Page 55 - Hamlet: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

xlviii H A M L E T

coherence of events or character as a reader can. 'From
the very outset of his career,' I have written elsewhere,
'Shakespeare took advantage of this freedom, but as
time went on and as his sense of mastery of his instru-
ment, the Elizabethan stage, grew upon him, he availed
himself of it more and more boldly, not because he was
becoming careless, but quite legitimately in the service
of his art, in order to heighten his effects and to increase
the volume and complexity of his theatrical orchestra-
1
tion .'
Once this point of Elizabethan dramatic technique is
grasped, a number of other problems in Hamlet are seen
to be mere devices similar to those by which a painter
secures perspective or balance. The analysing scholar,
for instance, is puzzled by certain 'difficulties' con-
nected with the character of Horatio. He is now a
foreigner to whom Hamlet is obliged to explain the
customs and outstanding personalities of Denmark, and
now a Dane, who knows the latest rumours at court, has
seen King Hamlet, and can command the respectful
hearing of Fortinbras and the rest after Prince Hamlet's
death. The explanation is, of course, that he is not a
person in actual life or a character in a novel but a piece
of dramatic structure. His function is to be the chief
spokesman of the first scene and the confidant of the hero
for the rest of the play. As the former he gives the
audience necessary information about the political situa-
tion in Denmark, as the latter he is the recipient of in-
formation even more necessary for the audience to hear.
The double role involves some inconsistency, but
rigid logical or historical consistency is hardly com-
patible with dramatic economy which requires all facts
to be communicated through the mouths of the charac-
ters. Yet only a very indifferent playwright will allow an
audience to perceive such joins in his flats. And Shake-
1
Aspects of Shakespeare (British Academy Lectures),
1933, p. 208.