Chapter XI: Introduction: To the Propylæa (5)

“Among these external relations I include the disturbances in Norway, the war with young Fortinbras, the embassy to his uncle, the settling of that feud, the march of young Fortinbras to Poland, and his coming back at the end; of the same sort are Horatio’s return from Wittenberg, Hamlet’s wish to go thither, the journey of Laertes to France, his return, the despatch of Hamlet into England, his capture by pirates, the death of the two courtiers by the letter which they carried. All these circumstances and events would be very fit for expanding and lengthening a novel; but here they injure exceedingly the unity of the piece, particularly as the hero has no plan, and are, in consequence, entirely out of place.”

“For once in the right!” cried Serlo.

“Do not interrupt me,” answered Wilhelm; “perhaps you will not always think me right. These errors are like temporary props of an edifice: they must not be removed till we have built a firm wall in their stead. My project, therefore, is not at all to change those first-mentioned grand situations, or at least as much as possible to spare them, both collectively and individually; but with respect to these external, single, dissipated, and dissipating motives, to cast them all at once away, and substitute a solitary one instead of them.”

“And this?” inquired Serlo, springing up from his recumbent posture.

“It lies in the piece itself,” answered Wilhelm, “only I employ it rightly. There are disturbances in Norway. You shall hear my plan, and try it.

“After the death of Hamlet’s father, the Norwegians, lately conquered, grow unruly. The viceroy of that country sends his son, Horatio, an old school-friend of Hamlet’s, and distinguished above every other for his bravery and prudence, to Denmark, to press forward the equipment of the fleet, which, under the new luxurious king, proceeds but slowly. Horatio has known the former king, having fought in his battles, having even stood in favor with him,--a circumstance by which the first ghost-scene will be nothing injured. The new sovereign gives Horatio audience and sends Laertes into Norway with intelligence that the fleet will soon arrive; whilst Horatio is commissioned to accelerate the preparation of it: and the Queen, on the other hand, will not consent that Hamlet, as he wishes, should go to sea along with him.”

“Heaven be praised!” cried Serlo; “we shall now get rid of Wittenberg and the university, which was always a sorry piece of business. I think your idea extremely good; for, except these two distant objects, Norway and the fleet, the spectator will not be required to _fancy_ anything: the rest he will _see_; the rest takes place before him; whereas his imagination, on the other plan, was hunted over all the world.”

“You easily perceive,” said Wilhelm, “how I shall contrive to keep the other parts together. When Hamlet tells Horatio of his uncle’s crime, Horatio counsels him to go to Norway in his company, to secure the affections of the army, and return in warlike force. Hamlet also is becoming dangerous to the King and Queen; they find no readier method of deliverance than to send him in the fleet, with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to be spies upon him; and, as Laertes in the meantime comes from France, they determine that this youth, exasperated even to murder, shall go after him. Unfavorable winds detain the fleet: Hamlet returns; for his wandering through the churchyard, perhaps some lucky motive may be thought of; his meeting with Laertes in Ophelia’s grave is a grand moment, which we must not part with. After this, the King resolves that it is better to get quit of Hamlet on the spot: the festival of his departure, the pretended reconcilement with Laertes, are now solemnized; on which occasion knightly sports are held, and Laertes fights with Hamlet. Without the four corpses, I cannot end the play: no one must survive. The right of popular election now again comes in force; and Hamlet, while dying, gives his vote to Horatio.”

“Quick! quick!” said Serlo, “sit down and work the play: your plan has my entire approbation; only let not your zeal evaporate.”

* * * * *

Wilhelm had already been for some time busied with translating _Hamlet_; making use, as he labored, of Wieland’s spirited performance, through which he had first become acquainted with Shakespeare. What had been omitted in Wieland’s work he replaced, and had secured a complete version, at the very time when Serlo and he were pretty well agreed about the way of treating it. He now began, according to his plan, to cut out and insert, to separate and unite, to alter, and often to restore; for, satisfied as he was with his own conception, it still appeared to him as if, in executing it, he were but spoiling the original.

When all was finished, he read his work to Serlo and the rest. They declared themselves exceedingly contented with it: Serlo, in particular, made many flattering observations.

“You have felt very justly,” said he, among other things, “that some external circumstances must accompany this play, but that they must be simpler than those which the great poet has employed. What takes place without the theatre, what the spectator does not see but must imagine, is like a background, in front of which the acting figures move. Your large and simple prospect of the fleet and Norway will do much to improve the play: if this were altogether taken from it, we should have but a family scene remaining; and the great idea that here a kingly house, by internal crimes and incongruities, goes down to ruin, would not be presented with its proper dignity. But if the former background were left standing, so manifold, so fluctuating and confused, it would hurt the impression of the figures.”

Wilhelm again took Shakespeare’s part; alleging that he wrote for islanders, for Englishmen, who generally in the distance were accustomed to see little else than ships and voyages, the coast of France and privateers; and thus what perplexed and distracted others was to them quite natural.

Serlo assented; and both were of opinion that, as the play was now to be produced upon the German stage, this more serious and simple background was the best adapted for the German mind.

