"Supernatural Soliciting" in Shakespeare
Author(s): H. M. Doak
Source: The Sewanee Review, Vol. 15, No. 3 (Jul., 1907), pp. 321-331
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27530861 .
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SOLICITING" IN SHAKESPEARE
"SUPERNATURAL
are two methods
There
It may
to work
be used
the supernatural
in literature.
impossible to natural agencies,
a
as a human belief, becoming
of using
out results
or
it may be employed
simply
motive
power and leading to results reached by purely natural
means.
The first may be fitly called the poetical method
and
of its use may be found in most of the great poets,
examples
in Tasso, Milton,
and Spenser.
The second may
conspicuously
In this Shakespeare
stands
be justly called the dramatic method.
two
of
it
thus
is
used
him
in
the
and
dramas
alone,
great
by
only
"Hamlet"
A
and
fair
"Macbeth."
illustration
his great
"Faust,"
the poetic method
poem, where
of
in Goethe's
is found
dramatic
by
Mephistopheles,
turns back the tide of life, makes
power,
young
supernatural
again the aging Faust, and fills the new-made man with all the
fire and quick-speeding
wine of a new life.
If a spiritist medium
stock would
suddenly
should
tell one
that a certain
and greatly
moved neither
and he
very stable
should act
fluctuate,
of the market,
upon that statement,
by knowledge
nor by his own judgment, but solely by superstitious
confidence
in the spiritistic power and knowledge
of the medium,
it would
afford a fair example of what I have called the dramatic method
of using the supernatural.
While
has also made use
Shakespeare
as
a
of the supernatural
subtile and mysterious
poetical atmos
phere,
cast
like
a
autumn
spell-working
haze
about
two
his
greatest
it from
the purely dramatic
standpoint,
and
action, he has used it precisely
dramas,
yet, viewing
as a motive
force to human
as
in
the
only
example
just given.
In dealing with
this element after
genius
is chiefly
That
machinery.
results
In
the
once
wrought,
once
he will.
Having
he is limited
life and means,
ment.
employed
use
of
the
the realm of the human
21
second
the first method,
creative
of the supernatural
in construction
the
master
may
out
work
what
transcended
the bounds
of natural
only by his
own
and
method,
soul, dealing
the
with
creator
desires,
taste
works
judg
within
thought,
will,
The
322
Review
Sewanee
out into action.
beliefs and their consequences,
motive,
working
to
In the first case, the poet brings the forces of another world
the
in the second, he deals strictly with
bear upon this world;
another
man's
beliefs
forces of this world,
respecting
including
such beliefs are true or false.
regard to whether
in two groups of two plays each, has exhibited
Shakespeare,
This is so apparent
skill in the use of both methods.
marvelous
intended
that one is almost tempted to believe that the dramatist
without
world,
a contrast which
is so patent.
In "Hamlet"
to tread upon the very boundaries
seeming
unfathomable
and "Macbeth," while
of an unknown
and
to
he has really confined himself
world,
rigidly
out to solution
of superstitious
beliefs working
the phenomena
purely moral and psychological
problems.
poetical
Discounting
there i!s
illusions and waving
aside the delicious
spell of mystery,
left in "Hamlet"
nothing
lated into human action.
and "Macbeth"
in "The Tempest,"
poetry, he gives
he ascends
where
the
anl
Night's Dream,"
to the heights of almost pure
of
full scope in the creation
on
the returning warrior as Glamis
the thane of Cawdor and king that shall be. Banquo
they
as father to a line of kings.
Of the "two truths" told as
In "Macbeth"
and
trans
beliefs
imagination
a free, but firm-held rein in driving
and
agencies
results impossible to natural agencies.
supernatural
to grotesque
hail
but human
In "A Midsummer
hail
the witches
to the swelling act of the imperial theme," Macbeth
"prologue
knows
that he is thane of Glamis and the spectator knows, al
does not, that he is thane of Cawdor.
though Macbeth
Banquo's
as superstitious
wholesome
and ear
with mind
soul, believing
as credulous as Macbeth's,
hears and heeds not. The darkly brood
ing soul of Macbeth
train
black
of
causation,
desires
Again,
wood
assailed
moral,
a complicated
and acts. Through
and
psychological
external,
his
first,
own
and dream
of murder,
and afterward
the witch
and the powerful
aid of his wife, acting upon a weak
suggestion
nature,
hears, heeds
in
culminating
the witches
shall
by
come
one
not
assassination?Macbeth
becomes
king.
tell him
that he need not fear till Birnam
nor
to Dunsinane,
he shall be
then until
of
woman
come
to Dunsinane
born,
and yet he perishes
and
he
born.
is never
miserably.
