An Introduction to Shakespeare Part 6

I am sorry that by hanging thee I can [run-on]

But shorten your life one week. And thou, fresh piece [run-on]

Of excellent witchcraft, who of force must know [end-stopped]

The royal fool thou cop'st with...--"

--_Winter's Tale_, IV, iv, 427-434.

Since Shakespeare keeps constantly increasing his use of run-on lines in plays for which dates are known, it seems reasonable to a.s.sume that he did this in all his work, that it was a habit which grew on him from year to year. Hence, if we sort out his plays in order, putting those with the fewest run-on lines first and those with the greatest number last, we shall have good reason for believing that this represents roughly the order in which they were written.

A second form of metrical evidence is found in the proportion of 'masculine' and 'feminine' endings in the verse. A line has a masculine ending when its last syllable is stressed; when it ends, for example, on words or phrases like _behold'_, _control'_, _no more'_, _begone'_. On the other hand, if the last stressed syllable of the line is followed by an unstressed one, the two together are called a feminine ending. Instances of this would be lines ending in such words or phrases as, _unho'/ly_, _forgive' /me_, _benight'/ed_. Notice the difference between them in the following pa.s.sage:--

"Our revels now are ended. These our actors [feminine]

As I foretold you, were all spirits, and [masculine]

Are melted into air, into thin air; [masculine]

And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, [feminine]

The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, [feminine]

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The solemn temples, the great globe itself, [masculine]

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, [masculine]

And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, [feminine]

Leave not a rack behind."

--_Tempest_, IV, i, 147-166.

In the main, although with some exceptions, the number of feminine endings, like the number of run-on lines, increases as the plays become later in date.

A third form of ending, which practically does not appear at all in the early plays, and which recurs with increasing frequency in the later ones, is what is called a 'weak ending.'[4] This occurs whenever a run-on line ends in a word which according to the meter needs to be stressed, and according to the sense ought not to be. Here there is a clash between meter and meaning, and the reader compromises by making a pause before the last syllable instead of emphasizing the syllable itself. Below are two examples of weak endings:--

"It should the good s.h.i.+p so have swallowed, and The fraughting souls within her."

"I will rend an oak And peg thee in his knotty entrails _till_ Thou hast howled away twelve winters."

Lastly, we have the evidence of rime. Run-on lines, feminine endings, and weak endings constantly increase as Shakespeare grows older. Rime, on the other hand, in general decreases. The early plays are {82} full of it; the later ones have very little. It does not follow that the chronological order of the individual plays could be exactly determined by their percentage of riming lines, for subject matter makes a great difference. In a staged fairy story, like _A Midsummer Night's Dream_, the poet would naturally fall into couplets. But, other things being equal, a large amount of rime is always a sign of early work. This is especially true when the rimes occur, not in pairs, but in quatrains or sonnet forms, or (as they sometimes do in the first comedies) in sc.r.a.ps of sing-song doggerel.

Such is the internal evidence from the various changes in versification. Its value, as must always be remembered, lies in the fact that the results of these different tests in the main agree with each other and with such external evidence as we have.

Then, wholly aside from metrical details, there is a large amount of internal evidence of other kinds,--evidence which cannot be measured by the rule of thumb, but which every intelligent reader must notice. We feel instinctively that one play mirrors the views and emotions of youth, another those of middle age. A man's face does not change more between twenty-five and forty than his mind changes during the same interval; and the difference between his thoughts at those periods is as distinct often as the difference between the rounded lines of youth and the stern features of middle age. This is a subject which will be better understood in the light of the next chapter.

+The Order of the Plays+.--Upon such evidence as has been described, a list of Shakespeare's plays in their {83} chronological order can now be presented. The details of evidence on date may be found in the account of the plays which appears in Chapters X-XIII.

Love's Labour's Lost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1590-1591 The Comedy of Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1590-1591 II and III Henry VI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1590-1592 Richard III . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1592-1593 Two Gentlemen of Verona . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1592 King John . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1592-1593 Richard II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1593-1594 t.i.tus Andronicus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1593-1594 Midsummer Night's Dream . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1593-1596 Romeo and Juliet . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1591, revised 1597 The Merchant of Venice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1594-1596 The Taming of the Shrew . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1596-1597 I Henry IV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1597 II Henry IV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1598 Henry V . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1599 Merry Wives of Windsor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1599 Much Ado about Nothing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1599 As You Like It . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1599-1600 Julius Caesar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1699-1601 Twelfth Night . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1601 Troilus and Cressida . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1602 All's Well That Ends Well . . . . . . . . . . . . 1602 Hamlet . . . . . . . . . . . 1602, 1603-1604 (two versions).

