Introducing Shakespeare: A Graphic Guide - Nick Groom, Piero 2013

Shelley and Byron Discuss Hamlet …

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) and Lord Byron (1788-1824) too had a discussion on the subject, walking through the trees one evening.

BYRON — YOU SEEM VERY INEFFABLE THIS EVENING. I HAVE BEEN READING HAMLET. NO WONDER THEN YOU ARE MELANCHOLY. NO, ’TIS NOT SO MUCH MELANCHOLY, BUT I FEEL PERPLEXED, CONFUSED, AND INEXTRICABLY SELF-INVOLVED; A NIGHTMARE SENSATION OF IMPOTENCE AND VAIN ENDEAVOR WEIGHS UPON ME, WHETHER MY OWN OR SHAKSPEARE’S …

NOR DO I AT ALL RECOGNIZE IN MY FEELINGS THAT CALMNESS AND GRANDEUR WHICH YOU SAID THE OTHER DAY ONE ALWAYS FELT IN THE PRESENCE OF GREAT GENIUS. I UNDERSTAND YOU! ’TIS A FEELING ONE BUT TOO OFTEN FEELS; WHEN AN OBJECT STANDS BEFORE ONE, UNINTELLIGIBLE, “WRAPPED IN ITS OWN FORMLESS HORROR LIKE A GHOST”. I DON’T WONDER YOU QUOTE THAT LINE OF YOURS. IT IS ONE OF THE BEST YOU EVER WROTE. I THINK IT GREAT AFFECTATION NOT TO QUOTE ONESELF.

Byron goes on …

If I had but an opinion —what can any man want more? But now I am like a nothing, a want, a privation. What is Hamlet? What means he? Are we, too, like him, the creatures of some incomprehensible sport, and the real universe just such another story, where all the deepest feelings, and dearest sympathies are insulted, and the understanding mocked? And yet we live on, as we read on …

AND WHO CAN READ THIS WONDERFUL PLAY WITHOUT THE PROFOUNDEST EMOTION? AND YET WHAT IS IT BUT A COLOSSAL ENIGMA? WE LOVE HAMLET EVEN AS WE LOVE OURSELVES…

Shelley insists on reading Byron his commentary on the play and Byron starts snoring.

THE PLAY IS MAYBE A “POEM UNLIMITED”, AS POLONIUS UNWITTINGLY RECOGNIZES — TRAGEDY, COMEDY HISTORY, PASTORAL, PASTORAL-COMICAL, HISTORICAL-PASTORAL, TRAGICAL-HISTORICAL-PASTORAL, SCENE INDIVIDABLE, OR POEM UNLIMITED — BUT HAMLET AS A PERSONAGE IS STILL GREATER.