CHAPTER V - OTHELLO: MACBETH: LEAR

Summary

If Shakspere had died at the age of forty, it might have been said, “The world has lost much, but the world's chief poet could hardly have created anything more wonderful than Hamlet.” But after Hamlet came King Lear. Hamlet was, in fact, only the point of departure in Shakspere's immense and final sweep of mind,—that in which he endeavoured to include and comprehend life for the first time adequately. Through Hamlet—perhaps also through events in the poet's personal history, which tested his will as Hamlet's will was tested—Shakspere had been reached and touched by the shadow of some of the deep mysteries of human existence. Somehow a relation between his soul and the dark and terrible forces of the world was established, and to escape from a thorough investigation and sounding of the depths of life was no longer possible. Shakspere had by this time mastered the world from a practical point of view. He was a prosperous and wealthy man. He had completed his English historical plays, which are concerned with this practical mastery of the world. But all the more because he had resolved his material difficulties was his mind open to the profounder spiritual problems of life. Having completed Henry V., for a short period he yielded his imagination and his heart to the brightest and most exuberant enjoyment.