Birnam
assailed
This,
by
never
wood
one
briefly
not
does
of woman
and meagrely
"Supernatural
in Shakespeare
Soliciting"
323
in "Macbeth."
told, is the sole part of the apparent supernatural
It plays a far other and more important part as a poetical agency
that have ever
and it serves to suggest the profoundest
problems
the great problem of free
vexed human philosophy,
including
"twixt which
worlds
will and fixed fate?two
a star."
from a purely dramatic
Considered
merely
a superstitious
willing
soul, moving
to
standpoint,
and
acting upon a weak, wicked
from the poetic
Considered
results.
charms
and
appals
the
spectator.
is a further prophecy by the witches
father to a
They hail Banquo
It is true that there
deserves
like
it is
belief
it enchains,
standpoint,
life hovers
consideration.
which
line of
kings and actually show that royal line to the anxious Macbeth.
it much be remembered
If this be taken for actual prophecy,
that
its part in the drama is still solely the effect it has upon the mind
of Macbeth,
driving him to seek safety in further wrong-doing,
and
swiftly and more
surely to ruin.
impelling him more
the bounds, however,
for which
of that little world
it
for it is not fulfilled
the drama itself, it is not prophecy,
the limits of the action.
thus
Within
exists,
within
temptation of Macbeth
by the weird sisters is very like the
Eve
It is merely
of
the
serpent, in Genesis.
sug
temptation
by
our
to
first
that
make
the
of the
parents
gested
they
delights
Garden of Eden complete by eating of the fruit of the tree of
The
of good and evil. The witches
to the
knowledge
only suggest
home in the hey-day
soldier, flushed with victory and hurrying
of success, a glittering
prize, fitted to round off and complete his
It is merely,
in both cases, a shining tait
glory and power.
cast out to free moral
classical
Two
ment
agents.
There
is no supernatural
power
or
case.
in either
constraint
instances
are
identical with
the use of
this ele
in "Macbeth."
the people of Eira consulted
When
the oracle as to their fate,
told that their city would
fall when a he-goat drank
they were
of the waters
of the Neda.
In the Messenian
dialect the same
a wild fig tree,
word means a he-goat and a wild fig tree. When
Neda's
had
until
its branches
upon
banks,
grown down
growing
drank
fulfilled.
of
the
The
river's
waters,
Spartans
a
attacked
soothsayer
announced
and the disheartened
the
oracle
inhabitatits
The
324
Sewanee
Review
fell easy prey, not because of any truth in the oracle, but because
beliefs and fears.
of their own superstitious
town of Ithome appealed to
the people of the Messenian
When
of the contending
were
that
told
whichever
the oracle,
they
or Sparta?should
first lay before the shrine
powers?Messenia
of Jove
strife.
pending
in preparing
in the
tripods, would be conqueror
the Ithomeans were hindered
lack of means,
tripods as they deemed a suitable offering.
a hundred
in Ithome
For
such
Spartans, being of a practical turn of mind, hastily prepared
a hundred small tripods, stole into Ithome by night, and laid them
in
abroad
noised
As soon as this was
before
altar.
Jove's
The
Ithome, the Spartans assaulted and took the town. The Ithome
ans yielded to their own superstitious
fears, scarcely resisting.
In "Hamlet,"
is at great pains to give his ghost
the dramatist
It appears thrice to three persons, and the
thorough verification.
to whom
it makes ghostly
third time also to Hamlet,
impartment
of the manner of his father's death. Equal pains are taken to sur
round the ghost and its appearance with all that is ordinarily
in
to superstitious
circumstantial
beliefs and ghostly appearances
a
starts
at
The
like
walks
and
popular
midnight,
legend.
ghost
of
at
talk
of
the
is
cock-crow.
The
old-time
guard
guilty thing
ghostly visitations, when the "sheeted dead did squeak and gibber
in the Roman
the
streets," and of the superstitions
concerning
near
our
of
all
the
time
Saviour's
cocks
of
crowing
night long
it appears to the guard upon the post of martial
birth. When
the ghost
is fitly clad in soldier's garb. When
it appears
watch,
to Hamlet,
and to him alone, in his mother's
it is be
chamber,
as he
in
in
clad
father
his
habit
comingly
night robes?"My
lived !" The
stage direction
in the quarto
is, "Enter
in his
ghost
night-gown."
to enthral
thorough verification was meant
of
the usual
but
environment;
ghostly
enough
This
with
of
superstitious
suspicion
of
appearances
actual
are
suggested
to
the spectator
concomitants
preserve
it
from
in
As
power or knowledge.
supernatural
intended that the drama should run its course
it was
"Macbeth,"
under a subtile canopy of the weird and mysterious.
