Numbers in bold brackets [] indicate original page numbers.
DRAMATIC SELIF-REVELATION: HAMLET
[390] "IN Hamlet Shakespeare has revealed too much of himself." FRANK HARRIS.
As the fame of Shakespeare rests chiefly upon his great achievements in drama, it is to these that the world is bound to look for some special revelation of the author himself. Such a revelation, however, it must be expected, will be in keeping with the character of his genius. Cryptograms and anagrams, though they may play a part, especially the latter, as being a recognized feature of the literature of the times, can only come in as supplementary to something greater: the real self-revelation being a dramatic one.
The essential objectivity of Shakespeare's work, with its foundations fixed in observation, is assurance enough that his characters would be taken from his own experience of the men and women about him. Mere photographic reproduction, of course, such a genius would not offer us; but actually living men and women, artistically modified and adjusted to fit them for the part they had to perform, are what we may be sure the plays contain. The fact that these have not been identified before now is no doubt due, in part, to such cunning disguises as we should naturally expect from a mind so profound and complex. The fact, too, that the active life of the reputed author does not fit in with either the time or circumstances of the active life of the actual author has also tended to prevent detection. Another explanation is that "Shakespeare" probably saw contemporary events and personalities from a standpoint totally different [391] from that taken by Englishmen since his day. If, therefore, the substitution of a new personality, as author, furnishes a point of view which enables us to identify characters in the plays, it will form a very strong argument that the right man has been discovered.
Such a faculty of observation as we notice in him, leading him to fix his attention specially upon those whose lives pressed directly upon his own — inevitable in one so sensitive and self-conscious as the Sonnets reveal him — is certain to have made his work much more a record of his own personal relationships than has, hitherto been supposed. His special domain, moreover, being the study of the human soul, this faculty of observation must have compelled him to subject his own nature to a rigorous examination and analysis. Consequently, when the author is better known, it will doubtless be found that his works are packed with delineations and studies of his own spiritual experiences. The working out of this department of Shakespearean enquiry belongs largely to the future. Something of this kind has, however, already been attempted in a desultory manner in these pages. Our present purpose is somewhat more definite.
The long accepted notion that the author has not given us a representation of himself in his plays breaks down completely, as we have seen, under the view of authorship put forward in this work. Already attention has been drawn to the case of Lord Berowne in "Love's Labour's Lost," and also to a most striking parallel between Edward de Vere and another of Shakespeare's characters, namely Bertram in "All's Well."
Bertram, a young lord of ancient lineage, of which he is himself proud, having lost a father for whom he entertained a strong affection, is brought to court by his mother and there left as a royal ward to be brought up under royal supervision. As he grows up he asks for military service and to be allowed to travel, but is repeatedly [392] refused or put off. At last he goes away without permission. Before leaving he had been married to a young woman with whom he had been brought up, and who had herself been most active in bringing about the marriage. Matrimonial troubles, of which the outstanding feature is a refusal of cohabitation, are associated with both his stay abroad and his return home. Such is the summary of a story we have told in fragments elsewhere, and is as near to biography, or autobiography if our theory be accepted, as a dramatist ever permitted himself to go. The later discovery, which we have fortunately been able to incorporate into this work before publication, that the central incident of Bertram's matrimonial trouble has a place in the records of the Earl of Oxford, leaves no doubt as to his being the prototype of Bertram. Still it is conceivable that a contemporary dramatist, knowing De Vere's story, had utilized parts of it in writing the play; and, therefore, if viewed alone, is not entitled to be called a dramatic self-revelation.
Properly speaking, it is the whole of the dramas that constitutes the full dramatic self-revelation. It is, therefore, as we approach the highest triumphs of his genius, which represent the whole, that his work becomes a special or synoptic, self-revelation. This, however, pertains to the inward or spiritual life rather than to its external forms. If, then, to a spiritual correspondence there is added a marked agreement in external circumstances, as evidence of the personal identity of the author, such dramatic work becomes specially convincing. The question, therefore, resolves itself into this: What play of Shakespeare's holds such pre-eminence that we are entitled to regard it as a work of special self-revelation, and how far do its inner spiritual facts, and the outward forms in which they are clothed, warrant the assumption that they constitute a work of self-revelation on the part of Edward de Vere?
On the first point, the choice of play, there is fortunately [393] no need for the exercise of our own individual judgment, nor any uncertainty as to the social verdict; for the world at large has long since proclaimed the play of "Hamlet" as the great tour de force of this master dramatist. The comedy of "Love's Labour's Lost" undoubtedly occupies a unique position amongst the lighter plays. It is usually accorded priority in time; it bears unmistakable evidence of the most painstaking labour; and it was the first to be published under the pseudonym of "Shakespeare." The correspondence of its central figure, Berowne, with the Earl of Oxford has therefore a special value, particularly if taken as supplementary to the play of "Hamlet."