The parts had been distributed before: Serlo undertook Polonius; Aurelia, Ophelia; Laertes was already designated by his name; a young, thick-set, jolly newcomer was to be Horatio; the King and Ghost alone occasioned some perplexity, for both of these no one but Old Boisterous remaining. Serlo proposed to make the Pedant, King; but against this our friend protested in the strongest terms. They could resolve on nothing.

Wilhelm had also allowed both Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to continue in his play. “Why not compress them into one?” said Serlo. “This abbreviation will not cost you much.”

“Heaven keep me from all such curtailments!” answered Wilhelm; “they destroy at once the sense and the effect. What these two persons are and do it is impossible to represent by one. In such small matters we discover Shakespeare’s greatness. These soft approaches, this smirking and bowing, this assenting, wheedling, flattering, this whisking agility, this wagging of the tail, this allness and emptiness, this legal knavery, this ineptitude and insipidity,--how can they be expressed by a single man? There ought to be at least a dozen of these people, if they could be had; for it is only in society that they are anything; they are society itself; and Shakespeare showed no little wisdom and discernment in bringing in a pair of them. Besides, I need them as a couple that may be contrasted with the single, noble, excellent Horatio....”

* * * * *

Though in this remolding of _Hamlet_ many characters had been cut off, a sufficient number of them still remained,--a number which the company was scarcely adequate to meet.

“If this is the way of it,” said Serlo, “our prompter himself must issue from his den, and mount the stage, and become a personage like one of us....”

* * * * *

“The very man!” exclaimed our friend, “the very man! What a fortunate discovery! We have now the proper hand for delivering the passage of ‘The rugged Pyrrhus.’”

“One requires your eagerness,” said Serlo, “before he can employ every object in the use it was meant for.”

“In truth,” said Wilhelm, “I was very much afraid we should be obliged to leave this passage out: the omission would have lamed the whole play.”

“Well! That is what I cannot understand,” observed Aurelia.

“I hope you will erelong be of my opinion,” answered Wilhelm. “Shakespeare has introduced these traveling players with a double purpose. The person who recites the death of Priam with such feeling, in the _first_ place, makes a deep impression on the prince himself; he sharpens the conscience of the wavering youth: and, accordingly, this scene becomes a prelude to that other, where, in the _second_ place, the little play produces such effect upon the King. Hamlet sees himself reproved and put to shame by the player, who feels so deep a sympathy in foreign and fictitious woes; and the thought of making an experiment upon the conscience of his stepfather is in consequence suggested to him. What a royal monologue is that which ends the second act! How charming it will be to speak it!”

“‘Oh, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
That, from her working, all his visage wann’d;
Tears in his eyes, distraction in’s aspect,
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing!
For Hecuba!
What’s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her?’” ...

In particular, one evening, the manager was very merry in speaking of the part of Polonius, and how he meant to take it up. “I engage,” said he, “on this occasion, to present a very meritorious person in his best aspect. The repose and security of this old gentleman, his emptiness and his significance, his exterior gracefulness and interior meanness, his frankness and sycophancy, his sincere roguery and deceitful truth, I will introduce with all due elegance in their fit proportions. This respectable, gray-haired, enduring, time-serving half-knave, I will represent in the most courtly style: the occasional roughness and coarseness of our author’s strokes will further me here. I will speak like a book when I am prepared beforehand, and like an ass when I utter the overflowings of my heart. I will be insipid and absurd enough to chime in with every one, and acute enough never to observe when people make a mock of me. I have seldom taken up a part with so much zeal and roguishness.”

“Could I but hope as much from mine!” exclaimed Aurelia. “I have neither youth nor softness enough to be at home in this character. One thing alone I am too sure of,--the feeling that turns Ophelia’s brain, I shall not want.”

“We must not take the matter up so strictly,” said our friend. “For my share, I am certain that the wish to act the character of Hamlet has led me exceedingly astray throughout my study of the play. And now, the more I look into the part, the more clearly do I see that, in my whole form and physiognomy, there is not one feature such as Shakespeare meant for Hamlet. When I consider with what nicety the various circumstances are adapted to each other, I can scarcely hope to produce even a tolerable effect.”

“You are entering on your new career with becoming conscientiousness,” said Serlo. “The actor fits himself to his part as he can, and the part to him as it must. But how has Shakespeare drawn his Hamlet? Is he so utterly unlike you?”

“In the first place,” answered Wilhelm, “he is fair-haired.”

“That I call far-fetched,” observed Aurelia. “How do you infer that?”

“As a Dane, as a Northman, he is fair-haired and blue-eyed by descent.”

“And you think Shakespeare had this in view?”

“I do not find it specially expressed; but, by comparison of passages, I think it incontestable. The fencing tires him; the sweat is running from his brow; and the Queen remarks, ‘_He’s fat, and scant of breath._’ Can you conceive him to be otherwise than plump and fair-haired? Brown-complexioned people, in their youth, are seldom plump. And does not his wavering melancholy, his soft lamenting, his irresolute activity, accord with such a figure? From a dark-haired young man, you would look for more decision and impetuosity.”

“You are spoiling my imagination,” cried Aurelia; “away with your fat Hamlets! Do not set your well-fed prince before us! Give us rather any _succedancum_ that will move us, will delight us. The intention of the author is of less importance to us than our own enjoyment, and we need a charm that is adapted for us.”

