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.
Pages:
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190