The central figure in the latter play occupies, however, a most exceptional position in relation to the work in which he appears, and therefore stands out as the supreme dramatic creation of the artist. "The play of 'Hamlet' with Hamlet left out" has become a proverbial expression for the very extreme of deprivation; and Sir Sidney Lee assures us that "the total length of Hamlet's speeches far exceeds that of those allotted by Shakespeare to any others of his characters." These, again, have so passed into common currency as to justify the well-worn joke about the play being "full of quotations." The play and the character of "Hamlet" may therefore be accepted as being in a peculiar sense the dramatic self-revelation of the author, if such a revelation exists anywhere.
Great as is the mass of printed matter which this particular creation has already called forth, probably exceeding in amount what has been written about any other literary work of similar dimensions outside the Bible, more is certain to appear if we succeed in making good our chief claim. The burden of much that has appeared is to the effect that in Hamlet the poet meant to give us the picture of a human soul struggling with Destiny. We venture to say that he meant nothing so philosophically abstract; but that what he was actually striving most consciously and [394] earnestly to do, was to represent himself; and he, like every other human being born into this world who succeeds in keeping his soul alive, was indeed a soul struggling most tragically with Destiny; refusing to be swept along passively by the currents into which his life was plunged or to surrender to the adverse forces within himself. This is certainly the picture which stands out from that self-presentation of the poet contained in his sonnets; and the fact that the character of Hamlet has been defined in terms that bring it into direct accord with that poetic self-revelation, is one more proof that the play is intended to be a special and direct dramatic self-revelation. It is this personal factor, doubtless, that has given to the drama that intense vitality and realism which makes its words and phrases grip the mind; becoming thus the instruments by which mankind at large have found new means of self-expression.
It is this fact of Hamlet representing the dramatist himself which also makes him stand out from all Shakespeare's characters as an interpreter of the motives of human actions. Into no other character has the author put an equal measure of his own distinctive powers of insight into human nature. Whilst other personages in the play are trying to penetrate his mystery to discover his purposes and to read his mind, we find Hamlet confusing them all, and, meanwhile, reading them like an open book.
"I set you up a glass
Where you may see the inmost part of you,"he says to his mother.
All that quickness of the senses which marks alike the work of De Vere and Shakespeare manifests itself in the person of Hamlet. He misses nothing; and everything he sees or hears opens some new avenue to the "inmost parts" of those about him. A man like this is almost foredoomed to a tragic loneliness; for even such a love as he shows towards Ophelia and she towards him cannot blind him to [395] her want of honesty in her dealings. He sees much of which he may not speak. In the play he can express himself in soliloquy or cunningly reveal to the audience what is hidden from the other personages in the drama; but in real life he would become a man of large mental reserves and an enforced secretiveness. Something of this is certainly noticeable in the slight records we have of De Vere: a trait which even Burleigh found disconcerting.
Having decided that "Hamlet" is the play which, by its pre-eminence, is entitled to be regarded as "Shakespeare's" special work of self-delineation, the next part of our problem is to see whether the revelation it contains has a marked and peculiar applicability to the case of Edward de Vere. In examining the work from this point of view it must be borne in mind that Shakespeare's plots are seldom pure inventions. The dramatist is obliged, therefore, to conform in certain essentials to the original; and it is to what he works into this, and the special adaptations he makes, that we must look for his self-revelation, rather than to the central idea of the plot itself. Naturally, however, his own definite purposes must influence his choice of plot: though it must also be borne in mind that self-disguise is one of his purposes as well as self-expression.
In testing the parallel we must substitute first of all the royal court of England for the royal court of Denmark. For Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, at the Danish court we shall then have to substitute Edward, Earl of Oxford, at the court of England. Oxford, of course, was not a prince of royal blood: but then there were no princes of royal blood at the English court, and the Earl of Oxford, in his younger days, was the nearest approach to a royal prince that the English court could boast. In the matter of ancient lineage and territorial establishment a descendant of Aubrey de Vere had nothing to fear in comparison with a descendant of Owen Tudor. And when it is remembered that noblemen [396] of inferior standing to Oxford were, in those days, contemplating the possibility of sharing royal honours, either with Elizabeth or her possible successor, the Queen of Scotland, for the dramatist to represent himself as a royal prince was no extravagant self-aggrandizement. With the substitution we have recommended in mind, let the reader turn again to "Hamlet" and read the play with the attention fixed, not upon the plot, but upon the characterization. If he does not experience all the elation which comes with new illumination, if he does not feel that every line of Hamlet's speeches pulsates with the heart and spirit of Oxford, either we have failed to represent accurately, or he has failed to appreciate, the character and circumstances of this remarkable and unfortunate nobleman.