* * * * *

One evening a dispute arose among our friends about the novel and the drama, and which of them deserved the preference. Serlo said it was a fruitless and misunderstood debate: both might be superior in their kinds, only each must keep within the limits proper to it.

“About their limits and their kinds,” said Wilhelm, “I confess myself not altogether clear.”

“Who _is_ so?” said the other; “and yet perhaps it were worth while to come a little closer to the business.”

They conversed together long upon the matter; and, in fine, the following was nearly the result of their discussion:--

“In the novel as well as in the drama, it is human nature and human action that we see. The difference between these sorts of fiction lies not merely in their outward form,--not merely in the circumstance that the personages of the one are made to speak, while those of the other have commonly their history narrated. Unfortunately many dramas are but novels which proceed by dialogue; and it would not be impossible to write a drama in the shape of letters.

“But, in the novel, it is chiefly _sentiments_ and _events_ that are exhibited; in the drama, it is _characters_ and _deeds_. The novel must go slowly forward; and the sentiments of the hero, by some means or another, must restrain the tendency of the whole to unfold itself and to conclude. The drama, on the other hand, must hasten; and the character of the hero must press forward to the end: it does not restrain, but is restrained. The novel-hero must be suffering,--at least he must not in a high degree be active; in the dramatic one, we look for activity and deeds. Grandison, Clarissa, Pamela, the Vicar of Wakefield, Tom Jones himself, are, if not suffering, at least retarding, personages; and the incidents are all in some sort modeled by their sentiments. In the drama the hero models nothing by himself; all things withstand him; and he clears and casts away the hindrances from off his path, or else sinks under them.”

Our friends were also of opinion that, in the novel, some degree of scope may be allowed to Chance, but that it must always be led and guided by the sentiments of the personages; on the other hand, that Fate, which, by means of outward, unconnected circumstances, proceeds to an unforeseen catastrophe, can have place only in the drama; that Chance may produce pathetic situations, but never tragic ones; Fate, on the other hand, ought always to be terrible,--and is, in the highest sense, tragic, when it brings into a ruinous concatenation the guilty man and the guiltless that was unconcerned with him.

These considerations led them back to the play of _Hamlet_, and the peculiarities of its composition. The hero in this case, it was observed, is endowed more properly with sentiments than with a character: it is events alone that push him on, and accordingly the play has in some measure the expansion of a novel. But as it is Fate that draws the plan, as the story issues from a deed of terror, the work is tragic in the highest sense, and admits of no other than a tragic end....

* * * * *

The necessary preparations for scenery and dresses, and whatever else was requisite, were now proceeding. In regard to certain scenes and passages, our friend had whims of his own, which Serlo humored, partly in consideration of their bargain, partly from conviction, and because he hoped by these civilities to gain Wilhelm, and to lead him according to his own purposes the more implicitly in time to come.

Thus, for example, the King and Queen were, at the first audience, to appear sitting on the throne, with the courtiers at the sides, and Hamlet standing undistinguished in the crowd. “Hamlet,” said he, “must keep himself quiet; his sable dress will sufficiently point him out. He should rather shun remark than seek it. Not till the audience is ended, and the King speaks with him as with a son, should he advance, and allow the scene to take its course.”

A formidable obstacle remained, in regard to the two pictures which Hamlet so passionately refers to in the scene with his mother. “We ought,” said Wilhelm, “to have both of them visible, at full length, in the bottom of the chamber, near the main door; and the former king must be clad in armor, like the Ghost, and hang at the side where it enters. I could wish that the figure held its right hand in a commanding attitude, were somewhat turned away, and, as it were, looked over its shoulder, that so it might perfectly resemble the Ghost at the moment when he issues from the door. It will produce a great effect when at this instant Hamlet looks upon the Ghost, and the Queen upon the picture. The stepfather may be painted in royal ornaments, but not so striking.”

There were several other points of this sort, about which we shall, perhaps, elsewhere have opportunity to speak.

“Are you, then, inexorably bent on Hamlet’s dying at the end?” inquired Serlo.

“How can I keep him alive,” said Wilhelm, “when the whole play is pressing him to death? We have already talked at large on that matter.”

“But the public wishes him to live.”

“I will show the public any other complaisance; but, as to this, I cannot. We often wish that some gallant, useful man, who is dying of a chronic disease, might yet live longer. The family weep, and conjure the physician; but he cannot stay him: and no more than this physician can withstand the necessity of nature, can we give law to an acknowledged necessity of art. It is a false compliance with the multitude, to raise in them emotions which they _wish_, when these are not emotions which they _ought_, to feel.”

“Whoever pays the cash,” said Serlo, “may require the ware according to his liking.”

“Doubtless, in some degree,” replied our friend; “but a great public should be reverenced, not used as children are when peddlers wish to hook the money from them. By presenting excellence to the people, you should gradually excite in them a taste and feeling for the excellent; and they will pay their money with double satisfaction when reason itself has nothing to object against this outlay. The public you may flatter, as you do a well-beloved child, to better, to enlighten it; not as you do a pampered child of quality, to perpetuate the error you profit from.”