Measure for Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1603 Oth.e.l.lo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1604 King Lear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1604-1605 Macbeth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1605-1606 Antony and Cleopatra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1607-1608 Timon of Athens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1607-1608 Pericles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1608 Coriola.n.u.s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1609 Cymbeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1610 The Winter's Tale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1610-1611

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The Tempest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1611 King Henry the Eighth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1612-1613

Among the many books and articles on the subject of this chapter, the following may be mentioned: _Shakespeare Manual_ by F. L. Fleay (Macmillan and Co., London, 1876); _Shakspere_, by E. Dowden (American Book Co., New York); _Cartae Shakespeariante_ by D. Sambert.

[1] This play is either lost, or preserved under another t.i.tle.

[2] Quoted in full in Chapter I, p. 10.

[3] This form of evidence is usually weak and unreliable. Most of the supposed allusions are much more vague than the two given. Where there have been similar events in history, the allusion might be to one which we had forgotten when we thought it was to a similar one which we knew.

[4] Mr. Ingram makes a distinction between "light" and "weak" endings.

Both are cla.s.sed together as weak endings above. The distinction seems to us too subtle for any but professional students.

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CHAPTER VII

SHAKESPEARE'S DEVELOPMENT AS A DRAMATIST

As the reader will remember, our main aim in attempting to date Shakespeare's plays was to trace through them his development as a dramatist and poet. Just as the successive chambers of the nautilus sh.e.l.l show the stages of growth of its dead and vanished tenant, so the plays of Shakespeare show how

"Each new temple, n.o.bler than the last, Shut him from heaven with a dome more vast."

The great thing which distinguishes the genius from the ordinary man, we repeat, is his power of constant improvement; and we can trace this improvement here from achievements less than those of many a modern writer up to the n.o.blest masterpieces of all time.

Much of the material connected with this development has already been discussed in another connection under Internal Evidence. Internal evidence, however, that one play is later than another, is nothing else than the marks of intellectual growth in the poet's mind between those two dates. We arrange the plays in order according to indications of intellectual growth, just as one could fit together again the broken fragments of a nautilus sh.e.l.l, guided by the relative size of the ever expanding chambers. So, in {86} discussing Shakespeare's development, we must bring up much old material, examining it from a different point of view.

+Meter+.--In the first place, the poet develops wonderfully in the command of his medium of expression; that is, in his mastery of meter.

What is meant by the fact that as Shakespeare grew older, wiser, more experienced, he used more run-on lines, more weak endings, more feminine endings? Simply this, that by means of these devices he gained more variety and expressiveness in his verse. A pa.s.sage from his early work (in spite of much that is fine) with every ending alike masculine and strong, and with every line end-stopped, harps away tediously in the same swing, like one lonely instrument on one monotonous note. His later verse, on the other hand, with masculine and feminine endings, weak ones and strong, end-stopped and run-on lines, continually relieving each other, is like the blended music of a great orchestra, continually varying, now stern, now soft, in harmony with the thought it expresses. Below are given two pa.s.sages, the first from an early play, the second from a late one. In print one may look as well as the other; but if one reads them aloud, he will see in a moment how much more variety and expressiveness there is in the second, especially for the purposes of acting.

"Urge not my father's anger, Eglamour, But think upon my grief, a lady's grief, And on the justice of my flying hence, To keep me from a most unholy match, Which heaven and fortune still rewards with plagues.

I do desire thee, even from a heart.

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As full of sorrows as the sea of sands, To bear me company and go with me; If not, to hide what I have said to thee, That I may venture to depart alone."

--_Two Gentlemen of Verona_, IV, iii, 27-36.

"By whose aid, Weak masters though ye be, I have bedimm'd The noontide sun, call'd forth the mutinous winds, And 'twixt the green sea and the azur'd vault Set roaring war; to the dread rattling thunder Have I given fire, and rifted Jove's stout oak With his own bolt; the strong-bas'd promontory Have I made shake, and by the spurs plucked up The pine and cedar; graves at my command Have wak'd their sleepers, op'd, and let 'em forth By my so potent art. But this rough magic I here abjure, and, when I have requir'd Some heavenly music, which even now I do, To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound I'll drown my book."

--_Tempest_, V, i, 40-57.

The same reason shows why Shakespeare used less and less rime as his taste and experience ripened. Rime is a valuable ornament for songs and lyric poetry generally; but from poetry which is actually to be acted on the English stage it takes away the most indispensable of all qualities, the natural, life-like tone of real speech. Notice this in the difference between the two extracts below. Observe how stilted and artificial the first one seems; and see how the second combines the melody and dignity of poetry with the simple naturalness of living language.

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