We shall endeavour to indicate elements of parallelism and coincidence between the two, but nothing can take the place of an attentive and discriminating reading of the play itself. As, then, we have elsewhere urged that one of the most convincing proofs is to read the sonnets, so now we would also urge those who are interested to read Hamlet. Already, in tracing illustrations of the life and circumstances of De Vere in Shakespeare's works, we have frequently had to call attention to analogies with Hamlet, extending to details of private relationships. We may therefore shorten our present task by asking the reader to revert to those chapters dealing with the early and middle periods of Oxford's life.
Following upon the consideration of his social rank comes the central fact of Hamlet's working out a secret purpose under a mask of eccentricity amounting almost to feigned madness. To have feigned complete madness would not have allowed him to accomplish his purpose, and therefore he assumes just sufficient insanity as is necessary to bewilder those whom he wishes to circumvent, and who are trying to circumvent him. It is a match of wits in which the ablest mind wins by allowing his inferior antagonists to suppose [397] him mentally deficient. Now the records we have of Oxford represent his eccentricity in his early and middle period as being of an extreme character, and if we suppose him to be Shakespeare, we can quite believe that his own secret purposes were being pursued partly under a mask of vagary.
It is to be observed how frequently Hamlet employs this particular stratagem in resisting molestation, especially from those who are trying to penetrate his secrets. This appears in his dealings with to Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, Polonius and Ophelia. Now this resistance to interference stands out clearly at the time when Oxford, having returned from abroad, is reported to have behaved in a strange manner towards Lady Oxford; for, in addition to the taciturnity which he adopted, and which one writer calls "sulkiness," he says, in the letter quoted in our "Othello" argument, "neither will he weary his life any more with such troubles and molestations as he has endured." Compare especially with the spirit expressed in this, the interesting scene in which Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are trying to probe and "play upon" Hamlet (III. 2). "You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass. 'S blood! do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Though you can fret me, you cannot play upon me."
That Hamlet is Shakespeare's representation of himself receives confirmation from another characteristic which the latter shares with Oxford. That remarkable combination of tragedy with comedy, in the ordinary sense of these words, which we find in Shakespeare attains its highest development in the play of "Hamlet." The only possible competitor is "The Merchant of Venice." In the latter we have a comedy which may at any moment resolve itself into an appalling tragedy. In "Hamlet" we have a tragedy which, [398] at parts, runs perilously near comedy, and may at any moment break up in absolute farce. Even in times of melancholy and in the very thick of disaster the wit and subtle fun of the hero never desert him. Over his life there hangs a dark shadow. Impotence, failure and despondency dog his steps. Yet, when things are at their worst he turns rapidly upon his butts, teasing and confusing them with an evident enjoyment of the intellectual fun of the business. The play of "Hamlet," which may therefore, in this particular, be taken as a compendium of "Shakespeare's" dramas as a whole, is unquestionably symptomatic of the general mental constitution and career of the Earl of Oxford.
The social position and general character of the hero of this play having lent support to the theory that its author was Edward de Vere, we shall find additional and even more surprising corroboration when we turn to the details of personal relationships. The driving force in the play of "Hamlet" is, of course, father-worship; the love and admiration of a son for a dead father who had borne himself in a manner worthy of his exalted station,. Such affection and respect is the spontaneous source of ancestor-worship. Although, therefore, we are not told that father-worship was a marked trait in Edward de Vere, we have abundant justification for such an assumption, and might indeed infer it from the fact that ancestor-worship was a pronounced feature of his character.
When, however, we turn to Hamlet's relationship to his surviving parent we are met with a totally different picture. Grief and disappointment at his mother's conduct lie at the root of all the tragedy of his life. With a capacity for intense affection, such as we have already pointed out in "Shakespeare" and in De Vere, Hamlet was incapable of any real trust in womanhood. His faith had been shattered by the inconstancy of his own mother. This curious combination of intense affectionateness with weakness of faith [399] in women is therefore characteristic of all three, "Shakespeare" (in his sonnets), Hamlet, and De Vere.