In this manner various other topics were discussed relating to the question, What might still be changed in the play, and what must of necessity remain untouched? We shall not enter farther on those points at present; but, perhaps, at some future time we may submit this altered _Hamlet_ itself to such of our readers as feel any interest in the subject.

SHAKESPEARE AD INFINITUM

(1813-16)

There has already been so much said about Shakespeare that it would seem as if there was nothing left to say; and yet it is the characteristic of genius ever to be stimulating other men’s genius. In the present case I wish to consider Shakespeare from more than one point of view,--first as a poet in general, then in comparison with the classic and modern writers, and finally as a writer of poetic drama. I shall attempt to work out what the imitation of his art has meant to us, and what it can mean in the future. I shall express my agreement with what has been written by reiterating it, and express my dissent briefly and positively, without involving myself in conflict and contradiction. I proceed to the first topic.

_I. Shakespeare as Poet in General_

The highest achievement possible to a man is the full consciousness of his own feelings and thoughts, for this gives him the means of knowing intimately the hearts of others. Now there are men who are born with a natural talent for this and who cultivate it by experience towards practical ends. From this talent springs the ability to profit in a higher sense by the world and its opportunities. Now the poet is born with the same talent, only he cultivates it not for his immediate worldly purposes but for a loftier spiritual and universal purpose. If we call Shakespeare one of the greatest poets, we mean that few have perceived the world as accurately as he, that few who have expressed their inner contemplation of it have given the reader deeper insight into its meaning and consciousness. It becomes for us completely transparent: we find ourselves at once in the most intimate touch with virtue and vice, greatness and meanness, nobility and infamy, and all this through the simplest of means. If we ask what these means are, it seems as if they were directed towards our visual apprehension. But we are mistaken; Shakespeare’s works are not for the physical vision. I shall attempt to explain what I mean.

The eye, the most facile of our organs of receptivity, may well be called the clearest of the senses; but the inner sense is still clearer, and to it by means of words belongs the most sensitive and clear receptivity. This is particularly obvious when what we apprehend with the eye seems alien and unimpressive considered in and for itself. But Shakespeare speaks always to our inner sense. Through this, the picture-world of imagination becomes animated, and a complete effect results, of which we can give no reckoning. Precisely here lies the ground for the illusion that everything is taking place before our eyes. But if we study the works of Shakespeare enough, we find that they contain much more of spiritual truth than of spectacular action. He makes happen what can easily be conceived by the imagination, indeed what can be better imagined than seen. Hamlet’s ghost, Macbeth’s witches, many fearful incidents, get their value only through the power of the imagination, and many of the minor scenes get their force from the same source. In reading, all these things pass easily through our minds, and seem quite appropriate, whereas in representation on the stage they would strike us unfavorably and appear not only unpleasant but even disgusting.

Shakespeare gets his effect by means of the living word, and it is for this reason that one should hear him read, for then the attention is not distracted either by a too adequate or a too inadequate stage-setting. There is no higher or purer pleasure than to sit with closed eyes and hear a naturally expressive voice recite, not declaim, a play of Shakespeare’s. According to the delineation of the characters we can picture to ourselves certain forms, but more particularly are we able by the succession of words and phrases to learn what is passing in their souls; the characters seem to have agreed to leave us in the dark, in doubt, about nothing. To that end conspire heroes and lackeys, gentlemen and slaves, kings and heralds; indeed even the subordinate characters are often more expressive in this way than the leading figures. Everything which in an affair of great importance breathes only secretly through the air, or lies hidden in the hearts of men, is here openly expressed. What the soul anxiously conceals and represses is here brought freely and abundantly to the light. We experience the truth of life,--how, we do not know!

Shakespeare associates himself with the World-Spirit; like it, he explores the world; from neither is anything hidden. But whereas it is the business of the World-Spirit to keep its secrets both before and after the event, it is the work of the poet to tell them, and take us into his confidence before the event or in the very action itself. The depraved man of power, the well-intentioned dullard, the passionate lover, the quiet scholar, all carry their heart in their hand, often contrary to verisimilitude. Every one is candid and loquacious. It is enough that the secret must out, and even the stones would publish it. The inanimate insists upon speaking; the elements, the phenomena of sky, earth and sea, thunder and lightning, wild animals, lift their voice, often apparently symbolically, but all joining in the revelation.

The whole civilized world too brings its treasures to Shakespeare; Art and Science, Commerce and Industry, all bear him their gifts. Shakespeare’s poems are a great animated fair; and it is to his own country that he owes his riches.

For back of him is England, the sea-encircled and mist-covered country, whose enterprise reaches all the parts of the earth. The poet lives at a noble and important epoch, and presents all its glory and its deficiencies with great vivacity; indeed, he would hardly produce such an effect upon us were it not just his own life-epoch that he was representing. No one despised the outer costume of men more than he; but he understood well the inner man, and here all are similar. It is said that he has delineated the Romans with wonderful skill. I cannot see it. They are Englishmen to the bone; but they are human, thoroughly human, and thus the Roman toga presumably fits them. When one takes this into consideration, one finds his anachronisms entirely admirable; indeed, it is just his neglect of the outer form that makes his works so vital.

