +her (I. iii. 91, 99). It always seemed to me, on the usual view of the +chronology, rather difficult (though not, of course, impossible) to +understand this, considering the state of feeling produced in him by his +mother's marriage, and in particular the shock it appears to have given +to his faith in woman. But if the marriage has only just been celebrated +the words 'of late' would naturally refer to a time before it. This time +presumably would be subsequent to the death of Hamlet's father, but it +is not so hard to fancy that Hamlet may have sought relief from mere +_grief_ in his love for Ophelia. + +But here another question arises; May not the words 'of late' include, +or even wholly refer to,[250] a time prior to the death of Hamlet's +father? And this question would be answered universally, I suppose, in +the negative, on the ground that Hamlet was not at Court but at +Wittenberg when his father died. I will deal with this idea in a +separate note, and will only add here that, though it is quite possible +that Shakespeare never imagined any of these matters clearly, and so +produced these unimportant difficulties, we ought not to assume this +without examination. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 250: This is intrinsically not probable, and is the more +improbable because in Q1 Hamlet's letter to Ophelia (which must have +been written before the action of the play begins) is signed 'Thine ever +the most unhappy Prince _Hamlet_.' 'Unhappy' _might_ be meant to +describe an unsuccessful lover, but it probably shows that the letter +was written after his father's death.] + + + + +NOTE B. + +WHERE WAS HAMLET AT THE TIME OF HIS FATHER'S DEATH? + + +The answer will at once be given: 'At the University of Wittenberg. For +the king says to him (I. ii. 112): + + For your intent + In going back to school in Wittenberg, + It is most retrograde to our desire. + +The Queen also prays him not to go to Wittenberg: and he consents to +remain.' + +Now I quite agree that the obvious interpretation of this passage is +that universally accepted, that Hamlet, like Horatio, was at Wittenberg +when his father died; and I do not say that it is wrong. But it involves +difficulties, and ought not to be regarded as certain. + +(1) One of these difficulties has long been recognised. Hamlet, +according to the evidence of Act V., Scene i., is thirty years of age; +and that is a very late age for a university student. One solution is +found (by those who admit that Hamlet _was_ thirty) in a passage in +Nash's _Pierce Penniless_: 'For fashion sake some [Danes] will put their +children to schoole, but they set them not to it till they are fourteene +years old, so that you shall see a great boy with a beard learne his +A.B.C. and sit weeping under the rod when he is thirty years old.' +Another solution, as we saw (p. 105), is found in Hamlet's character. He +is a philosopher who lingers on at the University from love of his +studies there. + +(2) But there is a more formidable difficulty, which seems to have +escaped notice. Horatio certainly came from Wittenberg to the funeral. +And observe how he and Hamlet meet (I. ii. 160). + + _Hor._ Hail to your lordship! + + _Ham._ I am glad to see you well: + Horatio,--or I do forget myself. + + _Hor._ The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever. + + _Ham._ Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with you: + And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio? + Marcellus? + + _Mar._ My good lord-- + + _Ham._ I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir.[251] + But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg? + + _Hor._ A truant disposition, good my lord. + + _Ham._ I would not hear your enemy say so, + Nor shall you do my ear that violence, + To make it truster of your own report + Against yourself: I know you are no truant. + But what is your affair in Elsinore? + We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart. + + _Hor._ My lord, I came to see your father's funeral. + + _Ham._ I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student; + I think it was to see my mother's wedding. + +Is not this passing strange? Hamlet and Horatio are supposed to be +fellow-students at Wittenberg, and to have left it for Elsinore less +than two months ago. Yet Hamlet hardly recognises Horatio at first, and +speaks as if he himself lived at Elsinore (I refer to his bitter jest, +'We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart'). Who would dream that +Hamlet had himself just come from Wittenberg, if it were not for the +previous words about his going back there? + +How can this be explained on the usual view? Only, I presume, by +supposing that Hamlet is so sunk in melancholy that he really does +almost 'forget himself'[252] and forget everything else, so that he +actually is in doubt who Horatio is. And this, though not impossible, is +hard to believe. + +'Oh no,' it may be answered, 'for he is doubtful about Marcellus too; +and yet, if he were living at Elsinore, he must have seen Marcellus +often.' But he is _not_ doubtful about Marcellus. That note of +interrogation after 'Marcellus' is Capell's conjecture: it is not in any +Quarto or any Folio. The fact is that he knows perfectly well the man +who lives at Elsinore, but is confused by the appearance of the friend +who comes from Wittenberg. + +(3) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are sent for, to wean Hamlet from his +melancholy and to worm his secret out of him, because he has known them +from his youth and is fond of them (II. ii. 1 ff.). They come _to_ +Denmark (II. ii. 247 f.): they come therefore _from_ some other country. +Where do they come from? They are, we hear, Hamlet's 'school-fellows' +(III. iv. 202). And in the first Quarto we are directly told that they +were with him at Wittenberg: + + _Ham._ What, Gilderstone, and Rossencraft, + Welcome, kind school-fellows, to Elsanore. + + _Gil._ We thank your grace, and would be very glad + You were as when we were at Wittenberg. + +Now let the reader look at Hamlet's first greeting of them in the +received text, and let him ask himself whether it is the greeting of a +man to fellow-students whom he left two months ago: whether it is not +rather, like his greeting of Horatio, the welcome of an old +fellow-student who has not seen his visitors for a considerable time +(II. ii. 226 f.). + +(4) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern tell Hamlet of the players who are +coming. He asks what players they are, and is told, 'Even those you were +wont to take such delight in, the tragedians of the city.' He asks, 'Do +they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city?' +Evidently he has not been in the city for some time. And this is still +more evident when the players come in, and he talks of one having grown +a beard, and another having perhaps cracked his voice, since they last +met. What then is this city, where he has not been for some time, but +where (it would appear) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern live? It is not in +Denmark ('Comest thou to beard me in Denmark?'). It would seem to be +Wittenberg.[253] + +All these passages, it should be observed, are consistent with one +another. And the conclusion they point to is that Hamlet has left the +University for some years and has been living at Court. This again is +consistent with his being thirty years of age, and with his being +mentioned as a soldier and a courtier as well as a scholar (III. i. +159). And it is inconsistent, I believe, with nothing in the play, +unless with the mention of his 'going back to school in Wittenberg.' But +it is not really inconsistent with that. The idea may quite well be that +Hamlet, feeling it impossible to continue at Court after his mother's +marriage and Claudius' accession, thinks of the University where, years +ago, he was so happy, and contemplates a return to it. If this were +Shakespeare's meaning he might easily fail to notice that the expression +'going back to school in Wittenberg' would naturally suggest that Hamlet +had only just left 'school.' + +I do not see how to account for these passages except on this +hypothesis. But it in its turn involves a certain difficulty. Horatio, +Rosencrantz and Guildenstern seem to be of about the same age as Hamlet. +How then do _they_ come to be at Wittenberg? I had thought that this +question might be answered in the following way. If 'the city' is +Wittenberg, Shakespeare would regard it as a place like London, and we +might suppose that Horatio, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were living +there, though they had ceased to be students. But this can hardly be +true of Horatio, who, when he (to spare Hamlet's feelings) talks of +being 'a truant,' must mean a truant from his University. The only +solution I can suggest is that, in the story or play which Shakespeare +used, Hamlet and the others were all at the time of the murder young +students at Wittenberg, and that when he determined to make them older +men (or to make Hamlet, at any rate, older), he did not take trouble +enough to carry this idea through all the necessary detail, and so left +some inconsistencies. But in any case the difficulty in the view which I +suggest seems to me not nearly so great as those which the usual view +has to meet.[254] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 251: These three words are evidently addressed to Bernardo.] + +[Footnote 252: Cf. Antonio in his melancholy (_Merchant of Venice_, I. +i. 6), + + And such a want-wit sadness makes of me + That I have much ado to know myself.] + +[Footnote 253: In _Der Bestrafte Brudermord_ it _is_ Wittenberg. Hamlet +says to the actors: 'Were you not, a few years ago, at the University of +Wittenberg? I think I saw you act there': Furness's _Variorum_, ii. 129. +But it is very doubtful whether this play is anything but an adaptation +and enlargement of _Hamlet_ as it existed in the stage represented by +Q1.] + +[Footnote 254: It is perhaps worth while to note that in _Der Bestrafte +Brudermord_ Hamlet is said to have been 'in Germany' at the time of his +father's murder.] + + + + +NOTE C. + +HAMLET'S AGE. + + +The chief arguments on this question may be found in Furness's _Variorum +Hamlet_, vol. i., pp. 391 ff. I will merely explain my position briefly. + +Even if the general impression I received from the play were that Hamlet +was a youth of eighteen or twenty, I should feel quite unable to set it +against the evidence of the statements in V. i. which show him to be +exactly thirty, unless these statements seemed to be casual. But they +have to my mind, on the contrary, the appearance of being expressly +inserted in order to fix Hamlet's age; and the fact that they differ +decidedly from the statements in Q1 confirms that idea. So does the fact +that the Player King speaks of having been married thirty years (III. +ii. 165), where again the number differs from that in Q1. + +If V. i. did not contain those decisive statements, I believe my +impression as to Hamlet's age would be uncertain. His being several +times called 'young' would not influence me much (nor at all when he is +called 'young' simply to distinguish him from his father, _as he is in +the very passage which shows him to be thirty_). But I think we +naturally take him to be about as old as Laertes, Rosencrantz and +Guildenstern, and take them to be less than thirty. Further, the +language used by Laertes and Polonius to Ophelia in I. iii. would +certainly, by itself, lead one to imagine Hamlet as a good deal less +than thirty; and the impression it makes is not, to me, altogether +effaced by the fact that Henry V. at his accession is said to be in 'the +very May-morn of his youth,'--an expression which corresponds closely +with those used by Laertes to Ophelia. In some passages, again, there is +an air of boyish petulance. On the other side, however, we should have +to set (1) the maturity of Hamlet's thought; (2) his manner, on the +whole, to other men and to his mother, which, I think, is far from +suggesting the idea of a mere youth; (3) such a passage as his words to +Horatio at III. ii. 59 ff., which imply that both he and Horatio have +seen a good deal of life (this passage has in Q1 nothing corresponding +to the most significant lines). I have shown in Note B that it is very +unsafe to argue to Hamlet's youth from the words about his going back to +Wittenberg. + +On the whole I agree with Prof. Dowden that, apart from the statements +in V. i., one would naturally take Hamlet to be a man of about five and +twenty. + +It has been suggested that in the old play Hamlet was a mere lad; that +Shakespeare, when he began to work on it,[255] had not determined to +make Hamlet older; that, as he went on, he did so determine; and that +this is the reason why the earlier part of the play makes (if it does +so) a different impression from the later. I see nothing very improbable +in this idea, but I must point out that it is a mistake to appeal in +support of it to the passage in V. i. as found in Q1; for that passage +does not in the least show that the author (if correctly reported) +imagined Hamlet as a lad. I set out the statements in Q2 and Q1. + +Q2 says: + + (1) The grave-digger came to his business on the day when old + Hamlet defeated Fortinbras: + + (2) On that day young Hamlet was born: + + (3) The grave-digger has, at the time of speaking, been sexton + for thirty years: + + (4) Yorick's skull has been in the earth twenty-three years: + + (5) Yorick used to carry young Hamlet on his back. + +This is all explicit and connected, and yields the result that Hamlet is +now thirty. + +Q1 says: + + (1) Yorick's skull has been in the ground a dozen years: + + (2) It has been in the ground ever since old Hamlet overcame + Fortinbras: + + (3) Yorick used to carry young Hamlet on his back. + +From this nothing whatever follows as to Hamlet's age, except that he is +more than twelve![256] Evidently the writer (if correctly reported) has +no intention of telling us how old Hamlet is. That he did not imagine +him as very young appears from his making him say that he has noted +'this seven year' (in Q2 'three years') that the toe of the peasant +comes near the heel of the courtier. The fact that the Player-King in Q1 +speaks of having been married forty years shows that here too the writer +has not any reference to Hamlet's age in his mind.[257] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 255: Of course we do not know that he did work on it.] + +[Footnote 256: I find that I have been anticipated in this remark by H. +Tuerck (_Jahrbuch_ for 1900, p. 267 ff.)] + +[Footnote 257: I do not know if it has been observed that in the opening +of the Player-King's speech, as given in Q2 and the Folio (it is quite +different in Q1), there seems to be a reminiscence of Greene's +_Alphonsus King of Arragon_, Act IV., lines 33 ff. (Dyce's _Greene and +Peele_, p. 239): + + Thrice ten times Phoebus with his golden beams + Hath compassed the circle of the sky, + Thrice ten times Ceres hath her workmen hir'd, + And fill'd her barns with fruitful crops of corn, + Since first in priesthood I did lead my life.] + + + + +NOTE D. + +'MY TABLES--MEET IT IS I SET IT DOWN.' + + +This passage has occasioned much difficulty, and to many readers seems +even absurd. And it has been suggested that it, with much that +immediately follows it, was adopted by Shakespeare, with very little +change, from the old play. + +It is surely in the highest degree improbable that, at such a critical +point, when he had to show the first effect on Hamlet of the disclosures +made by the Ghost, Shakespeare would write slackly or be content with +anything that did not satisfy his own imagination. But it is not +surprising that we should find some difficulty in following his +imagination at such a point. + +Let us look at the whole speech. The Ghost leaves Hamlet with the words, +'Adieu, adieu! Hamlet, remember me'; and he breaks out: + + O all you host of heaven! O earth! what else? + And shall I couple hell? O, fie! Hold, hold, my heart; + And you, my sinews, grow not instant old, + But bear me stiffly up. Remember thee! + Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat + In this distracted globe. Remember thee! + Yea, from the table of my memory + I'll wipe away all trivial fond records, + All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past, + That youth and observation copied there; + And thy commandment all alone shall live + Within the book and volume of my brain, + Unmix'd with baser matter: yes, by heaven! + O most pernicious woman! + O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain! + My tables--meet it is I set it down, + That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain; + At least I'm sure it may be so in Denmark: [_Writing_ + So, uncle, there you are. Now to my word; + It is 'Adieu, adieu! remember me.' + I have sworn 't. + +The man who speaks thus was, we must remember, already well-nigh +overwhelmed with sorrow and disgust when the Ghost appeared to him. He +has now suffered a tremendous shock. He has learned that his mother was +not merely what he supposed but an adulteress, and that his father was +murdered by her paramour. This knowledge too has come to him in such a +way as, quite apart from the _matter_ of the communication, might make +any human reason totter. And, finally, a terrible charge has been laid +upon him. Is it strange, then, that he should say what is strange? Why, +there would be nothing to wonder at if his mind collapsed on the spot. + +Now it is just this that he himself fears. In the midst of the first +tremendous outburst, he checks himself suddenly with the exclamation 'O, +fie!' (cf. the precisely similar use of this interjection, II. ii. 617). +He must not let himself feel: he has to live. He must not let his heart +break in pieces ('hold' means 'hold together'), his muscles turn into +those of a trembling old man, his brain dissolve--as they threaten in an +instant to do. For, if they do, how can he--_remember_? He goes on +reiterating this 'remember' (the 'word' of the Ghost). He is, literally, +afraid that he will _forget_--that his mind will lose the message +entrusted to it. Instinctively, then, he feels that, if he _is_ to +remember, he must wipe from his memory everything it already contains; +and the image of his past life rises before him, of all his joy in +thought and observation and the stores they have accumulated in his +memory. All that is done with for ever: nothing is to remain for him on +the 'table' but the command, 'remember me.' He swears it; 'yes, by +heaven!' That done, suddenly the repressed passion breaks out, and, most +characteristically, he thinks _first_ of his mother; then of his uncle, +the smooth-spoken scoundrel who has just been smiling on him and calling +him 'son.' And in bitter desperate irony he snatches his tables from his +breast (they are suggested to him by the phrases he has just used, +'table of my memory,' 'book and volume'). After all, he _will_ use them +once again; and, perhaps with a wild laugh, he writes with trembling +fingers his last observation: 'One may smile, and smile, and be a +villain.' + +But that, I believe, is not merely a desperate jest. It springs from +that _fear of forgetting_. A time will come, he feels, when all this +appalling experience of the last half-hour will be incredible to him, +will seem a mere nightmare, will even, conceivably, quite vanish from +his mind. Let him have something in black and white that will bring it +back and _force_ him to remember and believe. What is there so unnatural +in this, if you substitute a note-book or diary for the 'tables'?[258] + +But why should he write that particular note, and not rather his 'word,' +'Adieu, adieu! remember me'? I should answer, first, that a grotesque +jest at such a moment is thoroughly characteristic of Hamlet (see p. +151), and that the jocose 'So, uncle, there you are!' shows his state of +mind; and, secondly, that loathing of his uncle is vehement in his +thought at this moment. Possibly, too, he might remember that 'tables' +are stealable, and that if the appearance of the Ghost should be +reported, a mere observation on the smiling of villains could not betray +anything of his communication with the Ghost. What follows shows that +the instinct of secrecy is strong in him. + +It seems likely, I may add, that Shakespeare here was influenced, +consciously or unconsciously, by recollection of a place in _Titus +Andronicus_ (IV. i.). In that horrible play Chiron and Demetrius, after +outraging Lavinia, cut out her tongue and cut off her hands, in order +that she may be unable to reveal the outrage. She reveals it, however, +by taking a staff in her mouth, guiding it with her arms, and writing in +the sand, 'Stuprum. Chiron. Demetrius.' Titus soon afterwards says: + + I will go get a leaf of brass, + And with a gad of steel will write these words, + And lay it by. The angry northern wind + Will blow these sands, like Sibyl's leaves, abroad, + And where's your lesson then? + +Perhaps in the old _Hamlet_, which may have been a play something like +_Titus Andronicus_, Hamlet at this point did write something of the +Ghost's message in his tables. In any case Shakespeare, whether he wrote +_Titus Andronicus_ or only revised an older play on the subject, might +well recall this incident, as he frequently reproduces other things in +that drama. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 258: The reader will observe that this suggestion of a +_further_ reason for his making the note may be rejected without the +rest of the interpretation being affected.] + + + + +NOTE E. + +THE GHOST IN THE CELLARAGE. + + + It has been thought that the whole of the last part of I. v., + from the entrance of Horatio and Marcellus, follows the old + play closely, and that Shakespeare is condescending to the + groundlings. + + Here again, whether or no he took a suggestion from the old + play, I see no reason to think that he wrote down to his + public. So far as Hamlet's state of mind is concerned, there + is not a trace of this. Anyone who has a difficulty in + understanding it should read Coleridge's note. What appears + grotesque is the part taken by the Ghost, and Hamlet's + consequent removal from one part of the stage to another. But, + as to the former, should we feel anything grotesque in the + four injunctions 'Swear!' if it were not that they come from + under the stage--a fact which to an Elizabethan audience, + perfectly indifferent to what is absurdly called stage + illusion, was probably not in the least grotesque? And as to + the latter, if we knew the Ghost-lore of the time better than + we do, perhaps we should see nothing odd in Hamlet's insisting + on moving away and proposing the oath afresh when the Ghost + intervenes. + + But, further, it is to be observed that he does not merely + propose the oath afresh. He first makes Horatio and Marcellus + swear never to make known what they have _seen_. Then, on + shifting his ground, he makes them swear never to speak of + what they have _heard_. Then, moving again, he makes them + swear that, if he should think fit to play the antic, they + will give no sign of knowing aught of him. The oath is now + complete; and, when the Ghost commands them to swear the last + time, Hamlet suddenly becomes perfectly serious and bids it + rest. [In Fletcher's _Woman's Prize_, V. iii., a passage + pointed out to me by Mr. C.J. Wilkinson, a man taking an oath + shifts his ground.] + + + + + NOTE F. + + THE PLAYER'S SPEECH IN _HAMLET_. + + + There are two extreme views about this speech. According to + one, Shakespeare quoted it from some play, or composed it for + the occasion, simply and solely in order to ridicule, through + it, the bombastic style of dramatists contemporary with + himself or slightly older; just as he ridicules in _2 Henry + IV._ Tamburlaine's rant about the kings who draw his chariot, + or puts fragments of similar bombast into the mouth of Pistol. + According to Coleridge, on the other hand, this idea is 'below + criticism.' No sort of ridicule was intended. 'The lines, as + epic narrative, are superb.' It is true that the language is + 'too poetical--the language of lyric vehemence and epic pomp, + and not of the drama'; but this is due to the fact that + Shakespeare had to distinguish the style of the speech from + that of his own dramatic dialogue. + + In essentials I think that what Coleridge says[259] is true. + He goes too far, it seems to me, when he describes the + language of the speech as merely 'too poetical'; for with much + that is fine there is intermingled a good deal that, in epic + as in drama, must be called bombast. But I do not believe + Shakespeare meant it for bombast. + + I will briefly put the arguments which point to this + conclusion. Warburton long ago stated some of them fully and + cogently, but he misinterpreted here and there, and some + arguments have to be added to his. + + 1. If the speech was meant to be ridiculous, it follows either + that Hamlet in praising it spoke ironically, or that + Shakespeare, in making Hamlet praise it sincerely, himself + wrote ironically. And both these consequences are almost + incredible. + + Let us see what Hamlet says. He asks the player to recite 'a + passionate speech'; and, being requested to choose one, he + refers to a speech he once heard the player declaim. This + speech, he says, was never 'acted' or was acted only once; for + the play pleased not the million. But he, and others whose + opinion was of more importance than his, thought it an + excellent play, well constructed, and composed with equal + skill and temperance. One of these other judges commended it + because it contained neither piquant indecencies nor + affectations of phrase, but showed 'an honest method, as + wholesome as sweet, and by very much more handsome than + fine.'[260] In this play Hamlet 'chiefly loved' one speech; + and he asks for a part of it. + + Let the reader now refer to the passage I have just + summarised; let him consider its tone and manner; and let him + ask himself if Hamlet can possibly be speaking ironically. I + am sure he will answer No. And then let him observe what + follows. The speech is declaimed. Polonius interrupting it + with an objection to its length, Hamlet snubs him, bids the + player proceed, and adds, 'He's for a jig or a tale of bawdry: + or he sleeps.' 'He,' that is, 'shares the taste of the million + for sallets in the lines to make the matter savoury, and is + wearied by an honest method.'