It would not be fair to the memory of De Vere's mother to maintain, in the absence of positive proof, that she had furnished by her inconstancy a justification of her son's mistrust. We may, however, draw attention to facts that might account for it, even if they did not justify it. It has already been pointed out that in the short biography of De Vere, from which we have drawn so freely, no mention whatever is made of his mother, and one gets the impression that after his father's death she had almost dropped out of his life, the whole of the circumstances contrasting markedly with those recorded of Southampton and his mother. From the account given of De Vere's father, however, we learn that his widow died in 1568, Oxford being then only eighteen years of age; and that sometime in these early years of his life at the royal court, his mother had married Sir Charles (or Christopher) Tyrell. As, moreover, her death occurred at Castle Hedingham, one of the chief of the ancestral homes of the De Veres, it looks as though Oxford's stepfather had established himself on the family estates, and may have appeared to the youth as having doubly supplanted his father, first in his mother's affections and then in the hereditary domains. This, of course, is the situation represented in Hamlet. Whether, in addition to the central fact, there had also been an unseemly brevity in the widowhood of Oxford's mother we cannot tell; for although the precise date of her death is given, the date of her second marriage is not. We have spent much time in the search for this date; so far without result. It will be interesting, therefore, to learn whether or not it was an "o'er hasty marriage," and whether as Hamlet ironically remarked,
"The funeral baked meats
Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables."Apart from this, however, there was sufficient in the general situation to cut very deeply into the mind of an [400] imaginative and supersensitive youth, and to have struck a severe blow at that poetic ideal of feminine constancy which was natural to his age and temperament. The important point for our present argument is that we have in Oxford the same moral trait that we have in Hamlet, that we have parallel external circumstances tending towards its production, and that these external circumstances are just such as might lead to all the tragic developments which succeeded in both instances. Faith in motherhood being the fount at which faith in womanhood may be revived when threatened by the failure of other relationships, the man who like Hamlet or Oxford lacks this faith to carry him through crises can have but a hopeless outlook on the most vital and fundamental of human relationships.
The personal relationship in the play which bears most critically upon our present argument is that of Hamlet with Polonius and Ophelia. The chief minister at the royal court of Denmark is Polonius. The chief minister at the royal court of England was Burleigh. Is the character of Polonius such that we may identify him with Burleigh? Again it is not a question of whether Polonius is a correct representation of Burleigh, but whether he is a possible representation of the English minister from the special point of view of the Earl of Oxford. To what has already been said elsewhere in this connection, it will perhaps suffice to quote from Macaulay's essay on Burleigh:
"To the last Burleigh was somewhat jocose; and some of his sportive sayings have been recorded by Bacon. They show much more shrewdness than generosity, and are indeed neatly expressed reasons for exacting money rigorously and for keeping it carefully. It must, however, be acknowledged that he was rigorous and careful for the public advantage as well as for his own. To extol his moral character is absurd. It would be equally absurd to represent him as a corrupt, rapacious and bad-hearted man. He paid [401] great attention to the interest of the state, and great attention also to the interest of his own family."
Hardly any one will deny that Macaulay's delineation of Burleigh is correct portraiture of Polonius; and, therefore, if Burleigh appeared thus to Macaulay after two and a half centuries had done their purifying work on his memory, one can readily suppose his having presented a similar appearance to a contemporary who had had no special reason to bless his memory. The resemblance becomes all the more remarkable if we add to this description the spying proclivities of Denmark's minister, the philosophic egoism he propounds under a gloss of morality, his opposition to his son's going abroad, and his references to his youthful love affair and to what he did "at the university." All these are strikingly characteristic of Burleigh and the most of them have already been adequately dealt with.
Probably the most conclusive evidence that Polonius is Burleigh is to be found in the best-known lines which Shakespeare has put into the mouth of Denmark's minister — the string of worldly-wise maxims which he bestows upon his son Laertes (Act 1. 3). They are much too well known to require repetition here. With these in mind, however, consider the maxims which Burleigh laid down for his favourite son, of which Burleigh's biographer (Martin A. S. Hume) remarks that though "these precepts inculcate moderation and virtue, here and there Cecil's own philosophy of life peeps out." He then gives examples:
"Let thy hospitality be moderate."
"Beware that thou spendest not more than three or four parts of thy revenue."
"Beware of being surety for thy best friends; he that payetli, another man's debts seeketh his own decay."
"With thine equals be familiar yet respectful."
"Trust not any man with thy life, credit, or estate."
"Be sure to keep some great man for thy friend."[402] The whole method, style, language and sentiment are reproduced so much to the life in Polonius's advice to Laertes that Shakespeare seems hardly to have exercised his own distinctive powers at all in composing the speech. The connection of the advice of Polonius with similar precepts in Lyly's "Euphues" has long been recognized. What seems hitherto to have escaped notice is that both have a common source in Burleigh. How much of what appears in Lyly of these precepts was derived through Oxford it would be useless to discuss. The general relations of the two men has already been sufficiently considered.
We take this opportunity of remarking, what may not be very material to our argument, that the spirit of the closing words of Polonius's speech, the words beginning, "Unto thine own self be true," seems to us to be generally quite misunderstood. These words bring to a close a speech which, throughout, is a direct appeal in every word to mere self-interest. Is, then, this last passage framed in a nobler mould with a high moral purpose and an appeal to lofty sentiment? We think not. The bare terms in which the final exhortation is cast, stripped of all ethical inferences and reinterpretations, are as direct an appeal to self-interest as everything else in the speech. They are, "unto thine own self"; not unto the best that is in you, nor the worst. Consistently with his other injunctions he closes, with one which summarizes all, the real bearing of which may perhaps be best appreciated by turning it into modern slang: "Be true to 'number one.' Make your own interests your guiding principle, and be faithful to it."