Enough of these slight words, which cannot begin to sound the praises of Shakespeare. His friends and worshipers will have to add many a word to them. But one more remark:--it would be hard to find a poet each of whose works was more thoroughly pervaded by a definite and effective idea than his.

Thus _Coriolanus_ is permeated by the idea of anger at the refusal of the lower classes to recognize the superiority of their betters. In _Julius Cæsar_ everything hinges on the idea that the upper classes are not willing to see the highest place in the State occupied, since they wrongly imagine that they are able to act together. _Antony and Cleopatra_ expresses with a thousand tongues the idea that pleasure and action are ever incompatible. And so one will ever find, in searching his works, new cause for astonishment and admiration.

_II. Shakespeare Compared with the Ancients and the Moderns_

The interests which vitalize Shakespeare’s great genius are interests which centre in this world. For if prophecy and madness, dreams, omens, portents, fairies and gnomes, ghosts, imps, and conjurers introduce a magical element which so beautifully pervades his poems, yet these figures are in no way the basic elements of his works, but rest on a broad basis of the truth and fidelity of life, so that everything that comes from his pen seems to us genuine and sound. It has already been suggested that he belongs not so much to the poets of the modern era, which has been called “romantic,” but much more to the “naturalistic” school, since his work is permeated with the reality of the present, and scarcely touches the emotions of unsatisfied desire, except at his highest points.

Disregarding this, however, he is, from a closer point of view, a decidedly modern poet, separated from the ancients by an enormous gulf, not perhaps with regard to his outer form, which is here beside our point, but with regard to his inner and most profound spirit.

Here let me say that it is not my idea to use the following terminology as exhaustive or exclusive; it is an attempt not so much to add another new antithesis to those already recognized, as to indicate that it is already contained in these. These are the antitheses:--

Ancient Modern
Natural Sentimental
Pagan Christian
Classic Romantic
Realistic Idealistic
Necessity Freedom
Duty (_sollen_) Will (_wollen_)[8]

The greatest ills to which men are exposed, as well as the most numerous, arise from a certain inner conflict between duty and will, as well as between duty and its accomplishment, and desire and its accomplishment; and it is these conflicts which bring us so often into trouble in the course of our lives. Little difficulties, springing from a slight error which, though taking us by surprise, can be solved easily, give the clue to situations of comedy. The great difficulties, on the other hand, unresolved and unresolvable, give us tragedy.

Predominating in the old poems is the conflict between duty and performance, in the new between desire and accomplishment. Let us put this decided divergency among the other antitheses and see if it does not prove suggestive. In both epochs, I have said, there predominates now this side, now that; but since duty and desire are not radically separated in men’s characters, both will be found together, even if one prevails and the other is subordinate. Duty is imposed upon men; “must” is a bitter pill. The Will man imposes upon himself; man’s will is his kingdom of heaven. A long-continued obligation is burdensome, the inability to perform it even terrible; but a constant will is pleasurable, and with a firm will men can console themselves for their inability to accomplish their desire.

Let us consider a game of cards as a kind of poem; it consists of both those elements. The form of the game, bound up with chance, plays here the rôle of necessity, just as the ancients knew it under the form of Fate; the will, bound up with the skill of the player, works in the other direction. In this sense I might call whist “classic.” The form of play limits the operation of chance, and even of the will itself. I have to play, in company with definite partners and opponents, with the cards which come into my hand, make the best of a long series of chance plays, without being able to control or parry them. In Ombre and similar games, the contrary is the case. Here are many openings left for skill and daring. I can disavow the cards that fall to my hand, make them count in different ways, half or completely discard them, get help by luck, and in the play get the best advantage out of the worst cards. Thus this kind of game resembles perfectly the modern mode of thought and literature.

Ancient tragedy was based on unescapable necessity, which was only sharpened and accelerated by an opposing will. Here is the seat of all that is fearful in the oracles, the region in which Œdipus lords it over all. Less tragic appears necessity in the guise of duty in the “Antigone”; and in how many forms does it not appear! But all necessity is despotic, whether it belong to the realm of Reason, like custom and civil law, or to Nature, like the laws of Becoming, and Growing and Passing-away, of Life and of Death. Before all these we tremble, without realizing that it is the good of the _whole_ that is aimed at. The will, on the contrary, is free, appears free, and is advantageous to the _individual_. Thus the will is a flatterer, and takes possession of men as soon as they learn to recognize it. It is the god of the modern world. Dedicated to it, we are afraid of opposing doctrines, and here lies the crux of that eternal division which separates our art and thought from the ancients. Through the motive of Necessity, tragedy became mighty and strong; through the motive of Will, weak and feeble. Out of the latter arose the so-called Drama, in which dread Necessity is overcome and dissolved through the Will. But just because this comes to the aid of our weakness we feel moved when, after painful tension, we are at last a little encouraged and consoled.

As I turn now, after these preliminaries, to Shakespeare, I must express the hope that the reader himself will make the proper comparisons and applications. It is Shakespeare’s unique distinction that he has combined in such remarkable fashion the old and the new. In his plays Will and Necessity struggle to maintain an equilibrium; both contend powerfully, yet always so that Will remains at a disadvantage.