[261] Polonius later interrupts + again, for he thinks the emotion of the player too absurd; but + Hamlet respects it; and afterwards, when he is alone (and + therefore can hardly be ironical), in contrasting this emotion + with his own insensibility, he betrays no consciousness that + there was anything unfitting in the speech that caused it. + + So far I have chiefly followed Warburton, but there is an + important point which seems not to have been observed. All + Hamlet's praise of the speech is in the closest agreement with + his conduct and words elsewhere. His later advice to the + player (III. ii.) is on precisely the same lines. He is to + play to the judicious, not to the crowd, whose opinion is + worthless. He is to observe, like the author of Aeneas' + speech, the 'modesty' of nature. He must not tear a 'passion' + to tatters, to split the ears of the incompetent, but in the + very tempest of passion is to keep a temperance and + smoothness. The million, we gather from the first passage, + cares nothing for construction; and so, we learn in the second + passage, the barren spectators want to laugh at the clown + instead of attending to some necessary question of the play. + Hamlet's hatred of exaggeration is marked in both passages. + And so (as already pointed out, p. 133) in the play-scene, + when his own lines are going to be delivered, he impatiently + calls out to the actor to leave his damnable faces and begin; + and at the grave of Ophelia he is furious with what he thinks + the exaggeration of Laertes, burlesques his language, and + breaks off with the words, + + Nay, an thou'lt mouth, + I'll rant as well as thou. + +Now if Hamlet's praise of the Aeneas and Dido play and speech is +ironical, his later advice to the player must surely be ironical too: +and who will maintain that? And if in the one passage Hamlet is serious +but Shakespeare ironical, then in the other passage all those famous +remarks about drama and acting, which have been cherished as +Shakespeare's by all the world, express the opposite of Shakespeare's +opinion: and who will maintain that? And if Hamlet and Shakespeare are +both serious--and nothing else is credible--then, to Hamlet and +Shakespeare, the speeches of Laertes and Hamlet at Ophelia's grave are +rant, but the speech of Aeneas to Dido is not rant. Is it not evident +that he meant it for an exalted narrative speech of 'passion,' in a +style which, though he may not have adopted it, he still approved and +despised the million for not approving,--a speech to be delivered with +temperance or modesty, but not too tamely neither? Is he not aiming here +to do precisely what Marlowe aimed to do when he proposed to lead the +audience + + From jigging veins of rhyming mother-wits, + And such conceits as clownage keeps in pay, + +to 'stately' themes which beget 'high astounding terms'? And is it +strange that, like Marlowe in _Tamburlaine_, he adopted a style marred +in places by that which _we_ think bombast, but which the author meant +to be more 'handsome than fine'? + +2. If this is so, we can easily understand how it comes about that the +speech of Aeneas contains lines which are unquestionably grand and free +from any suspicion of bombast, and others which, though not free from +that suspicion, are nevertheless highly poetic. To the first class +certainly belongs the passage beginning, 'But as we often see.' To the +second belongs the description of Pyrrhus, covered with blood that was + + Baked and impasted with the parching streets, + That lend a tyrannous and damned light + To their lord's murder; + +and again the picture of Pyrrhus standing like a tyrant in a picture, +with his uplifted arm arrested in act to strike by the crash of the +falling towers of Ilium. It is surely impossible to say that these lines +are _merely_ absurd and not in the least grand; and with them I should +join the passage about Fortune's wheel, and the concluding lines. + +But how can the insertion of these passages possibly be explained on the +hypothesis that Shakespeare meant the speech to be ridiculous? + +3. 'Still,' it may be answered, 'Shakespeare _must_ have been conscious +of the bombast in some of these passages. How could he help seeing it? +And, if he saw it, he cannot have meant seriously to praise the speech.' +But why must he have seen it? Did Marlowe know when he wrote +bombastically? Or Marston? Or Heywood? Does not Shakespeare elsewhere +write bombast? The truth is that the two defects of style in the speech +are the very defects we do find in his writings. When he wished to make +his style exceptionally high and passionate he always ran some risk of +bombast. And he was even more prone to the fault which in this speech +seems to me the more marked, a use of metaphors which sound to our ears +'conceited' or grotesque. To me at any rate the metaphors in 'now is he +total gules' and 'mincing with his sword her husband's limbs' are more +disturbing than any of the bombast. But, as regards this second defect, +there are many places in Shakespeare worse than the speech of Aeneas; +and, as regards the first, though in his undoubtedly genuine works there +is no passage so faulty, there is also no passage of quite the same +species (for his narrative poems do not aim at epic grandeur), and there +are many passages where bombast of the same kind, though not of the same +degree, occurs. + +Let the reader ask himself, for instance, how the following lines would +strike him if he came on them for the first time out of their context: + + Whip me, ye devils, + From the possession of this heavenly sight! + Blow me about in winds! Roast me in sulphur! + Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire! + +Are Pyrrhus's 'total gules' any worse than Duncan's 'silver skin laced +with his golden blood,' or so bad as the chamberlains' daggers +'unmannerly breech'd with gore'?[262] If 'to bathe in reeking wounds,' +and 'spongy officers,' and even 'alarum'd by his sentinel the wolf, +Whose howl's his watch,' and other such phrases in _Macbeth_, had +occurred in the speech of Aeneas, we should certainly have been told +that they were meant for burlesque. I open _Troilus and Cressida_ +(because, like the speech of Aeneas, it has to do with the story of +Troy), and I read, in a perfectly serious context (IV. v. 6 f.): + + Thou, trumpet, there's thy purse. + Now crack thy lungs, and split thy brazen pipe: + Blow, villain, till thy sphered bias cheek + Outswell the colic of puff'd Aquilon: + Come, stretch thy chest, and let thy eyes spout blood; + Thou blow'st for Hector. + +'Splendid!' one cries. Yes, but if you are told it is also bombastic, +can you deny it? I read again (V. v. 7): + + bastard Margarelon + Hath Doreus prisoner, + And stands colossus-wise, waving his beam, + Upon the pashed corses of the kings. + +Or, to turn to earlier but still undoubted works, Shakespeare wrote in +_Romeo and Juliet_, + + here will I remain + With worms that are thy chamber-maids; + +and in _King John_, + + And pick strong matter of revolt and wrath + Out of the bloody finger-ends of John; + +and in _Lucrece_, + + And, bubbling from her breast, it doth divide + In two slow rivers, that the crimson blood + Circles her body in on every side, + Who, like a late-sack'd island, vastly stood + Bare and unpeopled in this fearful flood. + Some of her blood still pure and red remain'd, + And some look'd black, and that false Tarquin stain'd. + +Is it so very unlikely that the poet who wrote thus might, aiming at a +peculiarly heightened and passionate style, write the speech of Aeneas? + +4. But, pursuing this line of argument, we must go further. There is +really scarcely one idea, and there is but little phraseology, in the +speech that cannot be paralleled from Shakespeare's own works. He merely +exaggerates a little here what he has done elsewhere. I will conclude +this Note by showing that this is so as regards almost all the passages +most objected to, as well as some others. (1) 'The Hyrcanian beast' is +Macbeth's 'Hyrcan tiger' (III. iv. 101), who also occurs in _3 Hen. VI._ +I. iv. 155. (2) With 'total gules' Steevens compared _Timon_ IV. iii. 59 +(an undoubtedly Shakespearean passage), + + With man's blood paint the ground, gules, gules. + +(3) With 'baked and impasted' cf. _John_ III. iii. 42, 'If that surly +spirit melancholy Had baked thy blood.' In the questionable _Tit. And._ +V. ii. 201 we have, 'in that paste let their vile heads be baked' (a +paste made of blood and bones, _ib._ 188), and in the undoubted _Richard +II._ III. ii. 154 (quoted by Caldecott) Richard refers to the ground + + Which serves as paste and cover to our bones. + +(4) 'O'er-sized with coagulate gore' finds an exact parallel in the +'blood-siz'd field' of the _Two Noble Kinsmen_, I. i. 99, a scene which, +whether written by Shakespeare (as I fully believe) or by another poet, +was certainly written in all seriousness. (5) 'With eyes like +carbuncles' has been much ridiculed, but Milton (_P.L._ ix. 500) gives +'carbuncle eyes' to Satan turned into a serpent (Steevens), and why are +they more outrageous than ruby lips and cheeks (_J.C._ III. i. 260, +_Macb._ III. iv. 115, _Cym._ II. ii. 17)? (6) Priam falling with the +mere wind of Pyrrhus's sword is paralleled, not only in _Dido Queen of +Carthage_, but in _Tr. and Cr._ V. iii. 40 (Warburton). (7) With Pyrrhus +standing like a painted tyrant cf. _Macb._ V. viii. 25 (Delius). (8) The +forging of Mars's armour occurs again in _Tr. and Cr._ IV. v. 255, where +Hector swears by the forge that stithied Mars his helm, just as Hamlet +himself alludes to Vulcan's stithy (III. ii. 89). (9) The idea of +'strumpet Fortune' is common: _e.g._ _Macb._ I. ii. 15, 'Fortune ... +show'd like a rebel's whore.' (10) With the 'rant' about her wheel +Warburton compares _Ant. and Cl._ IV. xv. 43, where Cleopatra would + + rail so high + That the false huswife Fortune break her wheel. + +(11.) Pyrrhus minces with his sword Priam's limbs, and Timon (IV. iii. +122) bids Alcibiades 'mince' the babe without remorse.'[263] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 259: It is impossible to tell whether Coleridge formed his +view independently, or adopted it from Schlegel. For there is no record +of his having expressed his opinion prior to the time of his reading +Schlegel's _Lectures_; and, whatever he said to the contrary, his +borrowings from Schlegel are demonstrable.] + +[Footnote 260: Clark and Wright well compare Polonius' antithesis of +'rich, not gaudy': though I doubt if 'handsome' implies richness.] + +[Footnote 261: Is it not possible that 'mobled queen,' to which Hamlet +seems to object, and which Polonius praises, is meant for an example of +the second fault of affected phraseology, from which the play was said +to be free, and an instance of which therefore surprises Hamlet?] + +[Footnote 262: The extravagance of these phrases is doubtless +intentional (for Macbeth in using them is trying to act a part), but the +_absurdity_ of the second can hardly be so.] + +[Footnote 263: Steevens observes that Heywood uses the phrase 'guled +with slaughter,' and I find in his _Iron Age_ various passages +indicating that he knew the speech of Aeneas (cf. p. 140 for another +sign that he knew _Hamlet_). The two parts of the _Iron Age_ were +published in 1632, but are said, in the preface to the Second, to have +'been long since writ.' I refer to the pages of vol. 3 of Pearson's +_Heywood_ (1874). (1) p. 329, Troilus 'lyeth imbak'd In his cold blood.' +(2) p. 341, of Achilles' armour: + + _Vulcan_ that wrought it out of gadds of Steele + With his _Ciclopian_ hammers, never made + Such noise upon his Anvile forging it, + Than these my arm'd fists in _Ulisses_ wracke. + +(3) p. 357, 'till _Hecub's_ reverent lockes Be gul'd in slaughter.' (4) +p. 357, '_Scamander_ plaines Ore-spread with intrailes bak'd in blood +and dust.' (5) p. 378, 'We'll rost them at the scorching flames of +_Troy_.' (6) p. 379, 'tragicke slaughter, clad in gules and sables' +(cf.'sable arms' in the speech in _Hamlet_). (7) p. 384, 'these lockes, +now knotted all, As bak't in blood.' Of these, all but (1) and (2) are +in Part II. Part I. has many passages which recall _Troilus and +Cressida_. Mr. Fleay's speculation as to its date will be found in his +_Chronicle History of the English Drama_, i. p. 285. + +For the same writer's ingenious theory (which is of course incapable of +proof) regarding the relation of the player's speech in _Hamlet_ to +Marlowe and Nash's _Dido_, see Furness's Variorum _Hamlet_.] + + + + +NOTE G. + +HAMLET'S APOLOGY TO LAERTES. + + +Johnson, in commenting on the passage (V. ii. 237-255), says: 'I wish +Hamlet had made some other defence; it is unsuitable to the character of +a good or a brave man to shelter himself in falsehood.' And Seymour +(according to Furness) thought the falsehood so ignoble that he rejected +lines 239-250 as an interpolation! + +I wish first to remark that we are mistaken when we suppose that Hamlet +is here apologising specially for his behaviour to Laertes at Ophelia's +grave. We naturally suppose this because he has told Horatio that he is +sorry he 'forgot himself' on that occasion, and that he will court +Laertes' favours (V. ii. 75 ff.). But what he says in that very passage +shows that he is thinking chiefly of the greater wrong he has done +Laertes by depriving him of his father: + + For, by the image of my cause, I see + The portraiture of his. + +And it is also evident in the last words of the apology itself that he +is referring in it to the deaths of Polonius and Ophelia: + + Sir, in this audience, + Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil + Free me so far in your most generous thoughts, + _That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house, + And hurt my brother._ + +But now, as to the falsehood. The charge is not to be set aside lightly; +and, for my part, I confess that, while rejecting of course Johnson's +notion that Shakespeare wanted to paint 'a good man,' I have momentarily +shared Johnson's wish that Hamlet had made 'some other defence' than +that of madness. But I think the wish proceeds from failure to imagine +the situation. + +In the first place, _what_ other defence can we wish Hamlet to have +made? I can think of none. He cannot tell the truth. He cannot say to +Laertes, 'I meant to stab the King, not your father.' He cannot explain +why he was unkind to Ophelia. Even on the false supposition that he is +referring simply to his behaviour at the grave, he can hardly say, I +suppose, 'You ranted so abominably that you put me into a towering +passion.' _Whatever_ he said, it would have to be more or less untrue. + +Next, what moral difference is there between feigning insanity and +asserting it? If we are to blame Hamlet for the second, why not equally +for the first? + +And, finally, even if he were referring simply to his behaviour at the +grave, his excuse, besides falling in with his whole plan of feigning +insanity, would be as near the truth as any he could devise. For we are +not to take the account he gives to Horatio, that he was put in a +passion by the bravery of Laertes' grief, as the whole truth. His raving +over the grave is not _mere_ acting. On the contrary, that passage is +the best card that the believers in Hamlet's madness have to play. He is +really almost beside himself with grief as well as anger, half-maddened +by the impossibility of explaining to Laertes how he has come to do what +he has done, full of wild rage and then of sick despair at this wretched +world which drives him to such deeds and such misery. It is the same +rage and despair that mingle with other feelings in his outbreak to +Ophelia in the Nunnery-scene. But of all this, even if he were clearly +conscious of it, he cannot speak to Horatio; for his love to Ophelia is +a subject on which he has never opened his lips to his friend. + +If we realise the situation, then, we shall, I think, repress the wish +that Hamlet had 'made some other defence' than that of madness. We shall +feel only tragic sympathy. + + * * * * * + +As I have referred to Hamlet's apology, I will add a remark on it from a +different point of view. It forms another refutation of the theory that +Hamlet has delayed his vengeance till he could publicly convict the +King, and that he has come back to Denmark because now, with the +evidence of the commission in his pocket, he can safely accuse him. If +that were so, what better opportunity could he possibly find than this +occasion, where he has to express his sorrow to Laertes for the grievous +wrongs which he has unintentionally inflicted on him? + + + + +NOTE H. + +THE EXCHANGE OF RAPIERS. + + +I am not going to discuss the question how this exchange ought to be +managed. I wish merely to point out that the stage-direction fails to +show the sequence of speeches and events. The passage is as follows +(Globe text): + + _Ham._ Come, for the third, Laertes: you but dally; + I pray you, pass with your best violence; + I am afeard you make a wanton of me. + + _Laer._ Say you so? come on. [_They play._ + + _Osr._ Nothing, neither way. + + _Laer._ Have at you now! + + [_Laertes wounds Hamlet; then, in scuffling, they + change rapiers, and Hamlet wounds Laertes._[264] + + _King._ Part them; they are incensed. + + _Ham._ Nay, come, again. _The Queen falls._[265] + + _Osr._ Look to the Queen there, ho! + + _Hor._ They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord? + + _Osr._ How is't, Laertes? + +The words 'and Hamlet wounds Laertes' in Rowe's stage-direction destroy +the point of the words given to the King in the text. If Laertes is +already wounded, why should the King care whether the fencers are parted +or not? What makes him cry out is that, while he sees his purpose +effected as regards Hamlet, he also sees Laertes in danger through the +exchange of foils in the scuffle. Now it is not to be supposed that +Laertes is particularly dear to him; but he sees instantaneously that, +if Laertes escapes the poisoned foil, he will certainly hold his tongue +about the plot against Hamlet, while, if he is wounded, he may confess +the truth; for it is no doubt quite evident to the King that Laertes has +fenced tamely because his conscience is greatly troubled by the +treachery he is about to practise. The King therefore, as soon as he +sees the exchange of foils, cries out, 'Part them; they are incensed.' +But Hamlet's blood is up. 'Nay, come, again,' he calls to Laertes, who +cannot refuse to play, and _now_ is wounded by Hamlet. At the very same +moment the Queen falls to the ground; and ruin rushes on the King from +the right hand and the left. + +The passage, therefore, should be printed thus: + + _Laer._ Have at you now! + + [_Laertes wounds Hamlet; then, in scuffling, + they change rapiers._ + + _King._ Part them; they are incensed. + + _Ham._ Nay, come, again. + + [_They play, and Hamlet wounds Laertes. The Queen falls._ + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 264: So Rowe. The direction in Q1 is negligible, the text +being different. Q2 etc. have nothing, Ff. simply 'In scuffling they +change rapiers.'] + +[Footnote 265: Capell. The Quartos and Folios have no directions.] + + + + +NOTE I. + +THE DURATION OF THE ACTION IN _OTHELLO_. + + +The quite unusual difficulties regarding this subject have led to much +discussion, a synopsis of which may be found in Furness's Variorum +edition, pp. 358-72. Without detailing the facts I will briefly set out +the main difficulty, which is that, according to one set of indications +(which I will call A), Desdemona was murdered within a day or two of her +arrival in Cyprus, while, according to another set (which I will call +B), some time elapsed between her arrival and the catastrophe. Let us +take A first, and run through the play. + +(A) Act I. opens on the night of Othello's marriage. On that night he is +despatched to Cyprus, leaving Desdemona to follow him. + +In Act II. Sc. i., there arrive at Cyprus, first, in one ship, Cassio; +then, in another, Desdemona, Iago, and Emilia; then, in another, Othello +(Othello, Cassio, and Desdemona being in three different ships, it does +not matter, for our purpose, how long the voyage lasted). On the night +following these arrivals in Cyprus the marriage is consummated (II. iii. +9), Cassio is cashiered, and, on Iago's advice, he resolves to ask +Desdemona's intercession 'betimes in the morning' (II. iii. 335). + +In Act III. Sc. iii. (the Temptation scene), he does so: Desdemona does +intercede: Iago begins to poison Othello's mind: the handkerchief is +lost, found by Emilia, and given to Iago: he determines to leave it in +Cassio's room, and, renewing his attack on Othello, asserts that he has +seen the handkerchief in Cassio's hand: Othello bids him kill Cassio +within three days, and resolves to kill Desdemona himself. All this +occurs in one unbroken scene, and evidently on the day after the arrival +in Cyprus (see III. i. 33). + +In the scene (iv.) following the Temptation scene Desdemona sends to bid +Cassio come, as she has interceded for him: Othello enters, tests her +about the handkerchief, and departs in anger: Cassio, arriving, is told +of the change in Othello, and, being left _solus_, is accosted by +Bianca, whom he requests to copy the work on the handkerchief which he +has just found in his room (ll. 188 f.). All this is naturally taken to +happen in the later part of the day on which the events of III. i.-iii. +took place, _i.e._ the day after the arrival in Cyprus: but I shall +return to this point. + +In IV. i. Iago tells Othello that Cassio has confessed, and, placing +Othello where he can watch, he proceeds on Cassio's entrance to rally +him about Bianca; and Othello, not being near enough to hear what is +said, believes that Cassio is laughing at his conquest of Desdemona. +Cassio here says that Bianca haunts him and 'was here _even now_'; and +Bianca herself, coming in, reproaches him about the handkerchief 'you +gave me _even now_.' There is therefore no appreciable time between III. +iv. and IV. i. In this same scene Bianca bids Cassio come to supper +_to-night_; and Lodovico, arriving, is asked to sup with Othello +_to-night_. In IV. ii. Iago persuades Roderigo to kill Cassio _that +night_ as he comes from Bianca's. In IV. iii. Lodovico, after supper, +takes his leave, and Othello bids Desdemona go to bed on the instant and +dismiss her attendant. + +In Act V., _that night_, the attempted assassination of Cassio, and the +murder of Desdemona, take place. + +From all this, then, it seems clear that the time between the arrival in +Cyprus and the catastrophe is certainly not more than a few days, and +most probably only about a day and a half: or, to put it otherwise, that +most probably Othello kills his wife about twenty-four hours after the +consummation of their marriage! + +The only _possible_ place, it will be seen, where time can elapse is +between III. iii. and III. iv. And here Mr. Fleay would imagine a gap of +at least a week. The reader will find that this supposition involves the +following results, (_a_) Desdemona has allowed at least a week to elapse +without telling Cassio that she has interceded for him. (_b_) Othello, +after being convinced of her guilt, after resolving to kill her, and +after ordering Iago to kill Cassio within three days, has allowed at +least a week to elapse without even questioning her about the +handkerchief, and has so behaved during all this time that she is +totally unconscious of any change in his feelings. (_c_) Desdemona, who +reserves the handkerchief evermore about her to kiss and talk to (III. +iii. 295), has lost it for at least a week before she is conscious of +the loss. (_d_) Iago has waited at least a week to leave the +handkerchief in Cassio's chamber; for Cassio has evidently only just +found it, and wants the work on it copied before the owner makes +inquiries for it. These are all gross absurdities. It is certain that +only a short time, most probable that not even a night, elapses between +III. iii. and III. iv. + +(B) Now this idea that Othello killed his wife, probably within +twenty-four hours, certainly within a few days, of the consummation of +his marriage, contradicts the impression produced by the play on all +uncritical readers and spectators. It is also in flat contradiction with +a large number of time-indications in the play itself. It is needless to +mention more than a few. (_a_) Bianca complains that Cassio has kept +away from her for a week (III. iv. 173). Cassio and the rest have +therefore been more than a week in Cyprus, and, we should naturally +infer, considerably more. (_b_) The ground on which Iago builds +throughout is the probability of Desdemona's having got tired of the +Moor; she is accused of having repeatedly committed adultery with Cassio +(_e.g._ V. ii. 210); these facts and a great many others, such as +Othello's language in III. iii. 338 ff., are utterly absurd on the +supposition that he murders his wife within a day or two of the night +when he consummated his marriage. (_c_) Iago's account of Cassio's dream +implies (and indeed states) that he had been sleeping with Cassio +'lately,' _i.e._ after arriving at Cyprus: yet, according to A, he had +only spent one night in Cyprus, and we are expressly told that Cassio +never went to bed on that night. Iago doubtless was a liar, but Othello +was not an absolute idiot. + + * * * * * + +Thus (1) one set of time-indications clearly shows that Othello murdered +his wife within a few days, probably a day and a half, of his arrival in +Cyprus and the consummation of his marriage; (2) another set of +time-indications implies quite as clearly that some little time must +have elapsed, probably a few weeks; and this last is certainly the +impression of a reader who has not closely examined the play. + +It is impossible to escape this result. The suggestion that the imputed +intrigue of Cassio and Desdemona took place at Venice before the +marriage, not at Cyprus after it, is quite futile. There is no positive +evidence whatever for it; if the reader will merely refer to the +difficulties mentioned under B above, he will see that it leaves almost +all of them absolutely untouched; and Iago's accusation is uniformly one +of adultery. + +How then is this extraordinary contradiction to be explained? It can +hardly be one of the casual inconsistencies, due to forgetfulness, which +are found in Shakespeare's other tragedies; for the scheme of time +indicated under A seems deliberate and self-consistent, and the scheme +indicated under B seems, if less deliberate, equally self-consistent. +This does not look as if a single scheme had been so vaguely imagined +that inconsistencies arose in working it out; it points to some other +source of contradiction. + +'Christopher North,' who dealt very fully with the question, elaborated +a doctrine of Double Time, Short and Long. To do justice to this theory +in a few words is impossible, but its essence is the notion that +Shakespeare, consciously or unconsciously, wanted to produce on the +spectator (for he did not aim at readers) two impressions. He wanted the +spectator to feel a passionate and vehement haste in the action; but he +also wanted him to feel that the action was fairly probable. Consciously +or unconsciously he used Short Time (the scheme of A) for the first +purpose, and Long Time (the scheme of B) for the second. The spectator +is affected in the required manner by both, though without distinctly +noticing the indications of the two schemes. + +The notion underlying this theory is probably true, but the theory +itself can hardly stand. Passing minor matters by, I would ask the +reader to consider the following remarks. (_a_) If, as seems to be +maintained, the spectator does not notice the indications of 'Short +Time' at all, how can they possibly affect him? The passion, vehemence +and haste of Othello affect him, because he perceives them; but if he +does not perceive the hints which show the duration of the action from +the arrival in Cyprus to the murder, these hints have simply no +existence for him and are perfectly useless. The theory, therefore, does +not explain the existence of 'Short Time.' (_b_) It is not the case that +'Short Time' is wanted only to produce an impression of vehemence and +haste, and 'Long Time' for probability. The 'Short Time' is equally +wanted for probability: for it is grossly improbable that Iago's +intrigue should not break down if Othello spends a week or weeks between +the successful temptation and his execution of justice. (_c_) And this +brings me to the most important point, which appears to have escaped +notice. The place where 'Long Time' is wanted is not _within_ Iago's +intrigue. 