This is quite in keeping with the cynical egoism of Burleigh's advice, "Beware of being surety for thy best friends"; but "keep some great man for thy friend." And, of course, it does "follow as the night the day" that a man who directs his life on this egoistic principle cannot, truly speaking, be false to any man. A man cannot be false to [403] another unless he owes him fidelity. If, therefore, a man only acknowledges fidelity to his own self, nothing that he can do can be a breach of fidelity to another. On this principle Burleigh was true to himself when he made use of the patronage of Somerset; he was still true to himself, not false to Somerset, when he drew up the articles of impeachment against his former patron. Bacon was true to himself when he made use of the friendship of Essex; he was still true to himself, not false to Essex, when he used his powers to destroy his former friend.
This philosophic opportunism was therefore a very real thing in the political life of those days. And the fact that Shakespeare puts it into the mouth not of a moralist but of a politician, and, as we believe, into the mouth of one whom he intended to represent Burleigh, serves to justify both the very literal interpretation we put upon these sentences, and the identification of Polonius with Elizabeth's chief minister. Needless to say, one who like "Shakespeare" was imbued with the best ideals of feudalism, with their altruistic conceptions of duty, social fidelity and devotion would never have put forward as an exalted sentiment any ethical conception resting upon a merely personal and individualist sanction. For this admiration of the moral basis of feudalism would enlighten him in a way which hardly anything else could, respecting the sophistry which lurks in every individualist or self-interest system of ethics.
The advice of Polonius to Laertes is given just as the latter is about to set out for Paris, and all the instructions of the former to the spy Reynaldo have reference to the conduct of Laertes in that city. The applicability of it all to Burleigh's eldest son Thomas Cecil, afterwards Earl of Exeter and founder of the present house of Exeter, will be apparent to any one who will take the trouble to read G. Ravenscroft Dennis's work on "The House of Cecil."
The tendency towards irregularities, at which Ophelia hints in her parting words to her brother, is strongly [404] suggestive of Thomas Cecil's life in Paris; and all the enquiries which Polonius instructs the spy to make concerning Laertes are redolent of the private information which Burleigh was receiving, through some secret channel, of his son Thomas's life in the French capital. For he writes to his son's tutor, Windebank, that he "has a watchword sent him out of France that his son's being there shall serve him to little purpose, for that he spends his time in idleness." We are told that Thomas Cecil incurred his father's displeasure by his "slothfulness," "extravagance," "carelessness in dress," "inordinate love of unmeet plays, as dice and cards"; and that he learnt to dance and play at tennis.
With these things in mind let the reader again go carefully over the advice of Polonius, to Laertes, and the former's instructions to Reynaldo. He will hardly escape, we believe, a sense of the identity of father and son, with Burleigh and his son Thomas Cecil. One point in Hamlet's relations with Laertes strikes one as peculiar: his sudden and quite unexpected expression of affection:
"What is the reason that you use me thus?
I loved you ever."Now the fact is that Thomas Cecil was one entirely out of touch with and in many ways quite antagonistic to Burleigh and his policy. In spite of his wildness in early life he is spoken of as "a brave and unaffected man of action, out of place in court, but with all the finest instincts of a soldier." He was also one of those who, along with Oxford, favoured the Queen's, marriage with the Duke of Alençon, in direct opposition to the policy of Burleigh. Thomas Cecil was an older man than Oxford, and they had much in common to form the basis of affection.
It is impossible therefore to resist the conclusion that Polonius is Burleigh, and that Thomas Cecil formed, in part at any rate, the model for Laertes. This being so, it follows almost as conclusively, that Hamlet is Oxford. For, [405] although Polonius's daughter, Ophelia, was not actually Hamlet's wife, she represents that relationship in the play. The royal consent had been given to the marriage, and it was through no fault either of herself or her father that the union did not take place. Hamlet's bearing towards his would-be father-in-law is moreover strongly suggestive of Oxford's bearing towards his actual father-in-law. What points of resemblance may have existed between Ophelia and Lady Oxford it is impossible to say. We notice, however, that the few words the Queen speaks respecting Ophelia harp on the idea of that sweetness which, we have noticed, Lady Oxford and Helena in "All's Well" had in common:
"Sweets to the sweet: farewell! I thought thou should'st have been my Hamlet's wife . . . sweet maid."