No one has shown perhaps better than he the connection between Necessity and Will in the individual character. The person, considered as a character, is under a certain necessity; he is constrained, appointed to a certain particular line of action; but as a human being he has a will, which is unconfined and universal in its demands. Thus arises an inner conflict, and Shakespeare is superior to all other writers in the significance with which he endows this. But now an outer conflict may arise, and the individual through it may become so aroused that an insufficient will is raised through circumstance to the level of irremissible necessity. These motives I have referred to earlier in the case of Hamlet; but the motive is repeated constantly in Shakespeare,--Hamlet through the agency of the ghost; Macbeth through the witches, Hecate, and his wife; Brutus through his friends gets into a dilemma and situation to which they were not equal; even in Coriolanus the same motive is found. This Will, which reaches beyond the power of the individual, is decidedly modern. But since in Shakespeare it does not spring from within, but is developed through external circumstance, it becomes a sort of Necessity, and approaches the classical motive. For all the heroes of ancient poetry willed only what was possible to men, and from this arose that beautiful balance between Necessity, Will, and Accomplishment. Still their Necessity is a little too severe for it really to be able to please us, even though we may wonder at and admire it. A Necessity which more or less, or even completely, excludes human freedom does not chime with our views any longer. It is true that Shakespeare in his own way has approximated this, but in making this Necessity a moral necessity he has, to our pleasure and astonishment, united the spirit of the ancient and the modern worlds. If we are to learn anything from him, here is the point where we must study in his school. Instead of singing the praises of our Romanticism so exclusively, and sticking to it so uncritically,--our Romanticism, which need not be chidden or rejected,--and thus mistaking and obscuring its strong, solid practical aspect, we should rather attempt to make this great fusion between the old and the new, even though it does seem inconsistent and paradoxical; and all the more should we make the attempt, because a great and unique master, whom we value most highly, and, often without knowing why, give homage to above all others, has already most effectively accomplished this miracle. To be sure, he had the advantage of living in a true time of harvest, and of working in a vigorous Protestant country, where the madness of bigotry was silent for a time, so that freedom was given to a true child of nature, such as Shakespeare was, to develop religiously his own pure inner nature, without reference to any established religion.

* * * * *

The preceding words were written in the summer of 1813; I ask that the reader will not now find fault with me, but simply recall what was said above,--that this is merely an individual attempt to show how different poetic geniuses have tried to reconcile and resolve that tremendous antithesis which has appeared in their works in so many forms. To say more would be superfluous, since interest has been centred in this question for the past few years, and excellent explanations have been given us. Above all I wish to mention Blümner’s highly valuable treatise, _On the Idea of Fate in the Tragedies of Æschylus_, and the excellent criticism of it in the supplement of the _Jenaische Literaturzeitung_. Therefore, I come without further comment to my third point, which relates immediately to the German theatre and to Schiller’s efforts to establish it for the future.

_III. Shakespeare as Playwright_

When lovers of art wish to enjoy any work, they contemplate and delight in it as a whole, that is, they try to feel and apprehend the unity which the artist can bring to them. Whoever, on the other hand, wishes to judge such works theoretically, to assert some judgment about them, or instruct some one about them, must use his discriminating and analytic faculty. This we attempted to carry out when we discussed Shakespeare, first, as poet in general, and then compared him with the ancient and modern poets. Now we intend to close the matter by considering him as a playwright, or poet of the theatre.

Shakespeare’s fame and excellence belong to the history of poetry; but it is an injustice towards all playwrights of earlier and more recent times to give him his entire merit in the annals of the theatre.

A universally recognized talent may make of its capacities some use which is problematical. Not everything which the great do is done in the best fashion. So Shakespeare belongs by necessity in the annals of poetry; in the annals of the theatre he appears only by accident. Since we can honor him so unreservedly in the first case, it behooves us in the second to explain the conditions to which he had to accommodate himself, but not therefore to extol these conditions as either admirable or worthy of imitation.

We must distinguish closely-related poetic _genres_, however often they may be confused and merged together in actual treatment,--epic, dialogue, drama, play. _Epic_ requires the verbal delivery to the crowd through the mouth of an individual; _dialogue_, conversation in a narrow circle, where the crowd may eventually listen; _drama_, conversation bound up with action, even if enacted only before the imagination; _play_, all three together, in so far as they appeal to the sense of vision, and can be embodied under certain conditions of personal presence and stage-setting.

Shakespeare’s works are in this sense highly dramatic; by his treatment, his revelation of the inner life, he wins the reader; the theatrical demands appear to him unimportant, and so he takes it easy, and we, spiritually speaking, take it easy with him. We pass with him from place to place; our power of imagination provides all the episodes which he omits. We even feel grateful to him for arousing our imagination in so profitable a way. Since he exhibits everything in dramatic form, he renders easy the working of our imaginations; for with the “stage that signifies the world,” we are more familiar than with the world itself, and we can read and hear the most phantastic things, and still imagine that they might pass before our eyes on the stage. This accounts for the frequently bungling dramatizations of favorite novels.

