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A. C. Bradley - Shakespearean Tragedy

A >> A. C. Bradley >> Shakespearean Tragedy




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.

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