Something, too, of that mistrust and peculiar treatment which Hamlet extended to Ophelia has already been remarked in Oxford's bearing towards his wife, along with suggestions of the ultimate growth of a similar affection.
We have also observed that the only accusation which Oxford was willing to make against his wife was that she was allowing her parents to interfere between herself and him. This is precisely the state of things to which Hamlet objects in Ophelia. He perceives that Polonius is spying upon him with her connivance, and cunningly puts her to the test; whereon she lies to him. His reply is an intimation to her that he had detected the lie.
Hamlet. Where is your father?
Ophelia. At home, my lord.
Hamlet. Let the doors be shut on him that he may play the fool nowhere but in 's own house.Hamlet's use of the double sense of the word "honest" in a question to Ophelia — the identical word which in its worse sense was, thrust to the front by Burleigh respecting the rupture between Lord and Lady Oxford — is not [406] without significance. Polonius, we take it then, furnishes the key to the play of Hamlet. If Burleigh be Polonius, Oxford is Hamlet, and Hamlet we are entitled to, say is "Shakespeare."
No feature of the parallelism between Hamlet and Oxford is more to the point than that of their common interest in the drama, and the form that their interest takes. Both are high-born patrons of companies of play-actors, showing an interest in the welfare of their players, sympathetic and instructive critics in the technical aspects of the craft. They are no mere passive supporters of the drama, but actually take a hand in modifying and adjusting the plays, composing passages to be interpolated, and generally supervising all the activities of their companies. Not only in the play within the play, which forms so distinctive a feature of "Hamlet," but also before the period dealt with, it is evident that Hamlet had been so occupied. In all this, he is a direct representation of the Earl of Oxford, and of no one else in an equal degree amongst the other lordly patrons of drama in Queen Elizabeth's reign.
To fully elaborate the parallelism between Hamlet and Oxford would demand a rewriting of almost everything that is known of the latter, illustrated by the greater part of the text of the play. We shall therefore merely add to what has already been said several of the minor points. Hamlet expresses his musical feeling and even suggests musical skill in the "recorder" scene (III. 2). In the same scene he shows his interest in Italy. The duelling in which he takes part also has its counterpart in the life of Oxford, and even the tragic fate of Polonius at the hand of Hamlet is a reminder of the unfortunate death of one of Burleigh's servants at the hands of Oxford. Hamlet's desire to travel had to yield to the opposition of his mother and stepfather. His unrealized ambitions for a military vocation are indicated in the final scene, and his actual participation in a [407] sea-fight is duly recorded. The death and burial of Ophelia at the time of Hamlet's sea episode is elsewhere shown to be analogous to Lady Oxford's death about the same time as De Vere's sea experiences. Suggestions of a correspondence between minor characters in the play and people with whom Oxford had to do can easily be detected. Rosencrantz, for example, might well be taken for Oxford's representation of Sir Walter Raleigh, "the sanctimonious pirate who went to sea with the ten commandments" — less, one of them. If we are right in this, guess we have a most subtle touch in Act III, scene 2. Hamlet instead of saying "By these hands," in speaking to Rosencrantz, coins an expression from the Catechism and calls his hands his "pickers and stealers," thus indicating most ingeniously the combination of piracy with the religiosity of Raleigh. Hamlet's next ironical remark that he himself "lacks advancement" helps to bear out the identification we suggest.
That the dramatist had some definite personality in mind for the character of Horatio hardly admits of doubt. The curious way in which he puts expressions into the mouth of Hamlet describing this personality, without allowing Horatio any part in the play which would dramatically unfold his distinctive qualities, marks the description as a purely personal tribute to some living man. Here, however, it is the very exactness of the correspondence of the prototype, even to the detail of his actual name, that makes us suspect the accuracy of the identification we propose. For the introduction into the play of Oxford's own cousin, Sir Horace de Vere (or, as the older records give it, Horatio de Vere) seems only explicable upon the assumption that the dramatist was then meditating — just before his death — coming forward to claim in his own name the honours which he had won by his work; or, at any rate, that he had decided that these honours should be claimed on his behalf immediately after his death, and that Horatio de Vere had been entrusted with the responsibility. Such an assumption has full warrant [408] in the last words which Hamlet addresses to Horatio. Certainly the agreement is of a most surprising character and must not be neglected.
Sir Horace Vere (as he is also named) had followed the vocation which had been denied the Earl of Oxford, and in becoming the foremost soldier of his day, and chief of the "Fighting Veres," had maintained the military traditions of the family. This was the kind of glory which Edward de Vere had desired to win: an ambition which has left distinct marks in the Shakespearean dramas. The passage in which Hamlet describes the character of Horatio ought therefore to be compared with what Fuller says of Horatio de Vere.
Hamlet to Horatio:
"Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish, her election
Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,
A man that Fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks; and bless'd are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please. Give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,
As I do thee."Fuller's Worthies.