Strictly speaking, nothing is theatrical except what is immediately symbolical to the eye: an important action, that is, which signifies a still more important one. That Shakespeare knew how to attain this summit, that moment witnesses where the son and heir in _Henry IV_ takes the crown from the side of the slumbering king, who lies sick unto death,--takes the crown and marches proudly away with it. But these are only moments, scattered jewels, separated by much that is untheatrical. Shakespeare’s whole method finds in the stage itself something unwieldy and hostile. His great talent is that of a universal interpreter, or “epitomizer” (_Epitomator_), and since the poet in essence appears as universal interpreter of Nature, so we must recognize Shakespeare’s great genius as lying in this realm; it would be only falsehood--and in no sense is this to his dishonor--were we to say that the stage was a worthy field for his genius. These limitations of the stage, however, have forced upon him certain limitations of his own. But he does not, like other poets, pick out disconnected materials for his separate works, but puts an idea at the centre, and to it relates the world and the universe. As he works over and boils down ancient and modern history, he can often make use of the material of old chronicles; indeed, he often adapts them word for word. With romances he does not deal so conscientiously, as _Hamlet_ shows us. _Romeo and Juliet_ is truer to the original; still he almost destroys the tragic content of it by his two comic characters, Mercutio and the old nurse, played apparently by two favorite actors, the nurse perhaps originally by a male performer. If one examines the construction of the piece carefully, however, one notices that these two figures, and what surrounds them, come in only as farcical interludes, and must be as unbearable to the minds of the lovers on the stage as they are to us.

But Shakespeare appears most remarkable when he revises and pieces together already existing plays. In _King John_ and _Lear_ we can make this comparison, for the older plays are extant. But in these cases, too, he turns out to be more of a poet than playwright.

In closing, let us proceed to the solution of the riddle. The primitiveness of the English stage has been brought to our attention by scholars. There is no trace in it of that striving after realism, which we have developed with the improvement of machinery and the art of perspective and costuming, and from which we should find it hard to turn back to that childlike beginning of the stage,--a scaffolding, where one saw little, where everything was _signified_, where the audience was content to assume a royal chamber behind a green curtain; and the trumpeter, who always blew his trumpet at a certain place, and all the rest of it. Who would be content to-day to put up with such a stage? But amid such surroundings, Shakespeare’s plays were highly interesting stories, only told by several persons, who, in order to make somewhat more of an impression, had put on masks, and, when it was necessary, moved back and forth, entered and left the stage; but left to the spectator nevertheless the task of imagining at his pleasure Paradise and palaces on the empty stage.

How else then did Schroeder acquire the great distinction of bringing Shakespeare’s plays to the German stage, except by the fact that he was the “epitomizer” of the “epitomizer”!

Schroeder confined himself exclusively to effect; everything else he discarded, even many necessary things, if they seemed to injure the effect which he wanted to produce on his country and his time. Thus by the omission, for instance, of the first scenes of _King Lear_, he annulled the character of the play. And he was right, for in this scene Lear seems so absurd that we are not able, in what follows, to ascribe to his daughters the entire guilt. We are sorry for the old man, but we do not feel real pity for him; and it is pity that Schroeder wishes to arouse, as well as abhorrence for the daughters, who are indeed unnatural, but not wholly blameworthy.

In the old play, which Shakespeare revised, this scene produces in the course of the action the loveliest effect. Lear flees to France; the daughters and the stepson, from romantic caprice, make a pilgrimage over the sea, and meet the old man, who does not recognize them. Here everything is sweet, where Shakespeare’s loftier tragic genius has embittered us. A comparison of these plays will give the thoughtful reader ever fresh pleasure.

Many years ago the superstition crept into Germany that Shakespeare must be given literally word for word, even if actors and audience were murdered in the process. The attempts, occasioned by an excellent and exact translation, were nowhere successful, of which fact the painstaking and repeated endeavors of the stage at Weimar are the best witness. If we wish to see a Shakespearean play, we must take up again Schroeder’s version; but the notion that in the staging of Shakespeare not an iota may be omitted, senseless as it is, one hears constantly repeated. If the defenders of this opinion maintain the upper hand, in a few years Shakespeare will be quite driven from the stage, which for that matter would be no great misfortune; for then the reader, whether he be solitary or sociable, will be able to get so much the purer pleasure out of him.

They have, however, with the idea of making an attempt along the lines of which we have spoken in detail above, revised _Romeo and Juliet_ for the theatre at Weimar. The principles according to which this was done we shall develop before long, and it will perhaps become apparent why this version, whose staging is by no means difficult, although it must be handled artistically and carefully, did not take on the German stage. Attempts of a similar kind are going on, and perhaps something is preparing for the future, for frequent endeavors do not always show immediate effects.

FOOTNOTES:

[8] “Goethe, in a thoughtful essay, _Shakespeare und kein Ende_, written many years later than his famous criticism of Hamlet in _Wilhelm Meister_, says that the distinction between the two [ancient and modern drama] is the difference between _sollen_ and _wollen_, that is, between _must_ and _would_. He means that in the Greek drama the catastrophe is foreordained by an inexorable Destiny, while the element of free will, and consequently choice, is the very axis of the modern. The definition is conveniently portable, but it has its limitations. Goethe’s attention was too exclusively fixed on the fate tragedies of the Greeks, and upon Shakespeare among the moderns. In the Spanish drama, for example, custom, loyalty, honor, and religion are as imperative and as inevitable as doom. In the _Antigone_, on the other hand, the crisis lies in the character of the protagonist.”--James Russell Lowell, _Shakespeare Once More_.

