Encyclopaedia Britannica > Volume 21, ROT-Siam

764
SHAKESPEARE
students balance the princess and her three ladies, and
there is a symmetrical play of incident between the two
groups. The arrangement is obviously more artificial
than spontaneous, more mechanical than vital and organic.
But towards the close of the first period Shakespeare had
fully realized his own power and was able to dispense
with these artificial supports. Indeed, having rapidly
gained knowledge and experience, he had before the close
written plays of a far higher character than any which
even the ablest of his contemporaries had produced. He
had firmly laid the foundation of his future fame in the
direction both of comedy and tragedy, for, besides the
comedies already referred to, the first sketches of Hamlet
and Romeo and Juliet, and the tragedy of Richard III.,
may probably be referred to this period.
Another mark of early work belonging to these dramas
is the lyrical and elegiac tone and treatment associated
with the use of rhyme, of rhyming couplets and stanzas.
Spenser’s musical verse had for the time elevated the
character of rhyming metres by identifying them with the
highest kinds of poetry, and Shakespeare was evidently at
first affected by this powerful impulse. He rhymed with
great facility, and delighted in the gratification of his
lyrical fancy and feeling which the more musical rhyming
metres afforded. Khyme accordingly has a considerable
and not inappropriate place in the earlier romantic
comedies. The Comedy of Errors has indeed been de¬
scribed as a kind of lyrical farce in which the opposite
qualities of elegiac beauty and comic effect are happily
blended. Bhyme, however, at this period of the poet’s
work is not restricted to the comedies. It is largely used
in the tragedies and histories as well, and plays even an
important part in historical drama so late as Richard II.
Shakespeare appears, however, to have worked out this
favourite vein, and very much taken leave of it, by the
publication of his descriptive and narrative poems, the
Venus and Adonis and the Lucrece, although the enormous
popularity of these poems might almost have tempted him
to return again to the abandoned metrical form. The
only considerable exception to the disuse of rhyming
metres and lyrical treatment is supplied by the Sonnets,
which, though not published till 1609, were probably
begun early, soon after the poems, and written at intervals
during eight or ten of the intervening years. Into the
many vexed questions connected with the history and
meaning of these poems it is impossible to enter. The
attempts recently made by the Bev. W. A. Harrison and Mr
T. Tyler to identify the “ dark lady” of the later sonnets,
while of some historical interest, cannot be regarded as
successful. And the identification, even if rendered more
probable by the discovery of fresh evidence, would not clear
up the difficulties, biographical, literary, and historical, con¬
nected with these exquisite poems. It is perhaps enough
to say with Prof. Dowden that in Shakespeare’s case the
most natural interpretation is the best, and that, so far as
they throw light on his personal character, the sonnets
show that “he was capable of measureless personal devotion;
that he was tenderly sensitive, sensitive above all to every
diminution or alteration of that love his heart so eagerly
craved; and that, when wronged, although he suffered
anguish, he transcended his private injury and learned to
forgive.”
Second Whatever question may be raised with regard to the
period, superiority of some of the plays belonging to the first
period of Shakespeare’s dramatic career, there can be no
question at all as to any of the pieces belonging to the
second period, which extends to the end of the century.
During these years Shakespeare works as a master, having
complete command over the materials and resources of the
most mature and flexible dramatic art. “ To this stage,”
says Mr Swinburne, “ belongs the special faculty of fault¬
less, joyous, facile command upon each faculty required of
the presiding genius for service or for sport. It is in the
middle period of his work that the language of Shake¬
speare is most limpid in its fulness, the style most pure,
the thought most transparent through the close and
luminous raiment of perfect expression.” This period
includes the magnificent series of historical plays—Richard
II., the two parts of Henry IV., and Henry V.—and a
double series of brilliant comedies. The Midsummer
Night’s Dream, All ’s Well that ends Well, and the Mer¬
chant of Venice were produced before 1598, and during
the next three years there appeared a still more complete
and characteristic group including Much ado about No¬
thing, As you Like it, and Twelfth Night. These comedies
and historical plays are all marked by a rare harmony of
reflective and imaginative insight, perfection of creative
art, and completeness of dramatic effect. Before the close
of this period, in 1598, Francis Meres paid his cele¬
brated tribute to Shakespeare’s superiority in lyrical,
descriptive, and dramatic poetry, emphasizing his un¬
rivalled distinction in the three main departments of the
drama,—comedy, tragedy, and historical play. And from
this time onwards the contemporary recognitions of
Shakespeare’s eminence as a poet and dramatist rapidly
multiply, the critics and eulogists being in most cases
well entitled to speak with authority on the subject.
In the third period of Shakespeare’s dramatic career Third
years had evidently brought enlarged vision, wider period,
thoughts, and deeper experiences. While the old mastery
of art remains, the works belonging to this period seem to
bear traces of more intense moral struggles, larger and less
joyous views of human life, more troubled, complex, and
profound conceptions and emotions. Comparatively few
marks of the lightness and animation of the earlier works
remain, but at the same time the dramas of this period
display an unrivalled power of piercing the deepest
mysteries and sounding the most tremendous and perplex¬
ing problems of human life and human destiny. To this
period belong the four great tragedies—Hamlet, Macbeth,
Othello, Lear ; the three Roman plays—Coriolanus, Julius
Caesar, Anthony and Cleopatra; the two singular plays
whose scene and personages are Greek but whose action
and meaning are wider and deeper than either Greek or
Roman life—Troilus and Cressida and Timon of A thens ;
and one comedy—Measure for Measure, which is almost
tragic in the depth and intensity of its characters and
incidents. The four great tragedies represent the highest
reach of Shakespeare’s dramatic power, and they sufficiently
illustrate the range and complexity of the deeper problems
that now occupied his mind. Timon and Measure for
Measure, however, exemplify the same tendency to brood
with meditative intensity over the wrongs and miseries
that afflict humanity. These works sufficiently prove that
during this period Shakespeare gained a disturbing insight
into the deeper evils of the world, arising from the darker
passions, such as treachery and revenge. But it is also
clear that, with the larger vision of a noble, well-poised
nature, he at the same time gained a fuller perception of
the deeper springs of goodness in human nature, of the
great virtues of invincible fidelity and unwearied love,
and he evidently received not only consolation and calm
but new stimulus and power from the fuller realization of
these virtues. The typical plays of this period thus
embody Shakespeare’s ripest experience of the great issues
of life. In the four grand tragedies the central problem is
a profoundly moral one. It is the supreme internal conflict
of good and evil amongst the central forces and higher
elements of human nature, as appealed to and developed
by sudden and powerful temptation, smitten by accumu-