Horatio de Vere had "more meekness and as much valour as his brother (Francis). As for his temper it was true of him what is said of the Caspian Sea, that it doth never ebb nor flow, observing a constant tenor neither elated nor depressed, . . . returning from a victory (in) silence . . . in retreat (with) cheerfulness, of spirit."
Sir Horace Vere was therefore noted amongst his contemporaries for the possession of just such a character and temperament as Hamlet has ascribed to Horatio, in terms that have become classic. And as Horatio was the man selected by Hamlet to "tell his story," the theory we put [409] forward, that "Shakespeare" had instructed his cousin Horatio de Vere to "report him and his cause aright to the unsatisfied," is not without very substantial grounds.
The religious situation represented in "Hamlet" is peculiar. Though Hamlet himself and his father show distinct traces of Catholicism, we do not find him in contact with the institutions and ministrations of Catholicism, such as are represented in "Measure for Measure" and "Romeo and Juliet"; nor do we find the other characters in the play exhibiting the same point of view. Even Hamlet's most intimate friend, Horatio, evidently differs from him in religious outlook. Hamlet's position, therefore, is very similar to that which an English nobleman of Catholic leanings would occupy in court circles in the days of Queen Elizabeth. On the other hand, Hamlet is not a Catholic of the saintly type. His frankness with regard to his shortcomings is as clear and genuine as that shown by "Shakespeare" in the Sonnets. Hamlet confesses "I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me," just as "Shakespeare" confesses in his sonnets.
". . . you in me can nothing worthy prove,
Unless you would devise some virtuous lie,
To do more for me than mine own desert,
And hang more praise upon deceased I
That niggard truth would willingly impart.
* * *
For I am ashamed by that which I bring forth."The applicability of all this to Edward de Vere, so far as the records of him are concerned, is, unhappily, one point over which hangs no shadow of doubt and from which no dispute is likely to arise.
Nor is the religious faith of Hamlet of the steadfast orthodox kind. His soliloquies reveal a mind that had been touched by the kind of scepticism that was becoming pronounced in the literary and dramatic circles of the latter half of Queen [410] Elizabeth's reign. This again is representative of the mind of Shakespeare as shown by the plays as a whole: for the attenuated Catholicism they contain could hardly have come from the pen of one of the faithful. All this, too, is in accord with the shadowy indications that are given of Oxford's dealings with religion: his profession of Catholicism at one time, the accusation of atheism against him at another. Hamlet's cry, therefore, that "the time is out of joint," points to something deeper than his personal misfortunes and the tragedy of his private life. They are much more like the outburst of a writer, himself suffering from a keen sense of the unsatisfactory character of his whole social environment: one out of rapport with the age in which he lived; an age of social and spiritual disruption incapable of satisfying either his ideals of social order or the poet's need of a full, rich and harmonious spiritual life. All this personal dissatisfaction that the poet expresses through Hamlet is quite what was to be expected from one placed as was Edward de Vere in his relations to the men and movements of his day.
The aversion which Hamlet shows towards politicians, lawyers, and land-buyers has, no real connection with the plot of the drama; it is evidently then an expression of the author's personal feelings towards the times in which he lived: to what he calls "the fatness of those pursy times" — times which were glorying in being no longer "priest-ridden," but which, he perceived, had only exchanged masters, and were becoming politician-ridden, lawyer-ridden and money-ridden. These were indeed precisely the middle class forces which were rising into power upon the ruins of that very feudalism which "Shakespeare," on the one hand, delineates, and Edward de Vere, on the other hand, personally represents. In this again we see Hamlet, Shakespeare" and Edward de Vere are entirely at one in relation to the times in which the play was written.
Hamlet laments in relation to his time "O, cursed spite [411] that ever I was born to set it right." And yet the setting right has not been achieved though three centuries have passed away since "Shakespeare" penned this lament. Still, if the new order for which the "prophetic soul" of "Shakespeare" looked is to arise at last through a reinterpretation and application to modern problems, of social principles which existed in germ in medievalism, then "Shakespeare," in helping to preserve the best ideals of feudalism, will have been a most potent factor in the solution of those social problems which in our day are assuming threatening proportions throughout the civilized world. The feudal ideal which we once more emphasize is that of noblesse oblige; the devotion of the strong to the weak; the principle that all power of one man over his fellows, whether it rests upon a political or industrial basis, can only possess an enduring sanction so long as superiors discharge faithfully their duties to inferiors. In this task of "putting right," Hamlet or "Shakespeare," who we believe was Edward de Vere, through the silent spiritual influences which have spread from his dramas, will probably have contributed as much as any other single force.