'Long Time' is required simply and solely because the intrigue +and its circumstances presuppose a marriage consummated, and an adultery +possible, for (let us say) some weeks. But, granted that lapse between +the marriage and the temptation, there is no reason whatever why more +than a few days or even one day should elapse between this temptation +and the murder. The whole trouble arises because the temptation begins +on the morning after the consummated marriage. Let some three weeks +elapse between the first night at Cyprus and the temptation; let the +brawl which ends in the disgrace of Cassio occur not on that night but +three weeks later; or again let it occur that night, but let three weeks +elapse before the intercession of Desdemona and the temptation of Iago +begin. All will then be clear. Cassio has time to make acquaintance with +Bianca, and to neglect her: the Senate has time to hear of the perdition +of the Turkish fleet and to recall Othello: the accusations of Iago +cease to be ridiculous; and the headlong speed of the action after the +temptation has begun is quite in place. Now, too, there is no reason why +we should not be affected by the hints of time ('to-day,' 'to-night,' +'even now'), which we _do_ perceive (though we do not calculate them +out). And, lastly, this supposition corresponds with our natural +impression, which is that the temptation and what follows it take place +some little while after the marriage, but occupy, themselves, a very +short time. + +Now, of course, the supposition just described is no fact. As the play +stands, it is quite certain that there is no space of three weeks, or +anything like it, either between the arrival in Cyprus and the brawl, or +between the brawl and the temptation. And I draw attention to the +supposition chiefly to show that quite a small change would remove the +difficulties, and to insist that there is nothing wrong at all in regard +to the time from the temptation onward. How to account for the existing +contradictions I do not at all profess to know, and I will merely +mention two possibilities. + +Possibly, as Mr. Daniel observes, the play has been tampered with. We +have no text earlier than 1622, six years after Shakespeare's death. It +may be suggested, then, that in the play, as Shakespeare wrote it, there +was a gap of some weeks between the arrival in Cyprus and Cassio's +brawl, or (less probably) between the brawl and the temptation. Perhaps +there was a scene indicating the lapse of time. Perhaps it was dull, or +the play was a little too long, or devotees of the unity of time made +sport of a second breach of that unity coming just after the breach +caused by the voyage. Perhaps accordingly the owners of the play +altered, or hired a dramatist to alter, the arrangement at this point, +and this was unwittingly done in such a way as to produce the +contradictions we are engaged on. There is nothing intrinsically +unlikely in this idea; and certainly, I think, the amount of such +corruption of Shakespeare's texts by the players is usually rather +underrated than otherwise. But I cannot say I see any signs of foreign +alteration in the text, though it is somewhat odd that Roderigo, who +makes no complaint on the day of the arrival in Cyprus when he is being +persuaded to draw Cassio into a quarrel that night, should, directly +after the quarrel (II. iii. 370), complain that he is making no advance +in his pursuit of Desdemona, and should speak as though he had been in +Cyprus long enough to have spent nearly all the money he brought from +Venice. + +Or, possibly, Shakespeare's original plan was to allow some time to +elapse after the arrival at Cyprus, but when he reached the point he +found it troublesome to indicate this lapse in an interesting way, and +convenient to produce Cassio's fall by means of the rejoicings on the +night of the arrival, and then almost necessary to let the request for +intercession, and the temptation, follow on the next day. And perhaps he +said to himself, No one in the theatre will notice that all this makes +an impossible position: and I can make all safe by using language that +implies that Othello has after all been married for some time. If so, +probably he was right. I do not think anyone does notice the +impossibilities either in the theatre or in a casual reading of the +play. + +Either of these suppositions is possible: neither is, to me, probable. +The first seems the less unlikely. If the second is true, Shakespeare +did in _Othello_ what he seems to do in no other play. I can believe +that he may have done so; but I find it very hard to believe that he +produced this impossible situation without knowing it. It is one thing +to read a drama or see it, quite another to construct and compose it, +and he appears to have imagined the action in _Othello_ with even more +than his usual intensity. + + + + +NOTE J. + +THE 'ADDITIONS' TO _OTHELLO_ IN THE FIRST FOLIO. THE PONTIC SEA. + + +The first printed _Othello_ is the first Quarto (Q1), 1622; the second +is the first Folio (F1), 1623. These two texts are two distinct versions +of the play. Q1 contains many oaths and expletives where less +'objectionable' expressions occur in F1. Partly for this reason it is +believed to represent the _earlier_ text, perhaps the text as it stood +before the Act of 1605 against profanity on the stage. Its readings are +frequently superior to those of F1, but it wants many lines that appear +in F1, which probably represents the acting version in 1623. I give a +list of the longer passages absent from Q1: + + (_a_) I. i. 122-138. 'If't' ... 'yourself:' + + (_b_) I. ii 72-77. 'Judge' ... 'thee' + + (_c_) I. iii. 24-30. 'For' ... 'profitless.' + + (_d_) III. iii. 383-390. '_Oth._ By' ... 'satisfied! _Iago._' + + (_e_) III. iii. 453-460. 'Iago.' ... 'heaven,' + + (_f_) IV. i. 38-44. 'To confess' ... 'devil!' + + (_g_) IV. ii. 73-76, 'Committed!' ... 'committed!' + + (_h_) IV. ii. 151-164. 'Here' ... 'make me.' + + (_i_) IV. iii. 31-53. 'I have' ... 'not next' + and 55-57. '_Des._ [_Singing_]' ... 'men.' + + (_j_) IV. iii. 60-63. 'I have' ... 'question.' + + (_k_) IV. iii. 87-104. 'But I' ... 'us so.' + + (_l_) V. ii. 151-154. 'O mistress' ... 'Iago.' + + (_m_) V. ii. 185-193. 'My mistress' ... 'villany!' + + (_n_) V. ii. 266-272. 'Be not' ... 'wench!' + +Were these passages after-thoughts, composed after the version +represented by Q1 was written? Or were they in the version represented +by Q1, and only omitted in printing, whether accidentally or because +they were also omitted in the theatre? Or were some of them +after-thoughts, and others in the original version? + +I will take them in order. (_a_) can hardly be an after-thought. Up to +that point Roderigo had hardly said anything, for Iago had always +interposed; and it is very unlikely that Roderigo would now deliver but +four lines, and speak at once of 'she' instead of 'your daughter.' +Probably this 'omission' represents a 'cut' in stage performance. (_b_) +This may also be the case here. In our texts the omission of the passage +would make nonsense, but in Q1 the 'cut' (if a cut) has been mended, +awkwardly enough, by the substitution of 'Such' for 'For' in line 78. In +any case, the lines cannot be an addition. (_c_) cannot be an +after-thought, for the sentence is unfinished without it; and that it +was not meant to be interrupted is clear, because in Q1 line 31 begins +'And,' not 'Nay'; the Duke might say 'Nay' if he were cutting the +previous speaker short, but not 'And.' (_d_) is surely no addition. If +the lines are cut out, not only is the metre spoilt, but the obvious +reason for Iago's words, 'I see, Sir, you are eaten up with passion,' +disappears, and so does the reference of his word 'satisfied' in 393 to +Othello's 'satisfied' in 390. (_e_) is the famous passage about the +Pontic Sea, and I reserve it for the present. (_f_) As Pope observes, +'no hint of this trash in the first edition,' the 'trash' including the +words 'Nature would not invest herself in such shadowing passion without +some instruction. It is not words that shake me thus'! There is nothing +to prove these lines to be original or an after-thought. The omission of +(_g_) is clearly a printer's error, due to the fact that lines 72 and 76 +both end with the word 'committed.' No conclusion can be formed as to +(_h_), nor perhaps (_i_), which includes the whole of Desdemona's song; +but if (_j_) is removed the reference in 'such a deed' in 64 is +destroyed. (_k_) is Emilia's long speech about husbands. It cannot well +be an after-thought, for 105-6 evidently refer to 103-4 (even the word +'uses' in 105 refers to 'use' in 103). (_l_) is no after-thought, for +'if he says so' in 155 must point back to 'my husband say that she was +false!' in 152. (_m_) might be an after-thought, but, if so, in the +first version the ending 'to speak' occurred twice within three lines, +and the reason for Iago's sudden alarm in 193 is much less obvious. If +(_n_) is an addition the original collocation was: + + but O vain boast! + Who can control his fate? 'Tis not so now. + Pale as thy smock! + +which does not sound probable. + +Thus, as it seems to me, in the great majority of cases there is more or +less reason to think that the passages wanting in Q1 were nevertheless +parts of the original play, and I cannot in any one case see any +positive ground for supposing a subsequent addition. I think that most +of the gaps in Q1 were accidents of printing (like many other smaller +gaps in Q1), but that probably one or two were 'cuts'--_e.g._ Emilia's +long speech (_k_). The omission of (_i_) might be due to the state of +the MS.: the words of the song may have been left out of the dialogue, +as appearing on a separate page with the musical notes, or may have been +inserted in such an illegible way as to baffle the printer. + +I come now to (_e_), the famous passage about the Pontic Sea. Pope +supposed that it formed part of the original version, but approved of +its omission, as he considered it 'an unnatural excursion in this +place.' Mr. Swinburne thinks it an after-thought, but defends it. 'In +other lips indeed than Othello's, at the crowning minute of culminant +agony, the rush of imaginative reminiscence which brings back upon his +eyes and ears the lightning foam and tideless thunder of the Pontic Sea +might seem a thing less natural than sublime. But Othello has the +passion of a poet closed in as it were and shut up behind the passion of +a hero' (_Study of Shakespeare_, p. 184). I quote these words all the +more gladly because they will remind the reader of my lectures of my +debt to Mr. Swinburne here; and I will only add that the reminiscence +here is of _precisely the same character_ as the reminiscences of the +Arabian trees and the base Indian in Othello's final speech. But I find +it almost impossible to believe that Shakespeare _ever_ wrote the +passage without the words about the Pontic Sea. It seems to me almost an +imperative demand of imagination that Iago's set speech, if I may use +the phrase, should be preceded by a speech of somewhat the same +dimensions, the contrast of which should heighten the horror of its +hypocrisy; it seems to me that Shakespeare must have felt this; and it +is difficult to me to think that he ever made the lines, + + In the due reverence of a sacred vow + I here engage my words, + +follow directly on the one word 'Never' (however impressive that word in +its isolation might be). And as I can find no _other_ 'omission' in Q1 +which appears to point to a subsequent addition, I conclude that this +'omission' _was_ an omission, probably accidental, conceivably due to a +stupid 'cut.' Indeed it is nothing but Mr. Swinburne's opinion that +prevents my feeling certainty on the point. + +Finally, I may draw attention to certain facts which may be mere +accidents, but may possibly be significant. Passages (_b_) and (_c_) +consist respectively of six and seven lines; that is, they are almost of +the same length, and in a MS. might well fill exactly the same amount of +space. Passage (_d_) is eight lines long; so is passage (_e_). Now, +taking at random two editions of Shakespeare, the Globe and that of +Delius, I find that (_b_) and (_c_) are 6-1/4 inches apart in the Globe, +8 in Delius; and that (_d_) and (_e_) are separated by 7-3/8 inches in +the Globe, by 8-3/4 in Delius. In other words, there is about the same +distance in each case between two passages of about equal dimensions. + +The idea suggested by these facts is that the MS. from which Q1 was +printed was mutilated in various places; that (_b_) and (_c_) occupied +the bottom inches of two successive pages, and that these inches were +torn away; and that this was also the case with (_d_) and (_e_). + +This speculation has amused me and may amuse some reader. I do not know +enough of Elizabethan manuscripts to judge of its plausibility. + + + + +NOTE K. + +OTHELLO'S COURTSHIP. + + +It is curious that in the First Act two impressions are produced which +have afterwards to be corrected. + +1. We must not suppose that Othello's account of his courtship in his +famous speech before the Senate is intended to be exhaustive. He is +accused of having used drugs or charms in order to win Desdemona; and +therefore his purpose in his defence is merely to show that his +witchcraft was the story of his life. It is no part of his business to +trouble the Senators with the details of his courtship, and he so +condenses his narrative of it that it almost appears as though there was +no courtship at all, and as though Desdemona never imagined that he was +in love with her until she had practically confessed her love for him. +Hence she has been praised by some for her courage, and blamed by others +for her forwardness. + +But at III. iii. 70 f. matters are presented in quite a new light. There +we find the following words of hers: + + What! Michael Cassio, + That came a-wooing with you, and so many a time, + When I have spoke of you dispraisingly, + Hath ta'en your part. + +It seems, then, she understood why Othello came so often to her father's +house, and was perfectly secure of his love before she gave him that +very broad 'hint to speak.' I may add that those who find fault with her +forget that it was necessary for her to take the first open step. She +was the daughter of a Venetian grandee, and Othello was a black soldier +of fortune. + +2. We learn from the lines just quoted that Cassio used to accompany +Othello in his visits to the house; and from III. iii. 93 f. we learn +that he knew of Othello's love from first to last and 'went between' the +lovers 'very oft.' Yet in Act I. it appears that, while Iago on the +night of the marriage knows about it and knows where to find Othello (I. +i. 158 f.), Cassio, even if he knows where to find Othello (which is +doubtful: see I. ii. 44), seems to know nothing about the marriage. See +I. ii. 49: + + _Cas._ Ancient, what makes he here? + + _Iago._ 'Faith, he to-night hath boarded a land carack: + If it prove lawful prize, he's made for ever. + + _Cas._ I do not understand. + + _Iago._ He's married. + + _Cas._ To who? + +It is possible that Cassio does know, and only pretends ignorance +because he has not been informed by Othello that Iago also knows. And +this idea is consistent with Iago's apparent ignorance of Cassio's part +in the courtship (III. iii. 93). And of course, if this were so, a word +from Shakespeare to the actor who played Cassio would enable him to make +all clear to the audience. The alternative, and perhaps more probable, +explanation would be that, in writing Act I., Shakespeare had not yet +thought of making Cassio Othello's confidant, and that, after writing +Act III., he neglected to alter the passage in Act I. In that case the +further information which Act III. gives regarding Othello's courtship +would probably also be an after-thought. + + + + +NOTE L. + +OTHELLO IN THE TEMPTATION SCENE. + + +One reason why some readers think Othello 'easily jealous' is that they +completely misinterpret him in the early part of this scene. They fancy +that he is alarmed and suspicious the moment he hears Iago mutter 'Ha! I +like not that,' as he sees Cassio leaving Desdemona (III. iii. 35). But, +in fact, it takes a long time for Iago to excite surprise, curiosity, +and then grave concern--by no means yet jealousy--even about Cassio; and +it is still longer before Othello understands that Iago is suggesting +doubts about Desdemona too. ('Wronged' in 143 certainly does not refer +to her, as 154 and 162 show.) Nor, even at 171, is the exclamation 'O +misery' meant for an expression of Othello's own present feelings; as +his next speech clearly shows, it expresses an _imagined_ feeling, as +also the speech which elicits it professes to do (for Iago would not +have dared here to apply the term 'cuckold' to Othello). In fact it is +not until Iago hints that Othello, as a foreigner, might easily be +deceived, that he is seriously disturbed about Desdemona. + +Salvini played this passage, as might be expected, with entire +understanding. Nor have I ever seen it seriously misinterpreted on the +stage. I gather from the Furness Variorum that Fechter and Edwin Booth +took the same view as Salvini. Actors have to ask themselves what was +the precise state of mind expressed by the words they have to repeat. +But many readers never think of asking such a question. + +The lines which probably do most to lead hasty or unimaginative readers +astray are those at 90, where, on Desdemona's departure, Othello +exclaims to himself: + + Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my soul + But I do love thee! and when I love thee not, + Chaos is come again. + +He is supposed to mean by the last words that his love is _now_ +suspended by suspicion, whereas in fact, in his bliss, he has so totally +forgotten Iago's 'Ha! I like not that,' that the tempter has to begin +all over again. The meaning is, 'If ever I love thee not, Chaos will +have come again.' The feeling of insecurity is due to the excess of +_joy_, as in the wonderful words after he rejoins Desdemona at Cyprus +(II. i. 191): + + If it were now to die, + 'Twere now to be most happy: for, I fear + My soul hath her content so absolute + That not another comfort like to this + Succeeds in unknown fate. + +If any reader boggles at the use of the present in 'Chaos _is_ come +again,' let him observe 'succeeds' in the lines just quoted, or let him +look at the parallel passage in _Venus and Adonis_, 1019: + + For, he being dead, with him is beauty slain; + And, beauty dead, black Chaos comes again. + +Venus does not know that Adonis is dead when she speaks thus. + + + + +NOTE M. + +QUESTIONS AS TO _OTHELLO_, ACT IV. SCENE I. + + +(1) The first part of the scene is hard to understand, and the +commentators give little help. I take the idea to be as follows. Iago +sees that he must renew his attack on Othello; for, on the one hand, +Othello, in spite of the resolution he had arrived at to put Desdemona +to death, has taken the step, without consulting Iago, of testing her in +the matter of Iago's report about the handkerchief; and, on the other +hand, he now seems to have fallen into a dazed lethargic state, and must +be stimulated to action. Iago's plan seems to be to remind Othello of +everything that would madden him again, but to do so by professing to +make light of the whole affair, and by urging Othello to put the best +construction on the facts, or at any rate to acquiesce. So he says, in +effect: 'After all, if she did kiss Cassio, that might mean little. Nay, +she might even go much further without meaning any harm.[266] Of course +there is the handkerchief (10); but then why should she _not_ give it +away?' Then, affecting to renounce this hopeless attempt to disguise his +true opinion, he goes on: 'However, _I_ cannot, as your friend, pretend +that I really regard her as innocent: the fact is, Cassio boasted to me +in so many words of his conquest. [Here he is interrupted by Othello's +swoon.] But, after all, why make such a fuss? You share the fate of most +married men, and you have the advantage of not being deceived in the +matter.' It must have been a great pleasure to Iago to express his real +cynicism thus, with the certainty that he would not be taken seriously +and would advance his plot by it. At 208-210 he recurs to the same plan +of maddening Othello by suggesting that, if he is so fond of Desdemona, +he had better let the matter be, for it concerns no one but him. This +speech follows Othello's exclamation 'O Iago, the pity of it,' and this +is perhaps the moment when we most of all long to destroy Iago. + +(2) At 216 Othello tells Iago to get him some poison, that he may kill +Desdemona that night. Iago objects: 'Do it not with poison: strangle her +in her bed, even the bed she hath contaminated?' Why does he object to +poison? Because through the sale of the poison he himself would be +involved? Possibly. Perhaps his idea was that, Desdemona being killed by +Othello, and Cassio killed by Roderigo, he would then admit that he had +informed Othello of the adultery, and perhaps even that he had +undertaken Cassio's death; but he would declare that he never meant to +fulfil his promise as to Cassio, and that he had nothing to do with +Desdemona's death (he seems to be preparing for this at 285). His buying +poison might wreck this plan. But it may be that his objection to poison +springs merely from contempt for Othello's intellect. He can trust him +to use violence, but thinks he may bungle anything that requires +adroitness. + +(3) When the conversation breaks off here (225) Iago has brought Othello +back to the position reached at the end of the Temptation scene (III. +iii.). Cassio and Desdemona are to be killed; and, in addition, the time +is hastened; it is to be 'to-night,' not 'within three days.' + +The constructional idea clearly is that, after the Temptation scene, +Othello tends to relapse and wait, which is terribly dangerous to Iago, +who therefore in this scene quickens his purpose. Yet Othello relapses +again. He has declared that he will not expostulate with her (IV. i. +217). But he cannot keep his word, and there follows the scene of +accusation. Its _dramatic_ purposes are obvious, but Othello seems to +have no purpose in it. He asks no questions, or, rather, none that shows +the least glimpse of doubt or hope. He is merely torturing himself. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 266: The reader who is puzzled by this passage should refer to +the conversation at the end of the thirtieth tale in the _Heptameron_.] + + + + +NOTE N. + +TWO PASSAGES IN THE LAST SCENE OF _OTHELLO_. + + +(1) V. ii. 71 f. Desdemona demands that Cassio be sent for to 'confess' +the truth that she never gave him the handkerchief. Othello answers that +Cassio _has_ confessed the truth--has confessed the adultery. The +dialogue goes on: + + _Des._ He will not say so. + + _Oth._ No, his mouth is stopp'd: + Honest Iago hath ta'en order for 't. + + _Des._ O! my fear interprets: what, is he dead? + + _Oth._ Had all his hairs been lives, my great revenge + Had stomach for them all. + + _Des._ Alas! he is _betray'd_ and _I_ undone. + +It is a ghastly idea, but I believe Shakespeare means that, at the +mention of Iago's name, Desdemona suddenly sees that _he_ is the villain +whose existence he had declared to be impossible when, an hour before, +Emilia had suggested that someone had poisoned Othello's mind. But her +words rouse Othello to such furious indignation ('Out, strumpet! Weep'st +thou for him to my face?') that 'it is too late.' + +(2) V. ii. 286 f. + + _Oth._ I look down towards his feet; but that's a fable. + If that thou be'st a devil, I cannot kill thee. + [_Wounds Iago._ + + _Lod._ Wrench his sword from him. + + _Iago._ I bleed, sir, but not killed. + +Are Iago's strange words meant to show his absorption of interest in +himself amidst so much anguish? I think rather he is meant to be +alluding to Othello's words, and saying, with a cold contemptuous smile, +'You see he is right; I _am_ a devil.' + + + + +NOTE O. + +OTHELLO ON DESDEMONA'S LAST WORDS. + + +I have said that the last scene of _Othello_, though terribly painful, +contains almost nothing to diminish the admiration and love which +heighten our pity for the hero (p. 198). I said 'almost' in view of the +following passage (V. ii. 123 ff.): + + _Emil._ O, who hath done this deed? + + _Des._ Nobody; I myself. Farewell: + Commend me to my kind lord: O, farewell! [_Dies._ + + _Oth._ Why, how should she be murdered?