FIRST EDITION OF _HAMLET_

(1827)

_The First Edition of the Tragedy of Hamlet_, by William Shakespeare,
London, 1603. Reprinted by Fleischer, Leipzig, 1825.

In this book Shakespeare’s devoted admirers receive a valuable present. The first unbiased reading has given me a wonderful impression. It was the old familiar masterpiece again, its action and movement in no way altered, but the most powerful and effective principal passages left untouched, just as they came from the original hand of the genius. The play was exceedingly easy and delightful to read. One thought one’s self in a wholly familiar world, and yet felt something peculiar which could not be expressed, and this induced one to give the play a closer consideration, and indeed a stricter comparison with the old. Hence these few random remarks.

First of all, it was noticeable that there was no locality given, nor was there information about the stage-setting, and just as little about the division of the acts and scenes. All this was represented by “Enter” and “Exit.” The imagination was allowed free play. One saw again in his mind’s eye the old primitive English stage. The action took its impetuous course of life and passion, and one did not take the time to think of such things as places.

In the more recent familiar revision we find the division into acts and scenes, and locality and stage-setting are given. Whether these are by him or by later stage-managers, we leave undecided here.

The Polonius of the second revision is called Corambis in the first, and the rôle appears through this little circumstance to take on another character.

The unimportant supernumerary rôles were first designated merely by numbers, but here we find them endowed with honor and significance through being given names. We are thus reminded of Schiller, who in _Wilhelm Tell_ gave names to his peasant women and some words to speak, so that they became more acceptable rôles. The poet does the same here with guards and courtiers.

If in the first edition we find a loosely written syllabication, in the later one we find it better controlled, though always without pedantry. Rhythmic passages are divided into five-foot iambics, though half and quarter verses are not avoided.

So much for the external expression. A comparison of the inner connections and relations will be of profit to any admirer who gives the work an individual study. Here are only a few suggestions.

Passages, which in the first version are only lightly sketched by the hand of genius, we find more deliberately executed, and in a way that we have to approve and admire as necessary. We come, too, upon pleasing amplifications, which may not be absolutely necessary, but which are highly welcome. Here and there we find hardly perceptible yet vivid aspersions, connective passages, even important transpositions to make a highly effective speech,--everything done with a master-hand, with intelligence and feeling, everything thrilling our emotions and clarifying our insight.

Everywhere in the first version we admire that sureness of touch which, without lengthy reflection, seems rather as if it had been poured out spontaneously, a vivifying and illuminating discovery. And whatever excellences the poet may have given to his later work, whatever deviations he employed, at least we find nowhere any important omission or alteration. Only here and there some rather coarse and naïve expressions are expunged.

In closing we shall mention, however, a noticeable difference which concerns the costume of the Ghost. His first appearance, as we know, is in armor; he is armed from head to foot; his face is pale and sad, his glance wan and yet austere. In this guise he appears on the terrace, where the castle guard is marching up and down, and where he himself may often have drawn up his warriors.

In the closet of the Queen, on the other hand, we find mother and son in the familiar dialogue, and finally these words:--

“Queen. Hamlet, you break my heart.

Hamlet. O throw the worser part away and keep the better.”

But then follows: “Enter the Ghost in his night-gowne.”

Who, on first hearing this, does not find it for a moment incongruous? And yet if we grasp it, if we think it over, we shall find it right and proper. He should--indeed he must--appear first in armor, when he is entering the place where he has rallied his warriors, where he has encouraged them to noble deeds. And now we begin to be less confident of our conviction that it was suitable to see him enter the private closet of the queen in armor, too. How much more private, homelike, terrible, is his entrance here in the form in which he used to appear--in his house apparel, his night robe, harmless and unarmed--a guise which in itself stigmatizes in the most piteous way the treachery which befell him. Let the intelligent reader, as he may, picture this to himself. Let the stage-manager, convinced of this effect, produce it in this way, if Shakespeare is to be staged in his integrity.

It is worth noting that the commentator Steevens has already criticized this scene. When Hamlet says:--

“My father in his habit as he lived!”

this discerning critic adds this note:--“If the poet means by this expression that the father is appearing in his own house costume, he has either forgotten that at the beginning he introduced him in armor, or else it must be his intention in this latter appearance to alter his attire. Hamlet’s father, just as a warrior prince might do, does not always remain in armor, or sleep, as they tell of King Haakon, of Norway, with his battle-ax in his hand.”

If we had been clever enough, we should have already thought of Hamlet’s first utterance in this scene, when he sees the Ghost:--“What would your gracious figure?” For we have not words enough to express all that the English mean by the word “gracious,”--everything that is kind and gentle, friendly and benign, tender, and attractive, is fused in that word. Certainly it is no term for a hero in armor.

These doubts are happily now dispelled by the reprinting of the first edition. We are convinced anew that Shakespeare, like the Universe, is always offering us new aspects, and still remains, at the end of it all, lofty and inaccessible. For all our powers are not competent to do justice to his words, much less his genius.

_TROILUS AND CRESSIDA_

(1824)