Not as an important part of our argument, but as strengthening the feeling of a connection between the play of Hamlet and events in England at the time when it appeared, the rising of the citizens of Elsinor with the cry "Laertes shall be king," is suggestive of the rising in London under Essex, though it must not be omitted that Thomas Cecil, who in some respects resembles Laertes, was chiefly instrumental in putting down the Essex rebellion. Again the change, not only in the occupants of the throne but also of dynasties in Denmark, "the election lighting on Fortinbras," from the neighbouring country of Poland, is suggestive of a similar change in England when, consequent upon the royal nomination, England received the first of a new dynasty from the neighbouring country of Scotland. In this case Fortinbras [412] would be James I, and Oxford's officiating at the coronation might appear as an equivalent to Hamlet's dying vote, "He has my dying voice."
For Oxford would probably be of those who expected from the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, more sympathy with what his mother represented than James actually showed. A comparison of the different editions of "Hamlet" in respect to these political matters might disclose interesting particulars.
In view of all that is known of Edward de Vere, and of "Shakespeare" as revealed in the Sonnets, no other words contained in the great dramas surpass, either in significance in relation to our problem, or in power of moving appeal, than the parting words which Hamlet addresses to Horatio. The more they are dwelt upon the less appropriate do they appear to the fictitious Hamlet, and the more do they sound like a real heart-wrung cry from the dramatist himself for reparation and for justice to his memory. Put Edward de Vere quite out of the question; remember only that "Shakespeare," in sonnets written years before the drama, had spoken of himself as a man living under a cloud of disrepute beyond anything he had merited, desiring for himself nothing more than to pass from life's scene in such a way that his name would drop from the memory of man, then read the dying words of Hamlet:
"Had I but time as this fell sergeant, death,
Is strict in his arrest, O, I could tell you,
But let it be. Horatio, I am dead;
Thou livest; report me and my cause aright
To the unsatisfied.
O good Horatio, what a wounded name
Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me!
If ever thou did'st hold me in thy heart.
Absent thee, from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story. . . .
. . . The rest is silence."[413] If, therefore, Hamlet may be regarded as an indirect dramatic self-revelation of Shakespeare, so evidently do these dying words link themselves on to explicit statements in his direct poetic self-revelation, that they may be accepted, without in any way straining a point, as a dying appeal of "Shakespeare," whoever he may have been, that his true story should be told and his name cleared of the blemishes that "vulgar scandal" had stamped upon it. The change of attitude was justified by what he had accomplished in the interval. His was no longer the record of a wasted genius. Sitting apparently "in idle cell," he had achieved something which altered the whole aspect of his title to honour. He had created, and offered as an atonement for any shortcomings of which he had been guilty — and who, indeed, has not? — the most magnificent achievement that English literature can boast; one of the three greatest achievements in the literature of the world. It is impossible to resist the conviction, then, that these dying words of Hamlet's were intended for some friend of "Shakespeare's," who, from some cause or other, has fallen short in the discharge of the trust with which he was honoured; though the publishing of the sonnets, and of the folio editions of Shakespeare, may have been a partial discharge of this trust.
Although these things are applicable to any "Shakespeare," and any man to whom they will not apply is, ipso facto, excluded, it would appear, from all claim or title in the matter, it is to Edward de Vere alone, so far as we can discover, that they can be made to apply fully and directly. When, then, we find that this particular play, although appearing unauthentically in a curtailed form the previous year, was published, much as we have it now, in the year of his death, and then, although no further revision appeared for eighteen years, an edition appeared containing alterations upon which he had evidently been engaged at the time of his death, we can read in these closing passages of the [414] play nothing less than a final call for justice and for the honour he had merited by his work.
For three hundred years actors have uttered and audiences have listened to these tragic and pathetic passages, never dreaming that they came out of the inmost soul and the bitter experiences of the writer. Their deep personal significance we claim to be making known now for the first time; and we trust that our own imperfectly accomplished labours may achieve something towards winning that redress for which our great dramatist has so dramatically appealed.
The whole story of his life, as he may have wished it to be told, will probably never be known. To reinterpret the known facts by the light of the Shakespearean literature, in which work we have made the first essay, will doubtless yield larger and truer results when others have taken up the task. There is also the possibility that new data may be unearthed, and this, together with the gathering together and unifying of facts scattered through the diverse records of other men, may bring to light the things "standing yet unknown" which were in his mind. The greatest of the facts "standing thus unknown" is that which is now announced, and its substantiation will go further towards healing his "wounded name" than any other single fact that may in future be laid bare.
On a review of the contents of this chapter, it will hardly be denied that the number of the particulars, and the general unity of the plan, which bring the greatest "Shakespeare" masterpiece into accord with the life and personality of the man whom we selected, on quite other grounds, as the probable author of the play, is not the least remarkable of the series of correspondences that have appeared at every step of our investigations.