[267] + + _Emil._ Alas, who knows? + + _Oth._ You heard her say herself, it was not I. + + _Emil._ She said so: I must needs report the truth. + + _Oth._ She's, like a liar, gone to burning hell: + 'Twas I that kill'd her. + + _Emil._ O, the more angel she, + And you the blacker devil! + + _Oth._ She turn'd to folly, and she was a whore. + +This is a strange passage. What did Shakespeare mean us to feel? One is +astonished that Othello should not be startled, nay thunder-struck, when +he hears such dying words coming from the lips of an obdurate +adulteress. One is shocked by the moral blindness or obliquity which +takes them only as a further sign of her worthlessness. Here alone, I +think, in the scene sympathy with Othello quite disappears. Did +Shakespeare mean us to feel thus, and to realise how completely confused +and perverted Othello's mind has become? I suppose so: and yet Othello's +words continue to strike me as very strange, and also as not _like_ +Othello,--especially as at this point he was not in anger, much less +enraged. It has sometimes occurred to me that there is a touch of +personal animus in the passage. One remembers the place in _Hamlet_ +(written but a little while before) where Hamlet thinks he is unwilling +to kill the King at his prayers, for fear they may take him to heaven; +and one remembers Shakespeare's irony, how he shows that those prayers +do _not_ go to heaven, and that the soul of this praying murderer is at +that moment as murderous as ever (see p. 171), just as here the soul of +the lying Desdemona is angelic _in_ its lie. Is it conceivable that in +both passages he was intentionally striking at conventional 'religious' +ideas; and, in particular, that the belief that a man's everlasting fate +is decided by the occupation of his last moment excited in him +indignation as well as contempt? I admit that this fancy seems +un-Shakespearean, and yet it comes back on me whenever I read this +passage. [The words 'I suppose so' (l. 3 above) gave my conclusion; but +I wish to withdraw the whole Note] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 267: He alludes to her cry, 'O falsely, falsely murder'd!'] + + + + +NOTE P. + +DID EMILIA SUSPECT IAGO? + + +I have answered No (p. 216), and have no doubt about the matter; but at +one time I was puzzled, as perhaps others have been, by a single phrase +of Emilia's. It occurs in the conversation between her and Iago and +Desdemona (IV. ii. 130 f.): + + I will be hang'd if some eternal villain, + Some busy and insinuating rogue, + Some cogging, cozening slave, _to get some office_, + Have not devised this slander; I'll be hang'd else. + +Emilia, it may be said, knew that Cassio was the suspected man, so that +she must be thinking of _his_ office, and must mean that Iago has +poisoned Othello's mind in order to prevent his reinstatement and to get +the lieutenancy for himself. And, it may be said, she speaks +indefinitely so that Iago alone may understand her (for Desdemona does +not know that Cassio is the suspected man). Hence too, it may be said, +when, at V. ii. 190, she exclaims, + + Villany, villany, villany! + I think upon't, I think: I smell't: O villany! + _I thought so then:_--I'll kill myself for grief; + +she refers in the words italicised to the occasion of the passage in IV. +ii., and is reproaching herself for not having taken steps on her +suspicion of Iago. + +I have explained in the text why I think it impossible to suppose that +Emilia suspected her husband; and I do not think anyone who follows her +speeches in V. ii., and who realises that, if she did suspect him, she +must have been simply _pretending_ surprise when Othello told her that +Iago was his informant, will feel any doubt. Her idea in the lines at +IV. ii. 130 is, I believe, merely that someone is trying to establish a +ground for asking a favour from Othello in return for information which +nearly concerns him. It does not follow that, because she knew Cassio +was suspected, she must have been referring to Cassio's office. She was +a stupid woman, and, even if she had not been, she would not put two and +two together so easily as the reader of the play. + +In the line, + + I thought so then: I'll kill myself for grief, + +I think she certainly refers to IV. ii. 130 f. and also IV. ii. 15 +(Steevens's idea that she is thinking of the time when she let Iago take +the handkerchief is absurd). If 'I'll kill myself for grief' is to be +taken in close connection with the preceding words (which is not +certain), she may mean that she reproaches herself for not having acted +on her general suspicion, or (less probably) that she reproaches herself +for not having suspected that Iago was the rogue. + +With regard to my view that she failed to think of the handkerchief when +she saw how angry Othello was, those who believe that she did think of +it will of course also believe that she suspected Iago. But in addition +to other difficulties, they will have to suppose that her astonishment, +when Othello at last mentioned the handkerchief, was mere acting. And +anyone who can believe this seems to me beyond argument. [I regret that +I cannot now discuss some suggestions made to me in regard to the +subjects of Notes O and P.] + + + + +NOTE Q. + +IAGO'S SUSPICION REGARDING CASSIO AND EMILIA. + + +The one expression of this suspicion appears in a very curious manner. +Iago, soliloquising, says (II. i. 311): + + Which thing to do, + If this poor trash of Venice, whom I trash + For his quick hunting, stand the putting on, + I'll have our Michael Cassio on the hip, + Abuse him to the Moor in the rank [F. right] garb-- + For I fear Cassio with my night-cap too-- + Make the Moor thank me, etc. + +Why '_For_ I fear Cassio,' etc.? He can hardly be giving himself an +additional reason for involving Cassio; the parenthesis must be +explanatory of the preceding line or some part of it. I think it +explains 'rank garb' or 'right garb,' and the meaning is, 'For Cassio +_is_ what I shall accuse him of being, a seducer of wives.' He is +returning to the thought with which the soliloquy begins, 'That Cassio +loves her, I do well believe it.' In saying this he is unconsciously +trying to believe that Cassio would at any rate _like_ to be an +adulterer, so that it is not so very abominable to say that he _is_ one. +And the idea 'I suspect him with Emilia' is a second and stronger +attempt of the same kind. The idea probably was born and died in one +moment. It is a curious example of Iago's secret subjection to morality. + + + + +NOTE R. + +REMINISCENCES OF _OTHELLO_ IN _KING LEAR_. + + +The following is a list, made without any special search, and doubtless +incomplete, of words and phrases in _King Lear_ which recall words and +phrases in _Othello_, and many of which occur only in these two plays: + + 'waterish,' I. i. 261, appears only here and in _O._ + III. iii. 15. + + 'fortune's alms,' I. i. 281, appears only here and in + _O._ III. iv. 122. + + 'decline' seems to be used of the advance of age only in + I. ii. 78 and _O._ III. iii. 265. + + 'slack' in 'if when they chanced to slack you,' II. + iv. 248, has no exact parallel in Shakespeare, but recalls + 'they slack their duties,' _O._ IV. iii. 88. + + 'allowance' (=authorisation), I. iv. 228, is used + thus only in _K.L._, _O._ I. i. 128, and two places + in _Hamlet_ and _Hen. VIII._ + + 'besort,' vb., I. iv. 272, does not occur elsewhere, + but 'besort,' sb., occurs in _O._ I. iii. 239 and + nowhere else. + + Edmund's 'Look, sir, I bleed,' II. i. 43, sounds like + an echo of Iago's 'I bleed, sir, but not killed,' _O._ + V. ii. 288. + + 'potential,' II. i. 78, appears only here, in _O._ + I. ii. 13, and in the _Lover's Complaint_ (which, I + think, is certainly not an early poem). + + 'poise' in 'occasions of some poise,' II. i. 122, is + exactly like 'poise' in 'full of poise and difficult weight,' + _O._ III. iii. 82, and not exactly like 'poise' in + the three other places where it occurs. + + 'conjunct,' used only in II. ii. 125 (Q), V. + i. 12, recalls 'conjunctive,' used only in _H_. IV. + vii. 14, _O._ I. iii. 374 (F). + + 'grime,' vb., used only in II. iii. 9, recalls + 'begrime,' used only in _O._ III. iii. 387 and + _Lucrece_. + + 'unbonneted,' III. i. 14, appears only here and in + _O._ I. ii. 23. + + 'delicate,' III. iv. 12, IV. iii. 15, + IV. vi. 188, is not a rare word with Shakespeare; he + uses it about thirty times in his plays. But it is worth + notice that it occurs six times in _O._ + + 'commit,' used intr. for 'commit adultery,' appears only in + III. iv. 83, but cf. the famous iteration in _O._ + IV. ii. 72 f. + + 'stand in hard cure,' III. vi. 107, seems to have no + parallel except _O._ II. i. 51, 'stand in bold cure.' + + 'secure'=make careless, IV. i. 22, appears only here + and in _O._ I. iii. 10 and (not quite the same sense) + _Tim._ II. ii. 185. + + Albany's 'perforce must wither,' IV. ii. 35, recalls + Othello's 'It must needs wither,' V. ii. 15. + + 'deficient,' IV. vi. 23, occurs only here and in _O._ + I. iii. 63. + + 'the safer sense,' IV. vi. 81, recalls 'my blood + begins my safer guides to rules,' _O._ II. iii. 205. + + 'fitchew,' IV. vi. 124, is used only here, in _O._ + IV. i. 150, and in _T.C._ V. i. 67 (where it + has not the same significance). + + Lear's 'I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion I + would have made them skip,' V. iii. 276, recalls + Othello's 'I have seen the day, That with this little arm and + this good sword,' etc., V. ii. 261. + +The fact that more than half of the above occur in the first two Acts of +_King Lear_ may possibly be significant: for the farther removed +Shakespeare was from the time of the composition of _Othello_, the less +likely would be the recurrence of ideas or words used in that play. + + + + +NOTE S. + +_KING LEAR_ AND _TIMON OF ATHENS_. + + +That these two plays are near akin in character, and probably in date, +is recognised by many critics now; and I will merely add here a few +references to the points of resemblance mentioned in the text (p. 246), +and a few notes on other points. + +(1) The likeness between Timon's curses and some of the speeches of Lear +in his madness is, in one respect, curious. It is natural that Timon, +speaking to Alcibiades and two courtezans, should inveigh in particular +against sexual vices and corruption, as he does in the terrific passage +IV. iii. 82-166; but why should Lear refer at length, and with the same +loathing, to this particular subject (IV. vi. 112-132)? It almost looks +as if Shakespeare were expressing feelings which oppressed him at this +period of his life. + +The idea may be a mere fancy, but it has seemed to me that this +pre-occupation, and sometimes this oppression, are traceable in other +plays of the period from about 1602 to 1605 (_Hamlet_, _Measure for +Measure_, _Troilus and Cressida_, _All's Well_, _Othello_); while in +earlier plays the subject is handled less, and without disgust, and in +later plays (e.g. _Antony and Cleopatra_, _The Winter's Tale_, +_Cymbeline_) it is also handled, however freely, without this air of +repulsion (I omit _Pericles_ because the authorship of the +brothel-scenes is doubtful). + +(2) For references to the lower animals, similar to those in _King +Lear_, see especially _Timon_, I. i. 259; II. ii. 180; III. vi. 103 f.; +IV. i. 2, 36; IV. iii. 49 f., 177 ff., 325 ff. (surely a passage written +or, at the least, rewritten by Shakespeare), 392, 426 f. I ignore the +constant abuse of the dog in the conversations where Apemantus appears. + +(3) Further points of resemblance are noted in the text at pp. 246, 247, +310, 326, 327, and many likenesses in word, phrase and idea might be +added, of the type of the parallel 'Thine Do comfort and not burn,' +_Lear_, II. iv. 176, and 'Thou sun, that comfort'st, burn!' _Timon_, V. +i. 134. + +(4) The likeness in style and versification (so far as the purely +Shakespearean parts of _Timon_ are concerned) is surely unmistakable, +but some readers may like to see an example. Lear speaks here (IV. vi. +164 ff.): + + Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand! + Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thine own back; + Thou hotly lust'st to use her in that kind + For which thou whipp'st her. The usurer hangs the cozener. + Through tatter'd clothes small vices do appear; + Robes and furr'd gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold, + And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks; + Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw does pierce it. + None does offend, none, I say, none; I'll able 'em: + Take that of me, my friend, who have the power + To seal the accuser's lips. Get thee glass eyes; + And, like a scurvy politician, seem + To see the things thou dost not. + +And Timon speaks here (IV. iii. 1 ff.): + + O blessed breeding sun, draw from the earth + Rotten humidity; below thy sister's orb + Infect the air! Twinn'd brothers of one womb, + Whose procreation, residence, and birth, + Scarce is dividant, touch them with several fortunes, + The greater scorns the lesser: not nature, + To whom all sores lay siege, can bear great fortune, + But by contempt of nature. + Raise me this beggar, and deny't that lord: + The senator shall bear contempt hereditary, + The beggar native honour. + It is the pasture lards the rother's sides, + The want that makes him lean. Who dares, who dares. + In purity of manhood stand upright + And say 'This man's a flatterer'? if one be, + So are they all: for every grise of fortune + Is smooth'd by that below: the learned pate + Ducks to the golden fool: all is oblique; + There's nothing level in our cursed natures, + But direct villany. + +The reader may wish to know whether metrical tests throw any light on +the chronological position of _Timon_; and he will find such information +as I can give in Note BB. But he will bear in mind that results arrived +at by applying these tests to the whole play can have little value, +since it is practically certain that Shakespeare did not write the whole +play. It seems to consist (1) of parts that are purely Shakespearean +(the text, however, being here, as elsewhere, very corrupt); (2) of +parts untouched or very slightly touched by him; (3) of parts where a +good deal is Shakespeare's but not all (_e.g._, in my opinion, III. v., +which I cannot believe, with Mr. Fleay, to be wholly, or almost wholly, +by another writer). The tests ought to be applied not only to the whole +play but separately to (1), about which there is little difference of +opinion. This has not been done: but Dr. Ingram has applied one test, +and I have applied another, to the parts assigned by Mr. Fleay to +Shakespeare (see Note BB.).[268] The result is to place _Timon_ between +_King Lear_ and _Macbeth_ (a result which happens to coincide with that +of the application of the main tests to the whole play): and this result +corresponds, I believe, with the general impression which we derive from +the three dramas in regard to versification. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 268: These are I. i.; II. i.; II. ii., except 194-204; in III. +vi. Timon's verse speech; IV. i.; IV. ii. 1-28; IV. iii., except +292-362, 399-413, 454-543; V. i., except 1-50; V. ii.; V. iv. I am not +to be taken as accepting this division throughout.] + + + + +NOTE T. + +DID SHAKESPEARE SHORTEN _KING LEAR_? + + +I have remarked in the text (pp. 256 ff.) on the unusual number of +improbabilities, inconsistencies, etc., in _King Lear_. The list of +examples given might easily be lengthened. Thus (_a_) in IV. iii. Kent +refers to a letter which he confided to the Gentleman for Cordelia; but +in III. i. he had given to the Gentleman not a letter but a message. +(_b_) In III. i. again he says Cordelia will inform the Gentleman who +the sender of the message was; but from IV. iii. it is evident that she +has done no such thing, nor does the Gentleman show any curiosity on the +subject. (_c_) In the same scene (III. i.) Kent and the Gentleman +arrange that whichever finds the King first shall halloo to the other; +but when Kent finds the King he does not halloo. These are all examples +of mere carelessness as to matters which would escape attention in the +theatre,--matters introduced not because they are essential to the plot, +but in order to give an air of verisimilitude to the conversation. And +here is perhaps another instance. When Lear determines to leave Goneril +and go to Regan he says, 'call my train together' (I. iv. 275). When he +arrives at Gloster's house Kent asks why he comes with so small a train, +and the Fool gives a reply which intimates that the rest have deserted +him (II. iv. 63 ff.). He and his daughters, however, seem unaware of any +diminution; and, when Lear 'calls to horse' and leaves Gloster's house, +the doors are shut against him partly on the excuse that he is 'attended +with a desperate train' (308). Nevertheless in the storm he has no +knights with him, and in III. vii. 15 ff. we hear that 'some five or six +and thirty of his knights'[269] are 'hot questrists after him,' as +though the real reason of his leaving Goneril with so small a train was +that he had hurried away so quickly that many of his knights were +unaware of his departure. + +This prevalence of vagueness or inconsistency is probably due to +carelessness; but it may possibly be due to another cause. There are, it +has sometimes struck me, slight indications that the details of the plot +were originally more full and more clearly imagined than one would +suppose from the play as we have it; and some of the defects to which I +have drawn attention might have arisen if Shakespeare, finding his +matter too bulky, had (_a_) omitted to write some things originally +intended, and (_b_), after finishing his play, had reduced it by +excision, and had not, in these omissions and excisions, taken +sufficient pains to remove the obscurities and inconsistencies +occasioned by them. + +Thus, to take examples of (_b_), Lear's 'What, fifty of my followers at +a clap!' (I. iv. 315) is very easily explained if we suppose that in the +preceding conversation, as originally written, Goneril had mentioned the +number. Again the curious absence of any indication why Burgundy should +have the first choice of Cordelia's hand might easily be due to the same +cause. So might the ignorance in which we are left as to the fate of the +Fool, and several more of the defects noticed in the text. + +To illustrate the other point (_a_), that Shakespeare may have omitted +to write some things which he had originally intended, the play would +obviously gain something if it appeared that, at a time shortly before +that of the action, Gloster had encouraged the King in his idea of +dividing the kingdom, while Kent had tried to dissuade him. And there +are one or two passages which suggest that this is what Shakespeare +imagined. If it were so, there would be additional point in the Fool's +reference to the lord who counselled Lear to give away his land (I. iv. +154), and in Gloster's reflection (III. iv. 168), + + His daughters seek his death: ah, that good Kent! + He said it would be thus: + +('said,' of course, not to the King but to Gloster and perhaps others of +the council). Thus too the plots would be still more closely joined. +Then also we should at once understand the opening of the play. To +Kent's words, 'I thought the King had more affected the Duke of Albany +than Cornwall,' Gloster answers, 'It did always seem so to us.' Who are +the 'us' from whom Kent is excluded? I do not know, for there is no sign +that Kent has been absent. But if Kent, in consequence of his +opposition, had fallen out of favour and absented himself from the +council, it would be clear. So, besides, would be the strange suddenness +with which, after Gloster's answer, Kent changes the subject; he would +be avoiding, in presence of Gloster's son, any further reference to a +subject on which he and Gloster had differed. That Kent, I may add, had +already the strongest opinion about Goneril and Regan is clear from his +extremely bold words (I. i. 165), + + Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow + Upon thy foul disease. + +Did Lear remember this phrase when he called Goneril 'a disease that's +in my flesh' (II. iv. 225)? + +Again, the observant reader may have noticed that Goneril is not only +represented as the fiercer and more determined of the two sisters but +also strikes one as the more sensual. And with this may be connected one +or two somewhat curious points: Kent's comparison of Goneril to the +figure of Vanity in the Morality plays (II. ii. 38); the Fool's +apparently quite irrelevant remark (though his remarks are scarcely ever +so), 'For there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass' +(III. ii. 35); Kent's reference to Oswald (long before there is any sign +of Goneril's intrigue with Edmund) as 'one that would be a bawd in way +of good service' (II. ii. 20); and Edgar's words to the corpse of Oswald +(IV. vi. 257), also spoken before he knew anything of the intrigue with +Edmund, + + I know thee well: a serviceable villain; + As duteous to the vices of thy mistress + As badness would desire. + +Perhaps Shakespeare had conceived Goneril as a woman who before her +marriage had shown signs of sensual vice; but the distinct indications +of this idea were crowded out of his exposition when he came to write +it, or, being inserted, were afterwards excised. I will not go on to +hint that Edgar had Oswald in his mind when (III. iv. 87) he described +the serving-man who 'served the lust of his mistress' heart, and did the +act of darkness with her'; and still less that Lear can have had Goneril +in his mind in the declamation against lechery referred to in Note S. + +I do not mean to imply, by writing this note, that I believe in the +hypotheses suggested in it. On the contrary I think it more probable +that the defects referred to arose from carelessness and other causes. +But this is not, to me, certain; and the reader who rejects the +hypotheses may be glad to have his attention called to the points which +suggested them. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 269: It has been suggested that 'his' means 'Gloster's'; but +'him' all through the speech evidently means Lear.] + + + + +NOTE U. + +MOVEMENTS OF THE DRAMATIS PERSONAE IN ACT II. OF _KING LEAR_. + + +I have referred in the text to the obscurity of the play on this +subject, and I will set out the movements here. + +When Lear is ill-treated by Goneril his first thought is to seek refuge +with Regan (I. iv. 274 f., 327 f.). Goneril, accordingly, who had +foreseen this, and, even before the quarrel, had determined to write to +Regan (I. iii. 25), now sends Oswald off to her, telling her not to +receive Lear and his hundred knights (I. iv. 354 f.). In consequence of +this letter Regan and Cornwall immediately leave their home and ride by +night to Gloster's house, sending word on that they are coming (II. i. 1 +ff., 81, 120 ff.). Lear, on his part, just before leaving Goneril's +house, sends Kent with a letter to Regan, and tells him to be quick, or +Lear will be there before him. And we find that Kent reaches Regan and +delivers his letter before Oswald, Goneril's messenger. Both the +messengers are taken on by Cornwall and Regan to Gloster's house. + +In II. iv. Lear arrives at Gloster's house, having, it would seem, +failed to find Regan at her own home. And, later, Goneril arrives at +Gloster's house, in accordance with an intimation which she had sent in +her letter to Regan (II. iv. 186 f.). + +Thus all the principal persons except Cordelia and Albany are brought +together; and the crises of the double action--the expulsion of Lear and +the blinding and expulsion of Gloster--are reached in Act III. And this +is what was required. + +But it needs the closest attention to follow these movements. And, apart +from this, difficulties remain. + +1. Goneril, in despatching Oswald with the letter to Regan, tells him to +hasten his return (I. iv. 363). Lear again is surprised to find that +_his_ messenger has not been sent back (II. iv. 1 f., 36 f.). Yet +apparently both Goneril and Lear themselves start at once, so that their +messengers _could_ not return in time. It may be said that they expected +to meet them coming back, but there is no indication of this in the +text. + +2. Lear, in despatching Kent, says (I. v. 1): + + Go you before to Gloster with these letters. Acquaint my + daughter no further with anything you know than comes from her + demand out of the letter. + +This would seem to imply that Lear knew that Regan and Cornwall were at +Gloster's house, and meant either to go there (so Koppel) or to summon +her back to her own home to receive him. Yet this is clearly not so, for +Kent goes straight to Regan's house (II. i. 124, II. iv. 1, 27 ff., 114 +ff.). + +Hence it is generally supposed that by 'Gloster,' in the passage just +quoted, Lear means not the Earl but the _place_; that Regan's home was +there; and that Gloster's castle was somewhere not very far off. This is +to some extent confirmed by the fact that Cornwall is the 'arch' or +patron of Gloster (II. i. 60 f., 112 ff.). But Gloster's home or house +must not be imagined quite close to Cornwall's, for it takes a night to +ride from the one to the other, and Gloster's house is in the middle of +a solitary heath with scarce a bush for many miles about (II. iv. 304). + +The plural 'these letters' in the passage quoted need give no trouble, +for the plural is often used by Shakespeare for a single letter; and the +natural conjecture that Lear sent one letter to Regan and another to +Gloster is not confirmed by anything in the text. + +The only difficulty is that, as Koppel points out, 'Gloster' is nowhere +else used in the play for the place (except in the phrase 'Earl of +Gloster' or 'my lord of Gloster'); and--what is more important--that it +would unquestionably be taken by the audience to stand in this passage +for the Earl, especially as there has been no previous indication that +Cornwall lived at Gloster. One can only suppose that Shakespeare forgot +that he had given no such indication, and so wrote what was sure to be +misunderstood,--unless we suppose that 'Gloster' is a mere slip of the +pen, or even a misprint, for 'Regan.' But, apart from other +considerations, Lear would hardly have spoken to a servant of 'Regan,' +and, if he had, the next words would have run 'Acquaint her,' not +'Acquaint my daughter.' + + + + +NOTE V. + +SUSPECTED INTERPOLATIONS IN _KING LEAR_. + + +There are three passages in _King Lear_ which have been held to be +additions made by 'the players.' + +The first consists of the two lines of indecent doggerel spoken by the +Fool at the end of Act I.; the second, of the Fool's prophecy in rhyme +at the end of III. ii.; the third, of Edgar's soliloquy at the end of +III. vi. + +It is suspicious (1) that all three passages occur at the ends of +scenes, the place where an addition is most easily made; and (2) that in +each case the speaker remains behind alone to utter the words after the +other persons have gone off. + +I postpone discussion of the several passages until I have called +attention to the fact that, if these passages are genuine, the number of +scenes which end with a soliloquy is larger in _King Lear_ than in any +other undoubted tragedy. Thus, taking the tragedies in their probable +chronological order (and ignoring the very short scenes into which a +battle is sometimes divided),[270] I find that there are in _Romeo and +Juliet_ four such scenes, in _Julius Caesar_ two, in _Hamlet_ six, in +_Othello_ four,[271] in _King Lear_ seven,[272] in _Macbeth_ two,[273] +in _Antony and Cleopatra_ three, in _Coriolanus_ one. The difference +between _King Lear_ and the plays that come nearest to it is really much +greater than it appears from this list, for in _Hamlet_ four of the six +soliloquies, and in _Othello_ three of the four, are long speeches, +while most of those in _King Lear_ are quite short. + +Of course I do not attach any great importance to the fact just noticed, +but it should not be left entirely out of account in forming an opinion +as to the genuineness of the three doubted passages. + +(_a_) The first of these, I. v. 54-5, I decidedly believe to be +spurious. (1) The scene ends quite in Shakespeare's manner without it. +(2) It does not seem likely that at the _end_ of the scene Shakespeare +would have introduced anything _violently_ incongruous with the +immediately preceding words, + + Oh let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven! + Keep me in temper: I would not be mad! + +(3) Even if he had done so, it is very unlikely that the incongruous +words would have been grossly indecent. (4) Even if they had been, +surely they would not have been _irrelevantly_ indecent and evidently +addressed to the audience, two faults which are not in Shakespeare's +way. (5) The lines are doggerel. Doggerel is not uncommon in the +earliest plays; there are a few lines even in the _Merchant of Venice_, +a line and a half, perhaps, in _As You Like It_; but I do not think it +occurs later, not even where, in an early play, it would certainly have +been found, _e.g._ in the mouth of the Clown in _All's Well_. The best +that can be said for these lines is that they appear in the Quartos, +_i.e._ in reports, however vile, of the play as performed within two or +three years of its composition. + +(_b_) I believe, almost as decidedly, that the second passage, III. ii. +79 ff., is spurious. (1) The scene ends characteristically without the +lines. (2) They are addressed directly to the audience. (3) They destroy +the pathetic and beautiful effect of the immediately preceding words of +the Fool, and also of Lear's solicitude for him. (4) They involve the +absurdity that the shivering timid Fool would allow his master and +protector, Lear and Kent, to go away into the storm and darkness, +leaving him alone. (5) It is also somewhat against them that they do not +appear in the Quartos. At the same time I do not think one would +hesitate to accept them if they occurred at any natural place _within_ +the dialogue. + +(_c_) On the other hand I see no sufficient reason for doubting the +genuineness of Edgar's soliloquy at the end of III. vi. (1) Those who +doubt it appear not to perceive that _some_ words of soliloquy are +wanted; for it is evidently intended that, when Kent and Gloster bear +the King away, they should leave the Bedlam behind. Naturally they do +so. He is only accidentally connected with the King; he was taken to +shelter with him merely to gratify his whim, and as the King is now +asleep there is no occasion to retain the Bedlam; Kent, we know, shrank +from him, 'shunn'd [his] abhorr'd society' (V. iii. 210). So he is left +to return to the hovel where he was first found. When the others depart, +then, he must be left behind, and surely would not go off without a +word. (2) If his speech is spurious, therefore, it has been substituted +for some genuine speech; and surely that is a supposition not to be +entertained except under compulsion. (3) There is no such compulsion in +the speech. It is not very good, no doubt; but the use of rhymed and +somewhat antithetic lines in a gnomic passage is quite in Shakespeare's +manner, _more_ in his manner than, for example, the rhymed passages in +I. i. 183-190, 257-269, 281-4, which nobody doubts; quite like many +places in _All's Well_, or the concluding lines of _King Lear_ itself. +(4) The lines are in spirit of one kind with Edgar's fine lines at the +beginning of Act IV. (5) Some of them, as Delius observes, emphasize the +parallelism between the stories of Lear and Gloster. (6) The fact that +the Folio omits the lines is, of course, nothing against them. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 270: I ignore them partly because they are not significant for +the present purpose, but mainly because it is impossible to accept the +division of battle-scenes in our modern texts, while to depart from it +is to introduce intolerable inconvenience in reference. The only proper +plan in Elizabethan drama is to consider a scene ended as soon as no +person is left on the stage, and to pay no regard to the question of +locality,--a question theatrically insignificant and undetermined in +most scenes of an Elizabethan play, in consequence of the absence of +movable scenery. In dealing with battles the modern editors seem to have +gone on the principle (which they could not possibly apply generally) +that, so long as the place is not changed, you have only one scene. +Hence in _Macbeth_, Act V., they have included in their Scene vii. three +distinct scenes; yet in _Antony and Cleopatra_, Act III., following the +right division for a wrong reason, they have two scenes (viii. and ix.), +each less than four lines long.] + +[Footnote 271: One of these (V. i.) is not marked as such, but it is +evident that the last line and a half form a soliloquy of one remaining +character, just as much as some of the soliloquies marked as such in +other plays.] + +[Footnote 272: According to modern editions, eight, Act II., scene ii., +being an instance. But it is quite ridiculous to reckon as three scenes +what are marked as scenes ii., iii., iv. Kent is on the lower stage the +whole time, Edgar in the so-called scene iii. being on the upper stage +or balcony. The editors were misled by their ignorance of the stage +arrangements.] + +[Footnote 273: Perhaps three, for V. iii. is perhaps an instance, though +not so marked.] + + + + +NOTE W. + +THE STAGING OF THE SCENE OF LEAR'S REUNION WITH CORDELIA. + + +As Koppel has shown, the usual modern stage-directions[274] for this +scene (IV. vii.) are utterly wrong and do what they can to defeat the +poet's purpose. + +It is evident from the text that the scene shows the _first_ meeting of +Cordelia and Kent, and _first_ meeting of Cordelia and Lear, since they +parted in I. i. Kent and Cordelia indeed are doubtless supposed to have +exchanged a few words before they come on the stage; but Cordelia has +not seen her father at all until the moment before she begins (line 26), +'O my dear father!' Hence the tone of the first part of the scene, that +between Cordelia and Kent, is kept low, in order that the latter part, +between Cordelia and Lear, may have its full effect. + +The modern stage-direction at the beginning of the scene, as found, for +example, in the Cambridge and Globe editions, is as follows: + + 'SCENE vii.--A tent in the French camp. LEAR + on a bed asleep, soft music playing; _Gentleman_, and others + attending. + + Enter CORDELIA, KENT, and _Doctor_.' + +At line 25, where the Doctor says 'Please you, draw near,' Cordelia is +supposed to approach the bed, which is imagined by some editors visible +throughout at the back of the stage, by others as behind a curtain at +the back, this curtain being drawn open at line 25. + +Now, to pass by the fact that these arrangements are in flat +contradiction with the stage-directions of the Quartos and the Folio, +consider their effect upon the scene. In the first place, the reader at +once assumes that Cordelia has already seen her father; for otherwise it +is inconceivable that she would quietly talk with Kent while he was +within a few yards of her. The edge of the later passage where she +addresses him is therefore blunted. In the second place, through Lear's +presence the reader's interest in Lear and his meeting with Cordelia is +at once excited so strongly that he hardly attends at all to the +conversation of Cordelia and Kent; and so this effect is blunted too. +Thirdly, at line 57, where Cordelia says, + + O, look upon me, sir, + And hold your hands in benediction o'er me! + No, sir, you must not kneel, + +the poor old King must be supposed either to try to get out of bed, or +actually to do so, or to kneel, or to try to kneel, on the bed. +Fourthly, consider what happens at line 81. + + _Doctor._ Desire him to _go in_; trouble him no more + Till further settling. + + _Cor._ Will't please your highness _walk?_ + + _Lear._ You must bear with me; + Pray you now, forget and forgive; I am old and + foolish. [_Exeunt all but Kent and Gentleman_. + +If Lear is in a tent containing his bed, why in the world, when the +doctor thinks he can bear no more emotion, is he made to walk out of the +tent? A pretty doctor! + +But turn now to the original texts. Of course they say nothing about the +place. The stage-direction at the beginning runs, in the Quartos, 'Enter +Cordelia, Kent, and Doctor;' in the Folio, 'Enter Cordelia, Kent, and +Gentleman.' They differ about the Gentleman and the Doctor, and the +Folio later wrongly gives to the Gentleman the Doctor's speeches as well +as his own. This is a minor matter. But they agree in _making no mention +of Lear_. He is not on the stage at all. Thus Cordelia, and the reader, +can give their whole attention to Kent. + +Her conversation with Kent finished, she turns (line 12) to the Doctor +and asks 'How does the King?'[275] The Doctor tells her that Lear is +still asleep, and asks leave to wake him. Cordelia assents and asks if +he is 'arrayed,' which does not mean whether he has a night-gown on, but +whether they have taken away his crown of furrow-weeds, and tended him +duly after his mad wanderings in the fields. The Gentleman says that in +his sleep 'fresh garments' (not a night-gown) have been put on him. The +Doctor then asks Cordelia to be present when her father is waked. She +assents, and the Doctor says, 'Please you, draw near. Louder the music +there.' The next words are Cordelia's, 'O my dear father!' + +What has happened? At the words 'is he arrayed?' according to the Folio, +'_Enter Lear in a chair carried by Servants._' The moment of this +entrance, as so often in the original editions, is doubtless too soon. +It should probably come at the words 'Please you, draw near,' which +_may_, as Koppel suggests, be addressed to the bearers. But that the +stage-direction is otherwise right there cannot be a doubt (and that the +Quartos omit it is no argument against it, seeing that, according to +their directions, Lear never enters at all). + +This arrangement (1) allows Kent his proper place in the scene, (2) +makes it clear that Cordelia has not seen her father before, (3) makes +her first sight of him a theatrical crisis in the best sense, (4) makes +it quite natural that he should kneel, (5) makes it obvious why he +should leave the stage again when he shows signs of exhaustion, and (6) +is the only arrangement which has the slightest authority, for 'Lear on +a bed asleep' was never heard of till Capell proposed it. The ruinous +change of the staging was probably suggested by the version of that +unhappy Tate. + +Of course the chair arrangement is primitive, but the Elizabethans did +not care about such things. What they cared for was dramatic effect. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 274: There are exceptions: _e.g._, in the editions of Delius +and Mr. W.J. Craig.] + +[Footnote 275: And it is possible that, as Koppel suggests, the Doctor +should properly enter at this point; for if Kent, as he says, wishes to +remain unknown, it seems strange that he and Cordelia should talk as +they do before a third person. This change however is not necessary, for +the Doctor might naturally stand out of hearing till he was addressed; +and it is better not to go against the stage-direction without +necessity.] + + + + +NOTE X. + +THE BATTLE IN _KING LEAR_. + + +I found my impression of the extraordinary ineffectiveness of this +battle (p. 255) confirmed by a paper of James Spedding (_New Shakspere +Society Transactions_, 1877, or Furness's _King Lear_, p. 312 f.); but +his opinion that this is the one technical defect in _King Lear_ seems +certainly incorrect, and his view that this defect is not due to +Shakespeare himself will not, I think, bear scrutiny. + +To make Spedding's view quite clear I may remind the reader that in the +preceding scene the two British armies, that of Edmund and Regan, and +that of Albany and Goneril, have entered with drum and colours, and have +departed. Scene ii. is as follows (Globe): + + SCENE II.--_A field between the two camps. + + Alarum within. Enter, with drum and colours_, LEAR, CORDELIA, + _and_ Soldiers, _over the stage; and exeunt._ _Enter_ EDGAR + _and_ GLOSTER. + + _Edg._ Here, father, take the shadow of this tree + For your good host; pray that the right may thrive: + If ever I return to you again, + I'll bring you comfort. + + _Glo._ Grace go with you, sir! + + [_Exit_ Edgar + + _Alarum and retreat within._ _Re-enter_ EDGAR. + + _Edg._ Away, old man; give me thy hand; away! + King Lear hath lost, he and his daughter ta'en: + Give me thy hand; come on. + + _Glo._ No farther, sir; a man may rot even here. + + _Edg._ What, in ill thoughts again? Men must endure + Their going hence, even as their coming hither: + Ripeness is all: come on. + + _Glo._ And that's true too. [_Exeunt_. + +The battle, it will be seen, is represented only by military music +within the tiring-house, which formed the back of the stage. 'The +scene,' says Spedding, 'does not change; but 'alarums' are heard, and +afterwards a 'retreat,' and on the same field over which that great army +has this moment passed, fresh and full of hope, re-appears, with tidings +that all is lost, the same man who last left the stage to follow and +fight in it.[276] That Shakespeare meant the scene to stand thus, no one +who has the true faith will believe.' + +Spedding's suggestion is that things are here run together which +Shakespeare meant to keep apart. Shakespeare, he thinks, continued Act +IV. to the '_exit_ Edgar' after l. 4 of the above passage. Thus, just +before the close of the Act, the two British armies and the French army +had passed across the stage, and the interest of the audience in the +battle about to be fought was raised to a high pitch. Then, after a +short interval, Act V. opened with the noise of battle in the distance, +followed by the entrance of Edgar to announce the defeat of Cordelia's +army. The battle, thus, though not fought on the stage, was shown and +felt to be an event of the greatest importance. + +Apart from the main objection of the entire want of evidence of so great +a change having been made, there are other objections to this idea and +to the reasoning on which it is based. (1) The pause at the end of the +present Fourth Act is far from 'faulty,' as Spedding alleges it to be; +that Act ends with the most melting scene Shakespeare ever wrote; and a +pause after it, and before the business of the battle, was perfectly +right. (2) The Fourth Act is already much longer than the Fifth (about +fourteen columns of the Globe edition against about eight and a half), +and Spedding's change would give the Fourth nearly sixteen columns, and +the Fifth less than seven. (3) Spedding's proposal requires a much +greater alteration in the existing text than he supposed. It does not +simply shift the division of the two Acts, it requires the disappearance +and re-entrance of the blind Gloster. Gloster, as the text stands, is +alone on the stage while the battle is being fought at a distance, and +the reference to the tree shows that he was on the main or lower stage. +The main stage had no front curtain; and therefore, if Act IV. is to end +where Spedding wished it to end, Gloster must go off unaided at its +close, and come on again unaided for Act V. And this means that the +_whole_ arrangement of the present Act V. Sc. ii. must be changed. If +Spedding had been aware of this it is not likely that he would have +broached his theory.[277] + +It is curious that he does not allude to the one circumstance which +throws some little suspicion on the existing text. I mean the +contradiction between Edgar's statement that, if ever he returns to his +father again, he will bring him comfort, and the fact that immediately +afterwards he returns to bring him discomfort. It is possible to explain +this psychologically, of course, but the passage is not one in which we +should expect psychological subtlety. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 276: Where did Spedding find this? I find no trace of it, and +surely Edgar would not have risked his life in the battle, when he had, +in case of defeat, to appear and fight Edmund. He does not appear +'armed,' according to the Folio, till V. iii. 117.] + +[Footnote 277: Spedding supposed that there was a front curtain, and +this idea, coming down from Malone and Collier, is still found in +English works of authority. But it may be stated without hesitation that +there is no positive evidence at all for the existence of such a +curtain, and abundant evidence against it.] + + + + +NOTE Y. + +SOME DIFFICULT PASSAGES IN _KING LEAR_. + + +The following are notes on some passages where I have not been able to +accept any of the current interpretations, or on which I wish to express +an opinion or represent a little-known view. + + +1. _Kent's soliloquy at the end of_ II. ii. + +(_a_) In this speech the application of the words 'Nothing, almost sees +miracles but misery' seems not to have been understood. The 'misery' is +surely not that of Kent but that of Lear, who has come 'out of heaven's +benediction to the warm sun,' _i.e._ to misery. This, says Kent, is just +the situation where something like miraculous help may be looked for; +and he finds the sign of it in the fact that a letter from Cordelia has +just reached him; for his course since his banishment has been so +obscured that it is only by the rarest good fortune (something like a +miracle) that Cordelia has got intelligence of it. We may suppose that +this intelligence came from one of Albany's or Cornwall's servants, some +of whom are, he says (III. i. 23), + + to France the spies and speculations + Intelligent of our state. + +(_b_) The words 'and shall find time,' etc., have been much discussed. +Some have thought that they are detached phrases from the letter which +Kent is reading: but Kent has just implied by his address to the sun +that he has no light to read the letter by.[278] It has also been +suggested that the anacoluthon is meant to represent Kent's sleepiness, +which prevents him from finishing the sentence, and induces him to +dismiss his thoughts and yield to his drowsiness. But I remember nothing +like this elsewhere in Shakespeare, and it seems much more probable that +the passage is corrupt, perhaps from the loss of a line containing words +like 'to rescue us' before 'From this enormous state' (with 'state' cf. +'our state' in the lines quoted above). + +When we reach III. i. we find that Kent has now read the letter; he +knows that a force is coming from France and indeed has already 'secret +feet' in some of the harbours. So he sends the Gentleman to Dover. + + +2. _The Fool's Song in_ II. iv. + +At II. iv. 62 Kent asks why the King comes with so small a train. The +Fool answers, in effect, that most of his followers have deserted him +because they see that his fortunes are sinking. He proceeds to advise +Kent ironically to follow their example, though he confesses he does not +intend to follow it himself. 'Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs +down a hill, lest it break thy neck with following it: but the great one +that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after. When a wise man gives +thee better counsel, give me mine again: I would have none but knaves +follow it, since a fool gives it. + + That sir which serves and seeks for gain, + And follows but for form, + Will pack when it begins to rain, + And leave thee in the storm. + But I will tarry; the fool will stay, + And let the wise man fly: + The knave turns fool that runs away; + The fool no knave, perdy. + +The last two lines have caused difficulty. Johnson wanted to read, + + The fool turns knave that runs away, + The knave no fool, perdy; + +_i.e._ if I ran away, I should prove myself to be a knave and a wise +man, but, being a fool, I stay, as no knave or wise man would. Those who +rightly defend the existing reading misunderstand it, I think. +Shakespeare is not pointing out, in 'The knave turns fool that runs +away,' that the wise knave who runs away is really a 'fool with a +circumbendibus,' 'moral miscalculator as well as moral coward.' The Fool +is referring to his own words, 'I would have none but knaves follow [my +advice to desert the King], since a fool gives it'; and the last two +lines of his song mean, 'The knave who runs away follows the advice +given by a fool; but I, the fool, shall not follow my own advice by +turning knave.' + +For the ideas compare the striking passage in _Timon_, I. i. 64 ff. + + +3. '_Decline your head._' + +At IV. ii. 18 Goneril, dismissing Edmund in the presence of Oswald, +says: + + This trusty servant + Shall pass between us: ere long you are like to hear, + If you dare venture in your own behalf, + A mistress's command. Wear this; spare speech; + Decline your head: this kiss, if it durst speak, + Would stretch thy spirits up into the air. + +I copy Furness's note on 'Decline': 'STEEVENS thinks that Goneril bids +Edmund decline his head that she might, while giving him a kiss, appear +to Oswald merely to be whispering to him. But this, WRIGHT says, is +giving Goneril credit for too much delicacy, and Oswald was a +"serviceable villain." DELIUS suggests that perhaps she wishes to put a +chain around his neck.' + +Surely 'Decline your head' is connected, not with 'Wear this' (whatever +'this' may be), but with 'this kiss,' etc. Edmund is a good deal taller +than Goneril, and must stoop to be kissed. + + +4. _Self-cover'd_. + +At IV. ii. 59 Albany, horrified at the passions of anger, hate, and +contempt expressed in his wife's face, breaks out: + + See thyself, devil! + Proper deformity seems not in the fiend + So horrid as in woman. + + _Gon._ O vain fool! + + _Alb._ Thou changed and self-cover'd thing, for shame, + Be-monster not thy feature. Were't my fitness + To let these hands obey my blood, + They are apt enough to dislocate and tear + Thy flesh and bones: howe'er thou art a fiend, + A woman's shape doth shield thee. + +The passage has been much discussed, mainly because of the strange +expression 'self-cover'd,' for which of course emendations have been +proposed. The general meaning is clear. Albany tells his wife that she +is a devil in a woman's shape, and warns her not to cast off that shape +by be-monstering her feature (appearance), since it is this shape alone +that protects her from his wrath. Almost all commentators go astray +because they imagine that, in the words 'thou changed and self-cover'd +thing,' Albany is speaking to Goneril as a _woman_ who has been changed +into a fiend. Really he is addressing her as a fiend which has changed +its own shape and assumed that of a woman; and I suggest that +'self-cover'd' means either 'which hast covered or concealed thyself,' +or 'whose self is covered' [so Craig in Arden edition], not (what of +course it ought to mean) 'which hast been covered _by_ thyself.' + +Possibly the last lines of this passage (which does not appear in the +Folios) should be arranged thus: + + To let these hands obey my blood, they're apt enough + To dislocate and tear thy flesh and bones: + Howe'er thou art a fiend, a woman's shape + Doth shield thee. + + _Gon._ Marry, your manhood now-- + + _Alb._ What news? + + +5. _The stage-directions at_ V. i. 37, 39. + +In V. i. there first enter Edmund, Regan, and their army or soldiers: +then, at line 18, Albany, Goneril, and their army or soldiers. Edmund +and Albany speak very stiffly to one another, and Goneril bids them +defer their private quarrels and attend to business. Then follows this +passage (according to the modern texts): + + _Alb._ Let's then determine + With the ancient of war on our proceedings. + + _Edm._ I shall attend you presently at your tent. + + _Reg._ Sister, you'll go with us? + + _Gon._ No. + + _Reg._ 'Tis most convenient: pray you, go with us. + + _Gon._ [_Aside_] O, ho, I know the riddle.--I will go. + + _As they are going out, enter_ EDGAR _disguised._ + + _Edg._ If e'er your grace had speech with man so poor, + Hear me one word. + + _Alb._ I'll overtake you. Speak. + + [_Exeunt all but_ ALBANY _and_ EDGAR. + +It would appear from this that all the leading persons are to go to a +Council of War with the ancient (plural) in Albany's tent; and they are +going out, followed by their armies, when Edgar comes in. Why in the +world, then, should Goneril propose (as she apparently does) to absent +herself from the Council; and why, still more, should Regan object to +her doing so? This is a question which always perplexed me, and I could +not believe in the only answers I ever found suggested, viz., that Regan +wanted to keep Edmund and Goneril together in order that she might +observe them (Moberly, quoted in Furness), or that she could not bear to +lose sight of Goneril, for fear Goneril should effect a meeting with +Edmund after the Council (Delius, if I understand him). + +But I find in Koppel what seems to be the solution +(Verbesserungsvorschlaege, p. 127 f.). He points out that the modern +stage-directions are wrong. For the modern direction 'As they are going +out, enter Edgar disguised,' the Ff. read, 'Exeunt both the armies. +Enter Edgar.' For 'Exeunt all but Albany and Edgar' the Ff. have +nothing, but Q1 has 'exeunt' after 'word.' For the first direction +Koppel would read, 'Exeunt Regan, Goneril, Gentlemen, and Soldiers': for +the second he would read, after 'overtake you,' 'Exit Edmund.' + +This makes all clear. Albany proposes a Council of War. Edmund assents, +and says he will come at once to Albany's tent for that purpose. The +Council will consist of Albany, Edmund, and the ancient of war. Regan, +accordingly, is going away with her soldiers; but she observes that +Goneril shows no sign of moving with _her_ soldiers; and she at once +suspects that Goneril means to attend the Council in order to be with +Edmund. Full of jealousy, she invites Goneril to go with _her_. Goneril +refuses, but then, seeing Regan's motive, contemptuously and ironically +consents (I doubt if 'O ho, I know the riddle' should be 'aside,' as in +modern editions, following Capell). Accordingly the two sisters go out, +followed by their soldiers; and Edmund and Albany are just going out, in +a different direction, to Albany's tent when Edgar enters. His words +cause Albany to stay; Albany says to Edmund, as Edmund leaves, 'I'll +overtake you'; and then, turning to Edgar, bids him 'speak.' + + +6. V. iii. 151 ff. + +When Edmund falls in combat with the disguised Edgar, Albany produces +the letter from Goneril to Edmund, which Edgar had found in Oswald's +pocket and had handed over to Albany. This letter suggested to Edmund +the murder of Albany. The passage in the Globe edition is as follows: + + _Gon._ This is practice, Gloucester: + By the law of arms thou wast not bound to answer + An unknown opposite: thou art not vanquish'd, + But cozen'd and beguiled. + + _Alb._ Shut your mouth, dame, + Or with this paper shall I stop it: Hold, sir; + Thou worse than any name, read thy own evil: + No tearing, lady; I perceive you know it. + [_Gives the letter to Edmund._ + + _Gon._ Say, if I do, the laws are mine, not thine: + Who can arraign me for't? + + _Alb._ Most monstrous! oh! + Know'st thou this paper? + + _Gon._ Ask me not what I know. [_Exit._ + + _Alb._ Go after her: she's desperate: govern her. + + _Edm._ What you have charged me with, that have I done; + And more, much more; the time will bring it out. + 'Tis past, and so am I. But what art thou + That hast this fortune on me? + +The first of the stage-directions is not in the Qq. or Ff.: it was +inserted by Johnson. The second ('Exit') is both in the Qq. and in the +Ff., but the latter place it after the words 'arraign me for't.' And +they give the words 'Ask me not what I know' to Edmund, not to Goneril, +as in the Qq. (followed by the Globe). + +I will not go into the various views of these lines, but will simply say +what seems to me most probable. It does not matter much where precisely +Goneril's 'exit' comes; but I believe the Folios are right in giving the +words 'Ask me not what I know' to Edmund. It has been pointed out by +Knight that the question 'Know'st thou this paper?' cannot very well be +addressed to Goneril, for Albany has already said to her, 'I perceive +you know it.' It is possible to get over this difficulty by saying that +Albany wants her confession: but there is another fact which seems to +have passed unnoticed. When Albany is undoubtedly speaking to his wife, +he uses the plural pronoun, 'Shut _your_ mouth, dame,' 'No tearing, +lady; I perceive _you_ know it.' When then he asks 'Know'st _thou_ this +paper?' he is probably _not_ speaking to her. + +I should take the passage thus. At 'Hold, sir,' [omitted in Qq.] Albany +holds the letter out towards Edmund for him to see, or possibly gives it +to him.[279] The next line, with its 'thou,' is addressed to Edmund, +whose 'reciprocal vows' are mentioned in the letter. Goneril snatches at +it to tear it up: and Albany, who does not know whether Edmund ever saw +the letter or not, says to her 'I perceive _you_ know it,' the 'you' +being emphatic (her very wish to tear it showed she knew what was in +it). She practically admits her knowledge, defies him, and goes out to +kill herself. He exclaims in horror at her, and, turning again to +Edmund, asks if _he_ knows it. Edmund, who of course does not know it, +refuses to answer (like Iago), not (like Iago) out of defiance, but from +chivalry towards Goneril; and, having refused to answer _this_ charge, +he goes on to admit the charges brought against himself previously by +Albany (82 f.) and Edgar (130 f.). I should explain the change from +'you' to 'thou' in his speech by supposing that at first he is speaking +to Albany and Edgar together. + + +7. V. iii. 278. + +Lear, looking at Kent, asks, + + Who are you? + Mine eyes are not o' the best: I'll tell you straight. + + _Kent._ If fortune brag of two she loved _and_ hated (Qq. _or_), + One of them we behold. + +Kent is not answering Lear, nor is he speaking of himself. He is +speaking of Lear. The best interpretation is probably that of Malone, +according to which Kent means, 'We see the man most hated by Fortune, +whoever may be the man she has loved best'; and perhaps it is supported +by the variation of the text in the Qq., though their texts are so bad +in this scene that their support is worth little. But it occurs to me as +possible that the meaning is rather: 'Did Fortune ever show the extremes +_both_ of her love _and_ of her hatred to any other man as she has shown +them to this man?' + + +8. _The last lines._ + + _Alb._ Bear them from hence. Our present business + Is general woe. [_To Kent and Edgar_] Friends of my + soul, you twain + Rule in this realm, and the gored state sustain. + + _Kent._ I have a journey, sir, shortly to go; + My master calls me, I must not say no. + + _Alb._ The weight of this sad time we must obey; + Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say. + The oldest hath borne most: we that are young + Shall never see so much, nor live so long. + +So the Globe. The stage-direction (right, of course) is Johnson's. The +last four lines are given by the Ff. to Edgar, by the Qq. to Albany. The +Qq. read '_have_ borne most.' + +To whom ought the last four lines to be given, and what do they mean? It +is proper that the principal person should speak last, and this is in +favour of Albany. But in this scene at any rate the Ff., which give the +speech to Edgar, have the better text (though Ff. 2, 3, 4, make Kent die +after his two lines!); Kent has answered Albany, but Edgar has not; and +the lines seem to be rather more appropriate to Edgar. For the 'gentle +reproof' of Kent's despondency (if this phrase of Halliwell's is right) +is like Edgar; and, although we have no reason to suppose that Albany +was not young, there is nothing to prove his youth. + +As to the meaning of the last two lines (a poor conclusion to such a +play) I should suppose that 'the oldest' is not Lear, but 'the oldest of +us,' viz., Kent, the one survivor of the old generation: and this is the +more probable if there _is_ a reference to him in the preceding lines. +The last words seem to mean, 'We that are young shall never see so much +_and yet_ live so long'; _i.e._ if we suffer so much, we shall not bear +it as he has. If the Qq. 'have' is right, the reference is to Lear, +Gloster and Kent. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 278: The 'beacon' which he bids approach is not the moon, as +Pope supposed. The moon was up and shining some time ago (II. ii. 35), +and lines 1 and 141-2 imply that not much of the night is left.] + +[Footnote 279: 'Hold' can mean 'take'; but the word 'this' in line 160 +('Know'st thou this paper?') favours the idea that the paper is still in +Albany's hand.] + + + + +NOTE Z. + +SUSPECTED INTERPOLATIONS IN _MACBETH_. + + +I have assumed in the text that almost the whole of _Macbeth_ is +genuine; and, to avoid the repetition of arguments to be found in other +books,[280] I shall leave this opinion unsupported. But among the +passages that have been questioned or rejected there are two which seem +to me open to serious doubt. They are those in which Hecate appears: +viz. the whole of III. v.; and IV. i. 39-43. + +These passages have been suspected (1) because they contain +stage-directions for two songs which have been found in Middleton's +_Witch_; (2) because they can be excised without leaving the least trace +of their excision; and (3) because they contain lines incongruous with +the spirit and atmosphere of the rest of the Witch-scenes: _e.g._ III. +v. 10 f.: + + all you have done + Hath been but for a wayward son, + Spiteful and wrathful, who, as others do, + Loves for his own ends, not for you; + +and IV. i. 41, 2: + + And now about the cauldron sing, + Like elves and fairies in a ring. + +The idea of sexual relation in the first passage, and the trivial +daintiness of the second (with which cf. III. v. 34, + + Hark! I am call'd; my little spirit, see, + Sits in a foggy cloud, and stays for me) + +suit Middleton's Witches quite well, but Shakespeare's not at all; and +it is difficult to believe that, if Shakespeare had meant to introduce a +personage supreme over the Witches, he would have made her so +unimpressive as this Hecate. (It may be added that the original +stage-direction at IV. i. 39, 'Enter Hecat and the other three Witches,' +is suspicious.) + +I doubt if the second and third of these arguments, taken alone, would +justify a very serious suspicion of interpolation; but the fact, +mentioned under (1), that the play has here been meddled with, trebles +their weight. And it gives some weight to the further fact that these +passages resemble one another, and differ from the bulk of the other +Witch passages, in being iambic in rhythm. (It must, however, be +remembered that, supposing Shakespeare _did_ mean to introduce Hecate, +he might naturally use a special rhythm for the parts where she +appeared.) + +The same rhythm appears in a third passage which has been doubted: IV. +i. 125-132. But this is not _quite_ on a level with the other two; for +(1), though it is possible to suppose the Witches, as well as the +Apparitions, to vanish at 124, and Macbeth's speech to run straight on +to 133, the cut is not so clean as in the other cases; (2) it is not at +all clear that Hecate (the most suspicious element) is supposed to be +present. The original stage-direction at 133 is merely 'The Witches +Dance, and vanish'; and even if Hecate had been present before, she +might have vanished at 43, as Dyce makes her do. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 280: _E.g._ Mr. Chambers's excellent little edition in the +Warwick series.] + + + + +NOTE AA. + +HAS _MACBETH_ BEEN ABRIDGED? + + +_Macbeth_ is a very short play, the shortest of all Shakespeare's except +the _Comedy of Errors_. It contains only 1993 lines, while _King Lear_ +contains 3298, _Othello_ 3324, and _Hamlet_ 3924. The next shortest of +the tragedies is _Julius Caesar_, which has 2440 lines. (The figures are +Mr. Fleay's. I may remark that for our present purpose we want the +number of the lines in the first Folio, not those in modern composite +texts.) + +Is there any reason to think that the play has been shortened? I will +briefly consider this question, so far as it can be considered apart +from the wider one whether Shakespeare's play was re-handled by +Middleton or some one else. + +That the play, as we have it, is _slightly_ shorter than the play +Shakespeare wrote seems not improbable. (1) We have no Quarto of +_Macbeth_; and generally, where we have a Quarto or Quartos of a play, +we find them longer than the Folio text. (2) There are perhaps a few +signs of omission in our text (over and above the plentiful signs of +corruption). I will give one example (I. iv. 33-43). Macbeth and Banquo, +returning from their victories, enter the presence of Duncan (14), who +receives them with compliments and thanks, which they acknowledge. He +then speaks as follows: + + My plenteous joys, + Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves + In drops of sorrow. Sons, kinsmen, thanes, + And you whose places are the nearest, know, + We will establish our estate upon + Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter + The Prince of Cumberland; which honour must + Not unaccompanied invest him only, + But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine + On all deservers. From hence to Inverness, + And bind us further to you. + +Here the transition to the naming of Malcolm, for which there has been +no preparation, is extremely sudden; and the matter, considering its +importance, is disposed of very briefly. But the abruptness and brevity +of the sentence in which Duncan invites himself to Macbeth's castle are +still more striking. For not a word has yet been said on the subject; +nor is it possible to suppose that Duncan had conveyed his intention by +message, for in that case Macbeth would of course have informed his wife +of it in his letter (written in the interval between scenes iii. and +iv.). It is difficult not to suspect some omission or curtailment here. +On the other hand Shakespeare may have determined to sacrifice +everything possible to the effect of rapidity in the First Act; and he +may also have wished, by the suddenness and brevity of Duncan's +self-invitation, to startle both Macbeth and the audience, and to make +the latter feel that Fate is hurrying the King and the murderer to their +doom. + +And that any _extensive_ omissions have been made seems not likely. (1) +There is no internal evidence of the omission of anything essential to +the plot. (2) Forman, who saw the play in 1610, mentions nothing which +we do not find in our play; for his statement that Macbeth was made Duke +of Northumberland is obviously due to a confused recollection of +Malcolm's being made Duke of Cumberland. (3) Whereabouts could such +omissions occur? Only in the first part, for the rest is full enough. +And surely anyone who wanted to cut the play down would have operated, +say, on Macbeth's talk with Banquo's murderers, or on III. vi., or on +the very long dialogue of Malcolm and Macduff, instead of reducing the +most exciting part of the drama. We might indeed suppose that +Shakespeare himself originally wrote the first part more at length, and +made the murder of Duncan come in the Third Act, and then _himself_ +reduced his matter so as to bring the murder back to its present place, +perceiving in a flash of genius the extraordinary effect that might thus +be produced. But, even if this idea suited those who believe in a +rehandling of the play, what probability is there in it? + +Thus it seems most likely that the play always was an extremely short +one. Can we, then, at all account for its shortness? It is possible, in +the first place, that it was not composed originally for the public +stage, but for some private, perhaps royal, occasion, when time was +limited. And the presence of the passage about touching for the evil +(IV. iii. 140 ff.) supports this idea. We must remember, secondly, that +some of the scenes would take longer to perform than ordinary scenes of +mere dialogue and action; _e.g._ the Witch-scenes, and the Battle-scenes +in the last Act, for a broad-sword combat was an occasion for an +exhibition of skill.[281] And, lastly, Shakespeare may well have felt +that a play constructed and written like _Macbeth_, a play in which a +kind of fever-heat is felt almost from beginning to end, and which +offers very little relief by means of humorous or pathetic scenes, ought +to be short, and would be unbearable if it lasted so long as _Hamlet_ or +even _King Lear_. And in fact I do not think that, in reading, we _feel +Macbeth_ to be short: certainly we are astonished when we hear that it +is about half as long as _Hamlet_. Perhaps in the Shakespearean theatre +too it appeared to occupy a longer time than the clock recorded. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 281: These two considerations should also be borne in mind in +regard to the exceptional shortness of the _Midsummer Night's Dream_ and +the _Tempest_. Both contain scenes which, even on the Elizabethan stage, +would take an unusual time to perform. And it has been supposed of each +that it was composed to grace some wedding.] + + + + +NOTE BB. + +THE DATE OF _MACBETH_. METRICAL TESTS. + + +Dr. Forman saw _Macbeth_ performed at the Globe in 1610. The question is +how much earlier its composition or first appearance is to be put. + +It is agreed that the date is not earlier than that of the accession of +James I. in 1603. The style and versification would make an earlier date +almost impossible. And we have the allusions to 'two-fold balls and +treble sceptres' and to the descent of Scottish kings from Banquo; the +undramatic description of touching for the King's Evil (James performed +this ceremony); and the dramatic use of witchcraft, a matter on which +James considered himself an authority. + +Some of these references would have their fullest effect early in +James's reign. And on this ground, and on account both of resemblances +in the characters of Hamlet and Macbeth, and of the use of the +supernatural in the two plays, it has been held that _Macbeth_ was the +tragedy that came next after _Hamlet_, or, at any rate, next after +_Othello_. + +These arguments seem to me to have no force when set against those that +point to a later date (about 1606) and place _Macbeth_ after _King +Lear_.[282] And, as I have already observed, the probability is that it +also comes after Shakespeare's part of _Timon_, and immediately before +_Antony and Cleopatra_ and _Coriolanus_. + +I will first refer briefly to some of the older arguments in favour of +this later date, and then more at length to those based on +versification. + +(1) In II. iii. 4-5, 'Here's a farmer that hang'd himself on the +expectation of plenty,' Malone found a reference to the exceptionally +low price of wheat in 1606. + +(2) In the reference in the same speech to the equivocator who could +swear in both scales and committed treason enough for God's sake, he +found an allusion to the trial of the Jesuit Garnet, in the spring of +1606, for complicity in the Gunpowder Treason and Plot. Garnet protested +on his soul and salvation that he had not held a certain conversation, +then was obliged to confess that he had, and thereupon 'fell into a +large discourse defending equivocation.' This argument, which I have +barely sketched, seems to me much weightier than the first; and its +weight is increased by the further references to perjury and treason +pointed out on p. 397. + +(3) Halliwell observed what appears to be an allusion to _Macbeth_ in +the comedy of the _Puritan_, 4to, 1607: 'we'll ha' the ghost i' th' +white sheet sit at upper end o' th' table'; and Malone had referred to a +less striking parallel in _Caesar and Pompey_, also pub. 1607: + + Why, think you, lords, that 'tis _ambition's spur_ + That _pricketh_ Caesar to these high attempts? + +He also found a significance in the references in _Macbeth_ to the +genius of Mark Antony being rebuked by Caesar, and to the insane root +that takes the reason prisoner, as showing that Shakespeare, while +writing _Macbeth_, was reading Plutarch's _Lives_, with a view to his +next play _Antony and Cleopatra_ (S.R. 1608). + +(4) To these last arguments, which by themselves would be of little +weight, I may add another, of which the same may be said. Marston's +reminiscences of Shakespeare are only too obvious. In his _Dutch +Courtezan_, 1605, I have noticed passages which recall _Othello_ and +_King Lear_, but nothing that even faintly recalls _Macbeth_. But in +reading _Sophonisba_, 1606, I was several times reminded of _Macbeth_ +(as well as, more decidedly, of _Othello_). I note the parallels for +what they are worth. + +With _Sophonisba_, Act I. Sc. ii.: + + Upon whose tops the Roman eagles stretch'd + Their large spread wings, which fann'd the evening aire + To us cold breath, + +cf. _Macbeth_ I. ii. 49: + + Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky + And fan our people cold. + +Cf. _Sophonisba_, a page later: 'yet doubtful stood the fight,' with +_Macbeth_, I. ii. 7, 'Doubtful it stood' ['Doubtful long it stood'?] In +the same scene of _Macbeth_ the hero in fight is compared to an eagle, +and his foes to sparrows; and in _Soph._ III. ii. Massinissa in fight is +compared to a falcon, and his foes to fowls and lesser birds. I should +not note this were it not that all these reminiscences (if they are +such) recall one and the same scene. In _Sophonisba_ also there is a +tremendous description of the witch Erictho (IV. i.), who says to the +person consulting her, 'I know thy thoughts,' as the Witch says to +Macbeth, of the Armed Head, 'He knows thy thought.' + +(5) The resemblances between _Othello_ and _King Lear_ pointed out on +pp. 244-5 and in Note R. form, when taken in conjunction with other +indications, an argument of some strength in favour of the idea that +_King Lear_ followed directly on _Othello_. + +(6) There remains the evidence of style and especially of metre. I will +not add to what has been said in the text concerning the former; but I +wish to refer more fully to the latter, in so far as it can be +represented by the application of metrical tests. It is impossible to +argue here the whole question of these tests. I will only say that, +while I am aware, and quite admit the force, of what can be said against +the independent, rash, or incompetent use of them, I am fully convinced +of their value when they are properly used. + +Of these tests, that of rhyme and that of feminine endings, discreetly +employed, are of use in broadly distinguishing Shakespeare's plays into +two groups, earlier and later, and also in marking out the very latest +dramas; and the feminine-ending test is of service in distinguishing +Shakespeare's part in _Henry VIII._ and the _Two Noble Kinsmen_. But +neither of these tests has any power to separate plays composed within a +few years of one another. There is significance in the fact that the +_Winter's Tale_, the _Tempest_, _Henry VIII._, contain hardly any rhymed +five-foot lines; but none, probably, in the fact that _Macbeth_ shows a +higher percentage of such lines than _King Lear_, _Othello_, or +_Hamlet_. The percentages of feminine endings, again, in the four +tragedies, are almost conclusive against their being early plays, and +would tend to show that they were not among the latest; but the +differences in their respective percentages, which would place them in +the chronological order _Hamlet_, _Macbeth_, _Othello_, _King Lear_ +(Koenig), or _Macbeth_, _Hamlet_, _Othello_, _King Lear_ (Hertzberg), are +of scarcely any account.[283] Nearly all scholars, I think, would accept +these statements. + +The really useful tests, in regard to plays which admittedly are not +widely separated, are three which concern the endings of speeches and +lines. It is practically certain that Shakespeare made his verse +progressively less formal, by making the speeches end more and more +often within a line and not at the close of it; by making the sense +overflow more and more often from one line into another; and, at last, +by sometimes placing at the end of a line a word on which scarcely any +stress can be laid. The corresponding tests may be called the +Speech-ending test, the Overflow test, and the Light and Weak Ending +test. + +I. The Speech-ending test has been used by Koenig,[284] and I will first +give some of his results. But I regret to say that I am unable to +discover certainly the rule he has gone by. He omits speeches which are +rhymed throughout, or which end with a rhymed couplet. And he counts +only speeches which are 'mehrzeilig.' I suppose this means that he +counts any speech consisting of two lines or more, but omits not only +one-line speeches, but speeches containing more than one line but less +than two; but I am not sure. + +In the plays admitted by everyone to be early the percentage of speeches +ending with an incomplete line is quite small. In the _Comedy of +Errors_, for example, it is only 0.6. It advances to 12.1 in _King +John_, 18.3 in _Henry V._, and 21.6 in _As You Like It_. It rises +quickly soon after, and in no play written (according to general belief) +after about 1600 or 1601 is it less than 30. In the admittedly latest +plays it rises much higher, the figures being as follows:--_Antony_ +77.5, _Cor._ 79, _Temp._ 84.5, _Cym._ 85, _Win. Tale_ 87.6, _Henry +VIII._ (parts assigned to Shakespeare by Spedding) 89. Going back, now, +to the four tragedies, we find the following figures: _Othello_ 41.4, +_Hamlet_ 51.6, _Lear_ 60.9, _Macbeth_ 77.2. These figures place +_Macbeth_ decidedly last, with a percentage practically equal to that of +_Antony_, the first of the final group. + +I will now give my own figures for these tragedies, as they differ +somewhat from Koenig's, probably because my method differs. (1) I have +included speeches rhymed or ending with rhymes, mainly because I find +that Shakespeare will sometimes (in later plays) end a speech which is +partly rhymed with an incomplete line (_e.g. Ham._ III. ii. 187, and the +last words of the play: or _Macb._ V. i. 87, V. ii. 31). And if such +speeches are reckoned, as they surely must be (for they may be, and are, +highly significant), those speeches which end with complete rhymed lines +must also be reckoned. (2) I have counted any speech exceeding a line in +length, however little the excess may be; _e.g._ + + I'll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked. + Give me my armour: + +considering that the incomplete line here may be just as significant as +an incomplete line ending a longer speech. If a speech begins within a +line and ends brokenly, of course I have not counted it when it is +equivalent to a five-foot line; _e.g._ + + Wife, children, servants, all + That could be found: + +but I do count such a speech (they are very rare) as + + My lord, I do not know: + But truly I do fear it: + +for the same reason that I count + + You know not + Whether it was his wisdom or his fear. + +Of the speeches thus counted, those which end somewhere within the line +I find to be in _Othello_ about 54 per cent.; in _Hamlet_ about 57; in +_King Lear_ about 69; in _Macbeth_ about 75.[285] The order is the same +as Koenig's, but the figures differ a good deal. I presume in the last +three cases this comes from the difference in method; but I think +Koenig's figures for _Othello_ cannot be right, for I have tried several +methods and find that the result is in no case far from the result of my +own, and I am almost inclined to conjecture that Koenig's 41.4 is really +the percentage of speeches ending with the close of a line, which would +give 58.6 for the percentage of the broken-ended speeches.[286] + +We shall find that other tests also would put _Othello_ before _Hamlet_, +though close to it. This may be due to 'accident'--_i.e._ a cause or +causes unknown to us; but I have sometimes wondered whether the last +revision of _Hamlet_ may not have succeeded the composition of +_Othello_. In this connection the following fact may be worth notice. It +is well known that the differences of the Second Quarto of _Hamlet_ from +the First are much greater in the last three Acts than in the first +two--so much so that the editors of the Cambridge Shakespeare suggested +that Q1 represents an old play, of which Shakespeare's rehandling had +not then proceeded much beyond the Second Act, while Q2 represents his +later completed rehandling. If that were so, the composition of the last +three Acts would be a good deal later than that of the first two (though +of course the first two would be revised at the time of the composition +of the last three). Now I find that the percentage of speeches ending +with a broken line is about 50 for the first two Acts, but about 62 for +the last three. It is lowest in the first Act, and in the first two +scenes of it is less than 32. The percentage for the last two Acts is +about 65. + +II. The Enjambement or Overflow test is also known as the End-stopped +and Run-on line test. A line may be called 'end-stopped' when the sense, +as well as the metre, would naturally make one pause at its close; +'run-on' when the mere sense would lead one to pass to the next line +without any pause.[287] This distinction is in a great majority of cases +quite easy to draw: in others it is difficult. The reader cannot judge +by rules of grammar, or by marks of punctuation (for there is a distinct +pause at the end of many a line where most editors print no stop): he +must trust his ear. And readers will differ, one making a distinct pause +where another does not. This, however, does not matter greatly, so long +as the reader is consistent; for the important point is not the precise +number of run-on lines in a play, but the difference in this matter +between one play and another. Thus one may disagree with Koenig in his +estimate of many instances, but one can see that he is consistent. + +In Shakespeare's early plays, 'overflows' are rare. In the _Comedy of +Errors_, for example, their percentage is 12.9 according to Koenig[288] +(who excludes rhymed lines and some others). In the generally admitted +last plays they are comparatively frequent. Thus, according to Koenig, +the percentage in the _Winter's Tale_ is 37.5, in the _Tempest_ 41.5, in +_Antony_ 43.3, in _Coriolanus_ 45.9, in _Cymbeline_ 46, in the parts of +_Henry VIII._ assigned by Spedding to Shakespeare 53.18. Koenig's results +for the four tragedies are as follows: _Othello_, 19.5; _Hamlet_, 23.1; +_King Lear_, 29.3; _Macbeth_, 36.6; (_Timon_, the whole play, 32.5). +_Macbeth_ here again, therefore, stands decidedly last: indeed it stands +near the first of the latest plays. + +And no one who has ever attended to the versification of _Macbeth_ will +be surprised at these figures. It is almost obvious, I should say, that +Shakespeare is passing from one system to another. Some passages show +little change, but in others the change is almost complete. If the +reader will compare two somewhat similar soliloquies, 'To be or not to +be' and 'If it were done when 'tis done,' he will recognise this at +once. Or let him search the previous plays, even _King Lear_, for twelve +consecutive lines like these: + + If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well + It were done quickly: if the assassination + Could trammel up the consequence, and catch + With his surcease success; that but this blow + Might be the be-all and the end-all here, + But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, + We 'ld jump the life to come. But in these cases + We still have judgement here; that we but teach + Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return + To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice + Commends the ingredients of our poison'd chalice + To our own lips. + +Or let him try to parallel the following (III. vi. 37 f.): + + and this report + Hath so exasperate the king that he + Prepares for some attempt of war. + + _Len._ Sent he to Macduff? + + _Lord._ He did: and with an absolute 'Sir, not I,' + The cloudy messenger turns me his back + And hums, as who should say 'You'll rue the time + That clogs me with this answer.' + + _Len._ And that well might + Advise him to a caution, to hold what distance + His wisdom can provide. Some holy angel + Fly to the court of England, and unfold + His message ere he come, that a swift blessing + May soon return to this our suffering country + Under a hand accurs'd! + +or this (IV. iii. 118 f.): + + Macduff, this noble passion, + Child of integrity, hath from my soul + Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts + To thy good truth and honour. Devilish Macbeth + By many of these trains hath sought to win me + Into his power, and modest wisdom plucks me + From over-credulous haste: but God above + Deal between thee and me! for even now + I put myself to thy direction, and + Unspeak mine own detraction, here abjure + The taints and blames I laid upon myself, + For strangers to my nature. + +I pass to another point. In the last illustration the reader will +observe not only that 'overflows' abound, but that they follow one +another in an unbroken series of nine lines. So long a series could not, +probably, be found outside _Macbeth_ and the last plays. A series of two +or three is not uncommon; but a series of more than three is rare in the +early plays, and far from common in the plays of the second period +(Koenig). + +I thought it might be useful for our present purpose, to count the +series of four and upwards in the four tragedies, in the parts of +_Timon_ attributed by Mr. Fleay to Shakespeare, and in _Coriolanus_, a +play of the last period. I have not excluded rhymed lines in the two +places where they occur, and perhaps I may say that my idea of an +'overflow' is more exacting than Koenig's. The reader will understand the +following table at once if I say that, according to it, _Othello_ +contains three passages where a series of four successive overflowing +lines occurs, and two passages where a series of five such lines occurs: + +----------------------------------------------------------------- + 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 No. of Lines + (Fleay). +----------------------------------------------------------------- +Othello, 3 2 -- -- -- -- -- 2,758 +Hamlet, 7 -- -- -- -- -- -- 2,571 +Lear, 6 2 -- -- -- -- -- 2,312 +Timon, 7 2 1 1 -- -- -- 1,031 (?) +Macbeth, 7 5 1 1 -- 1 -- 1,706 +Coriolanus, 16 14 7 1 2 -- 1 2,563 +----------------------------------------------------------------- + +(The figures for _Macbeth_ and _Timon_ in the last column must be borne +in mind. I observed nothing in the non-Shakespeare part of _Timon_ that +would come into the table, but I did not make a careful search. I felt +some doubt as to two of the four series in _Othello_ and again in +_Hamlet_, and also whether the ten-series in _Coriolanus_ should not be +put in column 7). + +III. _The light and weak ending test._ + +We have just seen that in some cases a doubt is felt whether there is an +'overflow' or not. The fact is that the 'overflow' has many degrees of +intensity. If we take, for example, the passage last quoted, and if with +Koenig we consider the line + + The taints and blames I laid upon myself + +to be run-on (as I do not), we shall at least consider the overflow to +be much less distinct than those in the lines + + but God above + Deal between thee and me! for even now + I put myself to thy direction, and + Unspeak my own detraction, here abjure + +And of these four lines the third runs on into its successor at much the +greatest speed. + +'Above,' 'now,' 'abjure,' are not light or weak endings: 'and' is a weak +ending. Prof. Ingram gave the name weak ending to certain words on which +it is scarcely possible to dwell at all, and which, therefore, +precipitate the line which they close into the following. Light endings +are certain words which have the same effect in a slighter degree. For +example, _and_, _from_, _in_, _of_, are weak endings; _am_, _are_, _I_, +_he_, are light endings. + +The test founded on this distinction is, within its limits, the most +satisfactory of all, partly because the work of its author can be +absolutely trusted. The result of its application is briefly as follows. +Until quite a late date light and weak endings occur in Shakespeare's +works in such small numbers as hardly to be worth consideration.[289] +But in the well-defined group of last plays the numbers both of light +and of weak endings increase greatly, and, on the whole, the increase +apparently is progressive (I say apparently, because the order in which +the last plays are generally placed depends to some extent on the test +itself). I give Prof. Ingram's table of these plays, premising that in +_Pericles_, _Two Noble Kinsmen_, and _Henry VIII._ he uses only those +parts of the plays which are attributed by certain authorities to +Shakespeare (_New Shakspere Soc. Trans._, 1874). + +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + | Light | | Percentage | Percentage | Percentage + |endings.| Weak.| of light in | of weak in | of + | | | verse lines.| verse lines.| both. +------------------------------------------------------------------------ +Antony & | | | | | + Cleopatra, | 71 | 28 | 2.53 | 1. | 3.53 +Coriolanus, | 60 | 44 | 2.34 | 1.71 | 4.05 +Pericles, | 20 | 10 | 2.78 | 1.39 | 4.17 +Tempest, | 42 | 25 | 2.88 | 1.71 | 4.59 +Cymbeline, | 78 | 52 | 2.90 | 1.93 | 4.83 +Winter's Tale, | 57 | 43 | 3.12 | 2.36 | 5.48 +Two Noble | | | | | + Kinsmen, | 50 | 34 | 3.63 | 2.47 | 6.10 +Henry VIII., | 45 | 37 | 3.93 | 3.23 | 7.16 +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + +Now, let us turn to our four tragedies (with _Timon_). Here again we +have one doubtful play, and I give the figures for the whole of _Timon_, +and again for the parts of _Timon_ assigned to Shakespeare by Mr. Fleay, +both as they appear in his amended text and as they appear in the Globe +(perhaps the better text). + +----------------------------------------- + | Light. | Weak. +----------------------------------------- +Hamlet, | 8 | 0 +Othello, | 2 | 0 +Lear, | 5 | 1 +Timon (whole), | 16 | 5 + (Sh. in Fleay), | 14 | 7 + (Sh. in Globe), | 13 | 2 +Macbeth, | 21 | 2 +----------------------------------------- + +Now here the figures for the first three plays tell us practically +nothing. The tendency to a freer use of these endings is not visible. As +to _Timon_, the number of weak endings, I think, tells us little, for +probably only two or three are Shakespeare's; but the rise in the number +of light endings is so marked as to be significant. And most significant +is this rise in the case of _Macbeth_, which, like Shakespeare's part of +_Timon_, is much shorter than the preceding plays. It strongly confirms +the impression that in _Macbeth_ we have the transition to Shakespeare's +last style, and that the play is the latest of the five tragedies.[290] + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 282: The fact that _King Lear_ was performed at Court on +December 26, 1606, is of course very far from showing that it had never +been performed before.] + +[Footnote 283: I have not tried to discover the source of the difference +between these two reckonings.] + +[Footnote 284: _Der Vers in Shakspere's Dramen_, 1888.] + +[Footnote 285: In the parts of _Timon_ (Globe text) assigned by Mr. +Fleay to Shakespeare, I find the percentage to be about 74.5. Koenig +gives 62.8 as the percentage in the whole of the play.] + +[Footnote 286: I have noted also what must be a mistake in the case of +Pericles. Koenig gives 17.1 as the percentage of the speeches with broken +ends. I was astounded to see the figure, considering the style in the +undoubtedly Shakespearean parts; and I find that, on my method, in Acts +III., IV., V. the percentage is about 71, in the first two Acts (which +show very slight, if any, traces of Shakespeare's hand) about 19. I +cannot imagine the origin of the mistake here.] + +[Footnote 287: I put the matter thus, instead of saying that, with a +run-on line, one does pass to the next line without any pause, because, +in common with many others, I should not in any case whatever _wholly_ +ignore the fact that one line ends and another begins.] + +[Footnote 288: These overflows are what Koenig calls 'schroffe +Enjambements,' which he considers to correspond with Furnivall's 'run-on +lines.'] + +[Footnote 289: The number of light endings, however, in _Julius Caesar_ +(10) and _All's Well_ (12) is worth notice.] + +[Footnote 290: The Editors of the Cambridge Shakespeare might appeal in +support of their view, that parts of Act V. are not Shakespeare's, to +the fact that the last of the light endings occurs at IV. iii. 165.] + + + + +NOTE CC. + +WHEN WAS THE MURDER OF DUNCAN FIRST PLOTTED? + + +A good many readers probably think that, when Macbeth first met the +Witches, he was perfectly innocent; but a much larger number would say +that he had already harboured a vaguely guilty ambition, though he had +not faced the idea of murder. And I think there can be no doubt that +this is the obvious and natural interpretation of the scene. Only it is +almost necessary to go rather further, and to suppose that his guilty +ambition, whatever its precise form, was known to his wife and shared by +her. Otherwise, surely, she would not, on reading his letter, so +instantaneously assume that the King must be murdered in their castle; +nor would Macbeth, as soon as he meets her, be aware (as he evidently +is) that this thought is in her mind. + +But there is a famous passage in _Macbeth_ which, closely considered, +seems to require us to go further still, and to suppose that, at some +time before the action of the play begins, the husband and wife had +explicitly discussed the idea of murdering Duncan at some favourable +opportunity, and had agreed to execute this idea. Attention seems to +have been first drawn to this passage by Koester in vol. I. of the +_Jahrbuecher d. deutschen Shakespeare-gesellschaft_, and on it is based +the interpretation of the play in Werder's very able _Vorlesungen ueber +Macbeth_. + +The passage occurs in I. vii., where Lady Macbeth is urging her husband +to the deed: + + _Macb._ Prithee, peace: + I dare do all that may become a man; + Who dares do more is none. + + _Lady M._ What beast was't, then, + That made you break this enterprise to me? + When you durst do it, then you were a man; + And, to be more than what you were, you would + Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place + Did then adhere, and yet you would make both: + They have made themselves, and that their fitness now + Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know + How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me: + I would, while it was smiling in my face, + Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums, + And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you + Have done to this. + +Here Lady Macbeth asserts (1) that Macbeth proposed the murder to her: +(2) that he did so at a time when there was no opportunity to attack +Duncan, no 'adherence' of 'time' and 'place': (3) that he declared he +wou'd _make_ an opportunity, and swore to carry out the murder. + +Now it is possible that Macbeth's 'swearing' might have occurred in an +interview off the stage between scenes v. and vi., or scenes vi. and +vii.; and, if in that interview Lady Macbeth had with difficulty worked +her husband up to a resolution, her irritation at his relapse, in sc. +vii., would be very natural. But, as for Macbeth's first proposal of +murder, it certainly does not occur in our play, nor could it possibly +occur in any interview off the stage; for when Macbeth and his wife +first meet, 'time' and 'place' _do_ adhere; 'they have made themselves.' +The conclusion would seem to be, either that the proposal of the murder, +and probably the oath, occurred in a scene at the very beginning of the +play, which scene has been lost or cut out; or else that Macbeth +proposed, and swore to execute, the murder at some time prior to the +action of the play.[291] The first of these hypotheses is most +improbable, and we seem driven to adopt the second, unless we consent to +burden Shakespeare with a careless mistake in a very critical passage. + +And, apart from unwillingness to do this, we can find a good deal to say +in favour of the idea of a plan formed at a past time. It would explain +Macbeth's start of fear at the prophecy of the kingdom. It would explain +why Lady Macbeth, on receiving his letter, immediately resolves on +action; and why, on their meeting, each knows that murder is in the mind +of the other. And it is in harmony with her remarks on his probable +shrinking from the act, to which, _ex hypothesi_, she had already +thought it necessary to make him pledge himself by an oath. + +Yet I find it very difficult to believe in this interpretation. It is +not merely that the interest of Macbeth's struggle with himself and with +his wife would be seriously diminished if we felt he had been through +all this before. I think this would be so; but there are two more +important objections. In the first place the violent agitation described +in the words, + + If good, why do I yield to that suggestion + Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair + And make my seated heart knock at my ribs, + +would surely not be natural, even in Macbeth, if the idea of murder were +already quite familiar to him through conversation with his wife, and if +he had already done more than 'yield' to it. It is not as if the Witches +had told him that Duncan was coming to his house. In that case the +perception that the moment had come to execute a merely general design +might well appal him. But all that he hears is that he will one day be +King--a statement which, supposing this general design, would not point +to any immediate action.[292] And, in the second place, it is hard to +believe that, if Shakespeare really had imagined the murder planned and +sworn to before the action of the play, he would have written the first +six scenes in such a manner that practically all readers imagine quite +another state of affairs, and _continue to imagine it_ even after they +have read in scene vii. the passage which is troubling us. Is it likely, +to put it otherwise, that his idea was one which nobody seems to have +divined till late in the nineteenth century? And for what possible +reason could he refrain from making this idea clear to his audience, as +he might so easily have done in the third scene?[293] It seems very much +more likely that he himself imagined the matter as nearly all his +readers do. + +But, in that case, what are we to say of this passage? I will answer +first by explaining the way in which I understood it before I was aware +that it had caused so much difficulty. I supposed that an interview had +taken place after scene v., a scene which shows Macbeth shrinking, and +in which his last words were 'we will speak further.' In this interview, +I supposed, his wife had so wrought upon him that he had at last yielded +and pledged himself by oath to do the murder. As for her statement that +he had 'broken the enterprise' to her, I took it to refer to his letter +to her,--a letter written when time and place did not adhere, for he did +not yet know that Duncan was coming to visit him. In the letter he does +not, of course, openly 'break the enterprise' to her, and it is not +likely that he would do such a thing in a letter; but if they had had +ambitious conversations, in which each felt that some half-formed guilty +idea was floating in the mind of the other, she might naturally take the +words of the letter as indicating much more than they said; and then in +her passionate contempt at his hesitation, and her passionate eagerness +to overcome it, she might easily accuse him, doubtless with +exaggeration, and probably with conscious exaggeration, of having +actually proposed the murder. And Macbeth, knowing that when he wrote +the letter he really had been thinking of murder, and indifferent to +anything except the question whether murder should be done, would easily +let her statement pass unchallenged. + +This interpretation still seems to me not unnatural. The alternative +(unless we adopt the idea of an agreement prior to the action of the +play) is to suppose that Lady Macbeth refers throughout the passage to +some interview subsequent to her husband's return, and that, in making +her do so, Shakespeare simply forgot her speeches on welcoming Macbeth +home, and also forgot that at any such interview 'time' and 'place' did +'adhere.' It is easy to understand such forgetfulness in a spectator and +even in a reader; but it is less easy to imagine it in a poet whose +conception of the two characters throughout these scenes was evidently +so burningly vivid. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 291: The 'swearing' _might_ of course, on this view, occur off +the stage within the play; but there is no occasion to suppose this if +we are obliged to put the proposal outside the play.] + +[Footnote 292: To this it might be answered that the effect of the +prediction was to make him feel, 'Then I shall succeed if I carry out +the plan of murder,' and so make him yield to the idea over again. To +which I can only reply, anticipating the next argument, 'How is it that +Shakespeare wrote the speech in such a way that practically everybody +supposes the idea of murder to be occurring to Macbeth for the first +time?'] + +[Footnote 293: It might be answered here again that the actor, +instructed by Shakespeare, could act the start of fear so as to convey +quite clearly the idea of definite guilt. And this is true; but we ought +to do our best to interpret the text before we have recourse to this +kind of suggestion.] + + + + +NOTE DD. + +DID LADY MACBETH REALLY FAINT? + + +In the scene of confusion where the murder of Duncan is discovered, +Macbeth and Lennox return from the royal chamber; Lennox describes the +grooms who, as it seemed, had done the deed: + + Their hands and faces were all badged with blood; + So were their daggers, which unwiped we found + Upon their pillows: + They stared, and were distracted; no man's life + Was to be trusted with them. + + _Macb._ O, yet I do repent me of my fury + That I did kill them. + + _Macd._ Wherefore did you so? + + _Macb._ Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious, + Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man: + The expedition of my violent love + Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan, + His silver skin laced with his golden blood; + And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature + For ruin's wasteful entrance: there, the murderers, + Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers + Unmannerly breech'd with gore: who could refrain, + That had a heart to love, and in that heart + Courage to make's love known? + +At this point Lady Macbeth exclaims, 'Help me hence, ho!' Her husband +takes no notice, but Macduff calls out 'Look to the lady.' This, after a +few words 'aside' between Malcolm and Donalbain, is repeated by Banquo, +and, very shortly after, all except Duncan's sons _exeunt_. (The +stage-direction 'Lady Macbeth is carried out,' after Banquo's +exclamation 'Look to the lady,' is not in the Ff. and was introduced by +Rowe. If the Ff. are right, she can hardly have fainted _away_. But the +point has no importance here.) + +Does Lady Macbeth really turn faint, or does she pretend? The latter +seems to have been the general view, and Whately pointed out that +Macbeth's indifference betrays his consciousness that the faint was not +real. But to this it may be answered that, if he believed it to be real, +he would equally show indifference, in order to display his horror at +the murder. And Miss Helen Faucit and others have held that there was no +pretence. + +In favour of the pretence it may be said (1) that Lady Macbeth, who +herself took back the daggers, saw the old King in his blood, and +smeared the grooms, was not the woman to faint at a mere description; +(2) that she saw her husband over-acting his part, and saw the faces of +the lords, and wished to end the scene,--which she succeeded in doing. + +But to the last argument it may be replied that she would not willingly +have run the risk of leaving her husband to act his part alone. And for +other reasons (indicated above, p. 373 f.) I decidedly believe that she +is meant really to faint. She was no Goneril. She knew that she could +not kill the King herself; and she never expected to have to carry back +the daggers, see the bloody corpse, and smear the faces and hands of the +grooms. But Macbeth's agony greatly alarmed her, and she was driven to +the scene of horror to complete his task; and what an impression it made +on her we know from that sentence uttered in her sleep, 'Yet who would +have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?' She had now, +further, gone through the ordeal of the discovery. Is it not quite +natural that the reaction should come, and that it should come just when +Macbeth's description recalls the scene which had cost her the greatest +effort? Is it not likely, besides, that the expression on the faces of +the lords would force her to realise, what before the murder she had +refused to consider, the horror and the suspicion it must excite? It is +noticeable, also, that she is far from carrying out her intention of +bearing a part in making their 'griefs and clamours roar upon his death' +(I. vii. 78). She has left it all to her husband, and, after uttering +but two sentences, the second of which is answered very curtly by +Banquo, for some time (an interval of 33 lines) she has said nothing. I +believe Shakespeare means this interval to be occupied in desperate +efforts on her part to prevent herself from giving way, as she sees for +the first time something of the truth to which she was formerly so +blind, and which will destroy her in the end. + +It should be observed that at the close of the Banquet scene, where she +has gone through much less, she is evidently exhausted. + +Shakespeare, of course, knew whether he meant the faint to be real: but +I am not aware if an actor of the part could show the audience whether +it was real or pretended. If he could, he would doubtless receive +instructions from the author. + + + + +NOTE EE. + +DURATION OF THE ACTION IN _MACBETH_. MACBETH'S AGE. 'HE HAS NO +CHILDREN.' + + +1. The duration of the action cannot well be more than a few months. On +the day following the murder of Duncan his sons fly and Macbeth goes to +Scone to be invested (II. iv.). Between this scene and Act III. an +interval must be supposed, sufficient for news to arrive of Malcolm +being in England and Donalbain in Ireland, and for Banquo to have shown +himself a good counsellor. But the interval is evidently not long: +_e.g._ Banquo's first words are 'Thou hast it now' (III. i. 1). Banquo +is murdered on the day when he speaks these words. Macbeth's visit to +the Witches takes place the next day (III. iv. 132). At the end of this +visit (IV. i.) he hears of Macduff's flight to England, and determines +to have Macduff's wife and children slaughtered without delay; and this +is the subject of the next scene (IV. ii.). No great interval, then, can +be supposed between this scene and the next, where Macduff, arrived at +the English court, hears what has happened at his castle. At the end of +that scene (IV. iii. 237) Malcolm says that 'Macbeth is ripe for +shaking, and the powers above put on their instruments': and the events +of Act V. evidently follow with little delay, and occupy but a short +time. Holinshed's Macbeth appears to have reigned seventeen years: +Shakespeare's may perhaps be allowed as many weeks. + +But, naturally, Shakespeare creates some difficulties through wishing to +produce different impressions in different parts of the play. The main +effect is that of fiery speed, and it would be impossible to imagine the +torment of Macbeth's mind lasting through a number of years, even if +Shakespeare had been willing to allow him years of outward success. +Hence the brevity of the action. On the other hand time is wanted for +the degeneration of his character hinted at in IV. iii. 57 f., for the +development of his tyranny, for his attempts to entrap Malcolm (_ib._ +117 f.), and perhaps for the deepening of his feeling that his life had +passed into the sere and yellow leaf. Shakespeare, as we have seen, +scarcely provides time for all this, but at certain points he produces +an impression that a longer time has elapsed than he has provided for, +and he puts most of the indications of this longer time into a scene +(IV. iii.) which by its quietness contrasts strongly with almost all the +rest of the play. + +2. There is no unmistakable indication of the ages of the two principal +characters; but the question, though of no great importance, has an +interest. I believe most readers imagine Macbeth as a man between forty +and fifty, and his wife as younger but not young. In many cases this +impression is doubtless due to the custom of the theatre (which, if it +can be shown to go back far, should have much weight), but it is shared +by readers who have never seen the play performed, and is then +presumably due to a number of slight influences probably incapable of +complete analysis. Such readers would say, 'The hero and heroine do not +speak like young people, nor like old ones'; but, though I think this is +so, it can hardly be demonstrated. Perhaps however the following small +indications, mostly of a different kind, tend to the same result. + +(1) There is no positive sign of youth. (2) A young man would not be +likely to lead the army. (3) Macbeth is 'cousin' to an old man.[294] (4) +Macbeth calls Malcolm 'young,' and speaks of him scornfully as 'the boy +Malcolm.' He is probably therefore considerably his senior. But Malcolm +is evidently not really a boy (see I. ii. 3 f. as well as the later +Acts). (5) One gets the impression (possibly without reason) that +Macbeth and Banquo are of about the same age; and Banquo's son, the boy +Fleance, is evidently not a mere child. (On the other hand the children +of Macduff, who is clearly a good deal older than Malcolm, are all +young; and I do not think there is any sign that Macbeth is older than +Macduff.) (6) When Lady Macbeth, in the banquet scene, says, + + Sit, worthy friends: my lord is often thus, + And hath been from his youth, + +we naturally imagine him some way removed from his youth. (7) Lady +Macbeth saw a resemblance to her father in the aged king. (8) Macbeth +says, + + I have lived long enough: my way[295] of life + Is fall'n into the sere, the yellow leaf: + And that which should accompany old age, + As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, + I may not look to have. + +It is, surely, of the old age of the soul that he speaks in the second +line, but still the lines would hardly be spoken under any circumstances +by a man less than middle-aged. + +On the other hand I suppose no one ever imagined Macbeth, or on +consideration could imagine him, as _more_ than middle-aged when the +action begins. And in addition the reader may observe, if he finds it +necessary, that Macbeth looks forward to having children (I. vii. 72), +and that his terms of endearment ('dearest love,' 'dearest chuck') and +his language in public ('sweet remembrancer') do not suggest that his +wife and he are old; they even suggest that she at least is scarcely +middle-aged. But this discussion tends to grow ludicrous. + +For Shakespeare's audience these mysteries were revealed by a glance at +the actors, like the fact that Duncan was an old man, which the text, I +think, does not disclose till V. i. 44. + +3. Whether Macbeth had children or (as seems usually to be supposed) had +none, is quite immaterial. But it is material that, if he had none, he +looked forward to having one; for otherwise there would be no point in +the following words in his soliloquy about Banquo (III. i. 58 f.): + + Then prophet-like + They hail'd him father to a line of kings: + Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown, + And put a barren sceptre in my gripe, + Thence to be wrench'd with an unlineal hand, + No son of mine succeeding. If't be so, + For Banquo's issue have I filed my mind. + +And he is determined that it shall not 'be so': + + Rather than so, come, fate, into the list + And champion me to the utterance! + +Obviously he contemplates a son of his succeeding, if only he can get +rid of Banquo and Fleance. What he fears is that Banquo will kill him; +in which case, supposing he has a son, that son will not be allowed to +succeed him, and, supposing he has none, he will be unable to beget one. + +I hope this is clear; and nothing else matters. Lady Macbeth's child (I. +vii. 54) may be alive or may be dead. It may even be, or have been, her +child by a former husband; though, if Shakespeare had followed history +in making Macbeth marry a widow (as some writers gravely assume) he +would probably have told us so. It may be that Macbeth had many children +or that he had none. We cannot say, and it does not concern the play. +But the interpretation of a statement on which some critics build, 'He +has no children,' has an interest of another kind, and I proceed to +consider it. + +These words occur at IV. iii. 216. Malcolm and Macduff are talking at +the English Court, and Ross, arriving from Scotland, brings news to +Macduff of Macbeth's revenge on him. It is necessary to quote a good +many lines: + + _Ross._ Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes + Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, + Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer, + To add the death of you. + + _Mal._ Merciful heaven! + What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows; + Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak + Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break. + + _Macd._ My children too? + + _Ross._ Wife, children, servants, all + That could be found. + + _Macd._ And I must be from thence! + My wife kill'd too? + + _Ross._ I have said. + + _Mal._ Be comforted: + Let's makes us medicines of our great revenge, + To cure this deadly grief. + + _Macd._ He has no children. All my pretty ones? + Did you say all? O hell-kite! All? + What, all my pretty chickens and their dam + At one fell swoop? + + _Mal_. Dispute it like a man. + + _Macd._ I shall do so; + But I must also feel it as a man: + I cannot but remember such things were, + That were most precious to me.-- + +Three interpretations have been offered of the words 'He has no +children.' + +(_a_) They refer to Malcolm, who, if he had children of his own, would +not at such a moment suggest revenge, or talk of curing such a grief. +Cf. _King John_, III. iv. 91, where Pandulph says to Constance, + + You hold too heinous a respect of grief, + +and Constance answers, + + He talks to me that never had a son. + +(_b_) They refer to Macbeth, who has no children, and on whom therefore +Macduff cannot take an adequate revenge. + +(_c_) They refer to Macbeth, who, if he himself had children, could +never have ordered the slaughter of children. Cf. _3 Henry VI._ V. v. +63, where Margaret says to the murderers of Prince Edward, + + You have no children, butchers! if you had, + The thought of them would have stirred up remorse. + +I cannot think interpretation (_b_) the most natural. The whole idea of +the passage is that Macduff must feel _grief_ first and before he can +feel anything else, _e.g._ the desire for vengeance. As he says directly +after, he cannot at once 'dispute' it like a man, but must 'feel' it as +a man; and it is not till ten lines later that he is able to pass to the +thought of revenge. Macduff is not the man to conceive at any time the +idea of killing children in retaliation; and that he contemplates it +_here_, even as a suggestion, I find it hard to believe. + +For the same main reason interpretation (_a_) seems to me far more +probable than (_c_). What could be more consonant with the natural +course of the thought, as developed in the lines which follow, than that +Macduff, being told to think of revenge, not grief, should answer, 'No +one who was himself a father would ask that of me in the very first +moment of loss'? But the thought supposed by interpretation (_c_) has +not this natural connection. + +It has been objected to interpretation (_a_) that, according to it, +Macduff would naturally say 'You have no children,' not 'He has no +children.' But what Macduff does is precisely what Constance does in the +line quoted from _King John_. And it should be noted that, all through +the passage down to this point, and indeed in the fifteen lines which +precede our quotation, Macduff listens only to Ross. His questions 'My +children too?' 'My wife killed too?' show that he cannot fully realise +what he is told. When Malcolm interrupts, therefore, he puts aside his +suggestion with four words spoken to himself, or (less probably) to Ross +(his relative, who knew his wife and children), and continues his +agonised questions and exclamations. Surely it is not likely that at +that moment the idea of (_c_), an idea which there is nothing to +suggest, would occur to him. + +In favour of (_c_) as against (_a_) I see no argument except that the +words of Macduff almost repeat those of Margaret; and this fact does not +seem to me to have much weight. It shows only that Shakespeare might +easily use the words in the sense of (_c_) if that sense were suitable +to the occasion. It is not unlikely, again, I think, that the words came +to him here because he had used them many years before;[296] but it does +not follow that he knew he was repeating them; or that, if he did, he +remembered the sense they had previously borne; or that, if he did +remember it, he might not use them now in another sense. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote 294: So in Holinshed, as well as in the play, where however +'cousin' need not have its specific meaning.] + +[Footnote 295: 'May,' Johnson conjectured, without necessity.] + +[Footnote 296: As this point occurs here, I may observe that +Shakespeare's later tragedies contain many such reminiscences of the +tragic plays of his young days. For instance, cf. _Titus Andronicus_, I. +i. 150 f.: + + In peace and honour rest you here, my sons, + + * * * * * + + Secure from worldly chances and mishaps! + Here lurks no treason, here no envy swells, + Here grow no damned drugs: here are no storms, + No noise, but silence and eternal sleep, + +with _Macbeth_, III. ii. 22 f.: + + Duncan is in his grave; + After life's fitful fever he sleeps well; + Treason has done his worst: nor steel, nor poison, + Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing, + Can touch him further. + +In writing IV. i. Shakespeare can hardly have failed to remember the +conjuring of the Spirit, and the ambiguous oracles, in _2 Henry VI._ I. +iv. The 'Hyrcan tiger' of _Macbeth_ III. iv. 101, which is also alluded +to in _Hamlet_, appears first in _3 Henry VI._ I. iv. 155. Cf. _Richard +III._ II. i. 92, 'Nearer in bloody thoughts, but not in blood,' with +_Macbeth_ II. iii. 146, 'the near in blood, the nearer bloody'; _Richard +III._ IV. ii. 64, 'But I am in So far in blood that sin will pluck on +sin,' with _Macbeth_ III. iv. 136, 'I am in blood stepp'd in so far,' +etc. These are but a few instances. (It makes no difference whether +Shakespeare was author or reviser of _Titus_ and _Henry VI._).] + + + + +NOTE FF. + +THE GHOST OF BANQUO. + + +I do not think the suggestions that the Ghost on its first appearance is +Banquo's, and on its second Duncan's, or _vice versa_, are worth +discussion. But the question whether Shakespeare meant the Ghost to be +real or a mere hallucination, has some interest, and I have not seen it +fully examined. + +The following reasons may be given for the hallucination view: + +(1) We remember that Macbeth has already seen one hallucination, that of +the dagger; and if we failed to remember it Lady Macbeth would remind us +of it here: + + This is the very painting of your fear; + This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said, + Led you to Duncan. + +(2) The Ghost seems to be created by Macbeth's imagination; for his +words, + + now they rise again + With twenty mortal murders on their crowns, + +describe it, and they echo what the murderer had said to him a little +before, + + Safe in a ditch he bides + With twenty trenched gashes on his head. + +(3) It vanishes the second time on his making a violent effort and +asserting its unreality: + + Hence, horrible shadow! + Unreal mockery, hence! + +This is not quite so the first time, but then too its disappearance +follows on his defying it: + + Why what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too. + +So, apparently, the dagger vanishes when he exclaims, 'There's no such +thing!' + +(4) At the end of the scene Macbeth himself seems to regard it as an +illusion: + + My strange and self-abuse + Is the initiate fear that wants hard use. + +(5) It does not speak, like the Ghost in _Hamlet_ even on its last +appearance, and like the Ghost in _Julius Caesar_. + +(6) It is visible only to Macbeth. + +I should attach no weight to (6) taken alone (see p. 140). Of (3) it may +be remarked that Brutus himself seems to attribute the vanishing of +Caesar's Ghost to his taking courage: 'now I have taken heart thou +vanishest:' yet he certainly holds it to be real. It may also be +remarked on (5) that Caesar's Ghost says nothing that Brutus' own +forebodings might not have conjured up. And further it may be asked why, +if the Ghost of Banquo was meant for an illusion, it was represented on +the stage, as the stage-directions and Forman's account show it to have +been. + +On the whole, and with some doubt, I think that Shakespeare (1) meant +the judicious to take the Ghost for an hallucination, but (2) knew that +the bulk of the audience would take it for a reality. And I am more sure +of (2) than of (1). + + + + +INDEX + +The titles of plays are in italics. So are the numbers of the pages +containing the main discussion of a character. The titles of the Notes +are not repeated in the Index. + + +Aaron, 200, 211. + +Abnormal mental conditions, 13, 398. + +Accident, in tragedy, 7, 14-16, 26, 28; + in _Hamlet_, 143, 173; + in _Othello_, 181-2; + in _King Lear_, 253, 325. + +Act, difficulty in Fourth, 57-8; + the five Acts, 49. + +Action, tragic, 11, 12, 31; + and character, 12, 19; + a conflict, 16-19. + +Adversity and prosperity in _King Lear_, 326-7. + +Albany, _297-8_. + +Antonio, 110, 404. + +_Antony and Cleopatra_, 3, 7, 45, 80; + conflict, 17-8; + crisis, 53, 55, 66; + humour in catastrophe, 62, 395-6; + battle-scenes, 62-3; + extended catastrophe, 64; + faulty construction, 71, 260; + passion in, 82; + evil in, 83-4; + versification, 87, Note BB. + +Antony, 22, 29, 63, 83-4. + +_Arden of Feversham_, 9. + +Ariel, 264. + +Aristotle, 16, 22. + +Art, Shakespeare's, conscious, 68-9; + defects in, 71-78. + +Arthur, 294. + +_As You Like It_, 71, 267, 390. + +Atmosphere in tragedy, 333. + + +Banquo, 343, _379-86_. + +Barbara, the maid, 175. + +Battle-scene, 62, 451, 469; + in _King Lear_, 255, Note X. + +Beast and man, in _King Lear_, 266-8; + in _Timon_, 453. + +Bernhardt, Mme., 379. + +Biblical ideas, in _King Lear_, 328. + +Bombast, 73, 75-6, 389, Note F. + +Brandes, G., 379, 393. + +Brutus, 7, 14, 22, 27, 32, 81-2, 101, 364. + + +Caliban, 264. + +Cassio, 211-3, _238-9_, 433-4. + +Catastrophe, humour before, 61-2; + battle-scenes in, 62; + false hope before, 63; + extended, 62; + in _Antony_ and _Coriolanus_, 83-4. + See _Hamlet_, etc. + +Character, and plot, 12; + is destiny, 13; + tragic, 19-23. + +Chaucer, 8, 346. + +Children, in the plays, 293-5. + +Cleopatra, 7, 20, 84, 178, 208. + +Coleridge, 104-5, 107, 109, 127, 165, 200, 201, 209, 223, 226, 228, 249, + 343, 353, 362, 389, 391, 392, 397, 412, 413. + +Comedy, 15, 41. + +Conflict, tragic, 16-9; + originates in evil, 34; + oscillating movement in, 50; + crisis in, 51-5; + descending movement of, 55-62. + +Conscience. See Hamlet. + +Cordelia, 29, 32, 203-6, 250, 290, 314, _315-26_, Note W. + +_Coriolanus_, 3, 9, 43, 394-5; + crisis, 53; + hero off stage, 57; + counter-stroke, 58; + humour, 61; + passion, 82; + catastrophe, 83-4; + versification, Note BB. + +Coriolanus, 20, 29, 83-4, 196. + +Cornwall, 298-9. + +Crisis. See Conflict. + +Curtain, no front, in Shakespeare's theatre, 185, 458. + +_Cymbeline_, 7, 21, 72, 80, Note BB; + Queen in, 300. + + +Desdemona, 32, 165, 179, 193, 197, _201-6_, 323, 433, 437-9. + +Disillusionment, in tragedies, 175. + +Dog, the, Shakespeare and, 268. + +Don John, 110, 210. + +Double action in _King Lear_, 255-6, 262. + +Dowden, E., 82, 105, 330, 408. + +Dragging, 57-8, 64. + +Drunkenness, invective against, 238. + + +Edgar, _305-7_, 453, 465. + +Edmund, 210, 245, 253, _300-3_, Notes P, Q. + See Iago. + +Emilia, 214-6, 237, _239-42_, Note P. + +Emotional tension, variations of, 48-9. + +Evil, origin of conflict, 34; + negative, 35; + in earlier and later tragedies, 82-3; + poetic portrayal of, 207-8; + aspects of, specially impressive to Shakespeare, 232-3; + in _King Lear_, 298, 303-4, 327; + in _Tempest_, 328-30; + in _Macbeth_, 331, 386. + +Exposition, 41-7. + + +Fate, Fatality, 10, 26-30, 45, 59, 177, 181, 287, 340-6. + +Fleay, F.G., 419, 424, 445, 467, 479. + +Fool in _King Lear_, the, 258, _311-5_, 322, 447, Note V. + +Fools, Shakespeare's, 310. + +Forman, Dr., 468, 493. + +Fortinbras, 90. + +Fortune, 9, 10. + +Freytag, G., 40, 63. + +Furness, H.H., 199, 200. + + +Garnet and equivocation, 397, 470-1. + +Ghost, Banquo's, 332, 335, 338, 361, Note FF. + +Ghost, Caesar's, Note FF. + +Ghost in _Hamlet_, 97, 100, 118, 120, 125, 126, 134, 136, 138-40, + _173-4_. + +Ghosts, not hallucinations because appearing only to one in a company, + 140. + +Gloster, 272, _293-6_, 447. + +Gnomic speeches, 74, 453. + +Goethe, 101, 127, 165, 208. + +Goneril, 245, _299-300_, 331, 370, 447-8. + +Greek tragedy, 7, 16, 30, 33, 182, 276-9, 282. + +Greene, 409. + + +Hales, J.W., 397. + +_Hamlet_, exposition, 43-7; + conflict, 17, 47, 50-1; + crisis and counter-stroke, 52, 58-60, 136-7; + dragging, 57; + humour, and false hope, before catastrophe, 61, 63; + obscurities, 73; + undramatic passages, 72, 74; + place among tragedies, 80-8; + position of hero, 89-92; + not simply tragedy of thought, 82, 113, 127; + in the Romantic Revival, 92, 127-8; + lapse of time in, 129, 141; + accident, 15, 143, 173; + religious ideas, 144-5, 147-8, 172-4; + player's speech, 389-90, Note F; + grave-digger, 395-6; + last scene, 256. + See Notes A to H, and BB. + +Hamlet, only tragic character in play, 90; + contrasted with Laertes and Fortinbras, 90, 106; + failure of early criticism of, 91; + supposed unintelligible, 93-4; + external view, 94-7; + 'conscience' view, 97-101; + sentimental view, 101-4; + Schlegel-Coleridge view, 104-8, 116, 123, 126-7; + temperament, 109-10; + moral idealism, 110-3; + reflective genius, 113-5; + connection of this with inaction, 115-7; + origin of melancholy, 117-20; + its nature and effects, 120-7, 103, 158; + its diminution, 143-4; + his 'insanity,' 121-2, 421; + in Act II. 129-31, 155-6; + in III. i. 131-3, 157, 421; + in play-scene, 133-4; + spares King, 134-6, 100, 439; + with Queen, 136-8; + kills Polonius, 136-7, 104; + with Ghost, 138-40; + leaving Denmark, 140-1; + state after return, 143-5, 421; + in grave-yard, 145-6, 153, 158, 421-2; + in catastrophe, 102, 146-8, 151, 420-1; + and Ophelia, 103, 112, 119, 145-6, 152-9, 402, 420-1; + letter to Ophelia, 150, 403; + trick of repetition, 148-9; + word-play and humour, 149-52, 411; + aesthetic feeling, 133, 415; + and Iago, 208, 217, 222, 226; + other references, 9, 14, 20, 22, 28, 316, 353, Notes A to H. + +Hanmer, 91. + +Hazlitt, 209, 223, 228, 231, 243, 248. + +Hecate, 342, Note Z. + +Hegel, 16, 348. + +_2 Henry VI._, 492. + +_3 Henry VI._, 222, 418, 490, 492. + +_Henry VIII._, 80, 472, 479. + +Heredity, 30, 266, 303. + +Hero, tragic, 7; + of 'high degree,' 9-11; + contributes to catastrophe, 12; + nature of, 19-23, 37; + error of, 21, 34; + unlucky, 28; + place of, in construction, 53-55; + absence of, from stage, 57; + in earlier and later plays, 81-2, 176; + in _King Lear_, 280; + feeling at death of, 147-8, 174, 198, 324. + +Heywood, 140, 419. + +Historical tragedies, 3, 53, 71. + +Homer, 348. + +Horatio, 99, 112, 310, Notes A, B, C. + +Humour, constructional use of, 61; + Hamlet's, 149-52; + in _Othello_, 177; + in _Macbeth_, 395. + +Hunter, J., 199, 338. + + +Iachimo, 21, 210. + +Iago, and evil, 207, 232-3; + false views of, 208-11, 223-7; + danger of accepting his own evidence, 211-2, 222-5; + how he appeared to others, 213-5; + and to Emilia, 215-6, 439-40; + inferences hence, 217-8; + further analysis, 218-22; + source of his action, 222-31; + his tragedy, 218, 222, 232; + not merely evil, 233-5; + nor of supreme intellect, 236; + cause of failure, 236-7; + and Edmund, 245, 300-1, 464; + and Hamlet, 208, 217, 222, 226; + other references, 21, 28, 32, 192, 193, 196, 364, Notes L, M, P, Q. + +Improbability, not always a defect, 69; + in _King Lear_, 249, 256-7. + +Inconsistencies, 73; + real or supposed, in _Hamlet_, 408; + in _Othello_, Note I; + in _King Lear_, 256, Note T; + in _Macbeth_, Notes CC, EE. + +Ingram, Prof., 478. + +Insanity in tragedy, 13; + Ophelia's, 164-5, 399; + Lear's, 288-90. + +Intrigue in tragedy, 12, 67, 179. + +Irony, 182, 338. + +Isabella, 316, 317, 321. + + +Jameson, Mrs., 165, 204, 379. + +Jealousy in Othello, 178, 194, Note L. + +Job, 11. + +Johnson, 31, 91, 294, 298, 304, 377, 420. + +Jonson, 69, 282, 389. + +Juliet, 7, 204, 210. + +_Julius Caesar_, 3, 7, 9, 33, 34, 479; + conflict, 17-8; + exposition, 43-5; + crisis, 52; + dragging, 57; + counter-stroke, 58; + quarrel-scene, 60-1; + battle-scenes, 62; + and _Hamlet_, 80-2; + style, 85-6. + +Justice in tragedy, idea of, 31-33, 279, 318. + + +Kean, 99, 243-4. + +Kent, _307-10_, 314, 321, 447, Note W. + +King Claudius, 28, 102, 133, 137, 142, _168-72_, 402, 422. + +_King John_, 394, 490-1. + +_King Lear_, exposition, 44, 46-7; + conflict, 17, 53-4; + scenes of high and low tension, 49; + dragging, 57; + false hope before catastrophe, 63; + battle-scene, 62, 456-8; + soliloquy in, 72, 222; + place among tragedies, 82, 88, see Tate; + Tate's, 243-4; + two-fold character, 244-6; + not wholly dramatic, 247; + opening scene, 71, 249-51, 258, 319-21, 447; + blinding of Gloster, 185, 251; + catastrophe, 250-4, 271, 290-3, 309, 322-6; + structural defects, 254-6; + improbabilities, etc., 256-8; + vagueness of locality, 259-60; + poetic value of defects, 261; + double action, 262; + characterisation, 263; + tendency to symbolism, 264-5; + idea of monstrosity, 265-6; + beast and man, 266-8; + storm-scenes, 269-70, 286-7, 315; + question of government of world, in, 271-3; + supposed pessimism, 273-9, 284-5, 303-4, 322-30; + accident and fatality, 15, 250-4, 287-8; + intrigue in, 179; + evil in, 298, 303-4; + preaching patience, 330; + and _Othello_, 176-7, 179, 181, 244-5, 441-3; + and _Timon_, 245-7, 310, 326-7, 443-5; + other references, 8, 10, 61, 181, Notes R to Y, and BB. + +Koenig, G., Note BB. + +Koppel, R., 306, 450, 453, 462. + + +Laertes, 90, 111, 142, 422. + +Lamb, 202, 243, 248, 253, 255, 269, 343. + +Language, Shakespeare's, defects of, 73, 75, 416. + +Lear, 13, 14, 20, 28, 29, 32, 249-51, _280-93_, 293-5, Note W. + +Leontes, 21, 194. + + +_Macbeth_, exposition, 43, 45-6; + conflict, 17-9, 48, 52; + crisis, 59, 60; + pathos and humour, 61, 391, 395-7; + battle-scenes, 62; + extended catastrophe, 64; + defects in construction, 57, 71; + place among tragedies, 82, 87-8, Note BB; + religious ideas, 172-4; + atmosphere of, 333; + effects of darkness, 333-4, + colour, 334-6, + storm, 336-7, + supernatural, etc., 337-8, + irony, 338-40; + Witches, 340-9, 362, 379-86; + imagery, 336, 357; + minor characters, 387; + simplicity, 388; + Senecan effect, 389-90; + bombast, 389, 417; + prose, 388, 397-400; + relief-scenes, 391; + sleep-walking scene, 378, 398, 400; + references to Gunpowder Plot, 397, 470-1; + all genuine? 388, 391, 395-7, Note Z; + and _Hamlet_, 331-2; + and _Richard III._, 338, 390, 395, 492; + other references, 7, 8, 386, and Notes Z to FF. + +Macbeth, 13, 14, 20, 22, 28, 32, 63, 172, 343-5, _349-65_, 380, 383, + 386, Notes CC, EE. + +Macbeth, Lady, 13, 28, 32, 349-50, 358, 364, _366-79_, 398-400, Notes + CC, DD. + +Macduff, 387, 391-2, 490-1. + +Macduff, Lady, 61, 387, 391-2. + +Macduff, little, 393-5. + +Mackenzie, 91. + +Marlowe, 211, 415-6. + +Marston's possible reminiscences of Shakespeare's plays, 471-2. + +_Measure for Measure_, 76, 78, 275, 397. + +Mediaeval idea of tragedy, 8, 9. + +Melancholy, Shakespeare's representations of, 110, 121. + See Hamlet. + +Mephistopheles, 208. + +_Merchant of Venice_, 21, 200. + +Metrical tests, Notes S, BB. + +Middleton, 466. + +_Midsummer Night's Dream_, 390, 469. + +Milton, 207, 362, 418. + +Monstrosity, idea of, in _King Lear_, 265-6. + +Moral order in tragedy, idea of, 26, 31-9. + +Moulton, R.G., 40. + + +Negro? Othello a, 198-202. + + +Opening scene in tragedy, 43-4. + +Ophelia, 14, 61, 112, _160-5_, 204, 399. + See Hamlet. + +Oswald, 298, 448. + +_Othello_, exposition, 44-5; + conflict, 17, 18, 48; + peculiar construction, 54-5, 64-7, 177; + inconsistencies, 73; + place among tragedies, 82, 83, 88; + and _Hamlet_, 175-6; + and _King Lear_, 176-7, 179, 181, 244-5, 441-3; + distinctive effect, and its causes, 176-80; + accident in, 15, 181-2; + objections to, considered, 183-5; + point of inferiority to other three tragedies, 185-6; + elements of reconciliation in catastrophe, 198, 242; + other references, 9, 61, Notes I to R, and BB. + +Othello, 9, 20, 21, 22, 28, 29, 32, 176, 178, 179, _186-98_, 198-202, + 211, 212, Notes K to O. + + +Pathos, and tragedy, 14, 103, 160, 203, 281-2; + constructional use of, 60-1. + +Peele, 200. + +_Pericles_, 474. + +Period, Shakespeare's tragic, 79-89, 275-6. + +Pessimism, supposed, in _King Lear_, 275-9, 327; + in _Macbeth_, 359, 393. + +Plays, Shakespeare's, list of, in periods, 79. + +Plot, 12. + See Action, Intrigue. + +'Poetic justice,' 31-2. + +Poor, goodness of the, in _King Lear_ and _Timon_, 326. + +Posthumus, 21. + +Problems, probably non-existent for original audience, 73, 157, 159, + 315, 393, 483, 486, 488. + +Prose, in the tragedies, 388, 397-400. + + +Queen Gertrude, 104, 118, 134, 136-8, 161, 164, _166-8_. + + +Reconciliation, feeling of, in tragedy, 31, 36, 84, 147-8, 174, 198, + 242, 322-6. + +Regan, _299-300_. + +Religion, in Edgar, 306, + Horatio, 310, + Banquo, 387. + +_Richard II._, 3, 10, 17, 18, 42. + +Richard II., 20, 22, 150, 152. + +_Richard III._, 3, 18, 42, 62, 82; + and _Macbeth_, 338, 390, 395, 492. + +Richard III., 14, 20, 22, 32, 63, 152, 207, 210, 217, 218, 233, 301. + +_Romeo and Juliet_, 3, 7, 9, 15; + conflict, 17, 18, 34; + exposition, 41-5; + crisis, 52; + counter-stroke, 58. + +Romeo, 22, 29, 150, 210. + +Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, 137, 405-6. + +Rules of drama, Shakespeare's supposed ignorance of, 69. + + +Salvini, 434. + +Satan, Milton's, 207, 362. + +Scenery, no, in Shakespeare's theatre, 49, 71, 451. + +Scenes, their number, length, tone, 49; + wrong divisions of, 451. + +Schlegel, 82, 104, 105, 116, 123, 127, 254, 262, 344, 345, 413. + +Scot on Witch-craft, 341. + +Seneca, 389-90. + +Shakespeare the man, 6, 81, 83, 185-6, 246, 275-6, 282, 285, 327-30, + 359, 393, 414-5. + +Shylock, 21. + +Siddons, Mrs., 371, 379. + +Soliloquy, 72; + of villains, 222; + scenes ending with, 451. + +Sonnets, Shakespeare's, 264, 364. + +Spedding, J., 255, 476, Note X. + +Stage-directions, wrong modern, 260, 285, 422, 453-6, 462. + +Style in the tragedies, 85-9, 332, 336, 357. + +Suffering, tragic, 7, 8, 11. + +Supernatural, the, in tragedy, 14, 181, 295-6, 331-2. + See Ghost, Witch. + +Swinburne, A.C., 80, 179, 191, 209, 218, 223, 228, 231, 276-8, 431. + +Symonds, J.A., 10. + + +Tate's version of _King Lear_, 243, 251-3, 313. + +Temperament, 110, 282, 306. + +_Tempest_, 42, 80, 185, 264, 328-30, 469; Note BB. + +Theological ideas in tragedy, 25, 144, 147, 279; + in _Hamlet_ and _Macbeth_, 171-4, 439; + not in _Othello_, 181, 439; + in _King Lear_, 271-3, 296. + +Time, short and long, theory of, 426-7. + +_Timon of Athens_, 4, 9, 81-3, 88, 245-7, 266, 270, 275, 310, 326-7, + 443-5, 460; Note BB. + +Timon, 9, 82, 112. + +_Titus Andronicus_, 4, 200, 211, 411, 491. + +Tourgenief, 11, 295. + +Toussaint, 198. + +Tragedy, Shakespearean; parts, 41, 51; + earlier and later, 18, 176; + pure and historical, 3, 71. + See Accident, Action, Hero, Period, Reconciliation, etc. + +Transmigration of souls, 267. + +_Troilus and Cressida_, 7, 185-6, 268, 275-6, 302, 417, 419. + +_Twelfth Night_, 70, 267. + +_Two Noble Kinsmen_, 418, 472, 479. + + +Ultimate power in tragedy, 24-39, 171-4, 271-9. + See Fate, Moral Order, Reconciliation, Theological. + +Undramatic speeches, 74, 106. + + +Versification. See Style and Metrical tests. + +Virgilia, 387. + + +Waste, tragic, 23, 37. + +Werder, K., 94, 172, 480. + +_Winter's Tale_, 21, Note BB. + +Witches, the, and Macbeth, _340-9_, 362; + and Banquo, 379-87. + +Wittenberg, Hamlet at, 403-6. + +Wordsworth, 30, 198. + + +_Yorkshire Tragedy_, 10. + + +GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. +LTD. + + + + +_8vo. 12s. 6d. net._ + +Oxford Lectures on Poetry + +BY + +A.C. BRADLEY, LL.D., Litt.D. + +_ATHENAEUM._--"A remarkable achievement.... It is probable that this +volume will attain a permanence for which critical literature generally +cannot hope. Very many of the things that are said here are finally +said; they exhaust their subject. Of one thing we are certain--that +there is no work in English devoted to the interpretation of poetic +experience which can claim the delicacy and sureness of Mr. Bradley's." + +_SPECTATOR._--"In reviewing Professor Bradley's previous book on +_Shakespearean Tragedy_ we declared our opinion that it was probably the +best Shakespearean criticism since Coleridge. The new volume shows the +same complete sanity of judgment, the same subtlety, the same persuasive +and eloquent exposition." + +_TIMES._--"Nothing higher need be said of the present volume than it is +not unworthy to be the sequel to _Shakespearean Tragedy_." + +_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"This is not a book to be written about in a hasty +review of a thousand words. It is one to be perused and appreciated at +leisure--to be returned to again and again, partly because of its +supreme interest, partly because it provokes, as all good books should +do, a certain antagonism, partly because it is itself the product of a +careful, scholarly mind, basing conclusions on a scrupulous perusal of +documents and authorities.... The whole book is so full of good things +that it is impossible to make any adequate selection. In an age which is +not supposed to be very much interested in literary criticism, a book +like Mr. Bradley's is of no little significance and importance." + +_SATURDAY REVIEW._--"The writer of these admirable lectures may claim +what is rare even in this age of criticism--a note of his own. In type +he belongs to those critics of the best order, whose view of literature +is part and parcel of their view of life. His lectures on poetry are +therefore what they profess to be: not scraps of textual comment, nor +studies in the craft of verse-making, but broad considerations of poetry +as a mode of spiritual revelation. An accomplished style and signs of +careful reading we may justly demand from any professor who sets out to +lecture in literature. Mr. Bradley has them in full measure. But he has +also not a little of that priceless quality so seldom found in the +professional or professorial critic--the capacity of naive vision and +admiration. Here he is in a line with the really stimulating essayists, +the artists in criticism." + +MACMILLAN AND CO. LTD., LONDON. + + +_Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 5s. 6d. net._ + +A Commentary on Tennyson's 'In Memoriam' + +BY + +A.C. BRADLEY, LL.D., Litt.D. + +_THE SATURDAY REVIEW._--"Here we find a model of what a commentary on a +great work should be, every page instinct with thoughtfulness; complete +sympathy and appreciation; the most reverent care shown in the attempted +interpretation of passages whose meaning to a large degree evades, and +will always evade, readers of 'In Memoriam.' It is clear to us that Mr. +Bradley has devoted long time and thought to his work, and that he has +published the result of his labours simply to help those who, like +himself, have been and are in difficulties as to the drift of various +passages. He is not of course the first who has addressed himself to the +interpretation of 'In Memoriam'--in this spirit ... but Mr. Bradley's +commentary is sure to take rank as the most searching and scholarly of +any." + +_THE PILOT._--"In re-studying 'In Memoriam' with Dr. Bradley's aid, we +have found his interpretation helpful in numerous passages. The notes +are prefaced by a long introduction dealing with the origin, +composition, and structure of the poem, the ideas used in it, the metre +and the debt to other poems. All of these are good, but more interesting +than any of them is a section entitled, 'The Way of the Soul,' reviewing +the spiritual experience which 'In Memoriam' records. This is quite +admirable throughout, and proves conclusively that Dr. Bradley's keen +desire to fathom the exact meaning of every phrase has only quickened +his appreciation of the poem as a whole." + +MACMILLAN AND CO. LTD., LONDON. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Shakespearean Tragedy, by A. C. Bradley + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY *** + +***** This file should be named 16966.txt or 16966.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/9/6/16966/ + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Lisa Reigel and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. |