Thus each
is made, not only a rigidly practical drama of human life, motive
and action, strictly governed
laws of daily force and
by natural
in Shakespeare
Soliciting"
"Supernatural
325
operation, but each is also invested with a rare poetic charm such
as no dramatist save Shakespeare
has ever been able to cast about
in
in "Faust,"
of Goethe,
the single exception
with
the purely poetic supernatural
is em
element
however,
his two great
The poet's warrant
for thus surrounding
ployed.
of the occult, the mysterious,
dramas with a subtile atmosphere
the supernatural,
is found in the fact that human life itself is so
his work,
which,
Man's
life is lived out with the physical eye guiding
invested.
his way through this natural world, and with the mind's eye fixed
shadows
upon and ever glancing
fearfully at the thick-crowding
an
of
unknown world around him.
that may testify to the appearance of the
to any
the
suggestive
ghost,
point is that it is of no importance
some
but Hamlet.
like
With
the rest, merely
strange apparition,
For
many
all the witnesses
of
thought
accounted
appearances,
strange
it would
have
Hamlet,
already brooding
than suspecting
his uncle,
is more,
What
for
or
all
unaccountable,
faded utterly within a brief time. To
over his father's death, already more
it is revelation.
To
him
it can speak.
he needs no
it can speak truly, because
to tell him how his father died. His
to him
exclama
ghostly messenger
"Oh!
is
mine
uncle!"
conclusive
of his
tion,
my prophetic
soul,
belief in murder. What would have been to Marcellus,
Bernardo,
and Horatio
ner of his
of an hour,
the wonder
father's
death?nothing
of the entire
to Hamlet
more.
imparts the man
as is the
Wonderful
drama with a very "Sleepy
of
the ghost actually comes from the
enchantment,
spell
to tell Hamlet,
other world merely
that, instead of having been
a
in
while
his orchard,
the king was
serpent
stung by
sleeping
slain by a subtile poison
ear.
into
his
cir
poured
Place,
complete
Hollow"
cumstances,
investment
and
The
the
disclosure
agent,
Hamlet
knew
and
suspected
already.
is of
the slightest.
It is enough
for the
ghostly
dramatist's purpose, which was chiefly to invest the drama with a
also using the superstitious
mysterious
spell of supernaturalism,
as dramatic
beliefs of Hamlet
forces creating human action.
Thence
on
the ghost works
belief.
only through Hamlet's
not
is
some mingling
Even
without
of doubt.
Hamlet's
and darkly brooding,
mind,
suspicious
treading upon the border
line between
and
not wholly
is
madness,
sanity
given up to
that
The
326
He
hallucinations.
Review
Sewanee
doubts
be a foul fiend
it may
framed
he has
seen.
the court,
and acted before
the play,
The play within
like the scene of his father's death or not, is near enough
whether
"I'll take the ghost's word
to "catch the conscience
of a king."
for a thousand pound." From the end of the third act on to the
and the
in the fact of murder
absorbed
is wholly
and
the
of
vengeance,
forgets
ghost entirely.
duty
and the second time to him
The ghost appears twice to Hamlet
end Hamlet
alone.
terrific
purpose
to passion's
is wrought
tension in the
highest
it comes again for the sole
the queen mother,
sees nothing
of reminding him of his duty. His mother
When
he
scene with
is especially
called to it. It appears as it
in the first scene, as a ghost of the mind should appear,
appeared
in the
clad fitly with time and place.
The dramatist's
purpose
second introduction was for its effect upon the spectator, to con
although
her attention
tinue
the spell of mystery,
The ghost is introduced,
ducive
comes
to action,
again
its far
and
merely
it really plays no other part.
fulfills its part as a motive power con
for
a
as
larger
passing
and
subtiler
to
reminder
poetical
the
spectator
part?
that
it was, and then fades out entirely and is seen no more, heard of
no more. While
it still mysteriously
affects the spectator to the
very close of the drama, it has no other or further effect upon
or part in the play.
it is not even mentioned
Hamlet,
Curiously,
in the two concluding
is alone, when the
acts, not when Hamlet
mind would have given out some note of it, if it
over-wrought
were still remembered,
not even in the friendly communings
of
Hamlet
and Horatio,
not even in the suggestive
scene.
graveyard
is in "Hamlet" and "Macbeth"
There
neither veritable ghost nor
witch, but only a semblance of these; there is a subtile working
out of results
presence
and
through
human
belief
in such agencies
in their
potency.
In "A Midsummer
Dream,"
Night's
far above the ordinary dramatic
pitched
almost pure poetry, Shakespeare
draws
the great poets, in their purely poetical
keeping a carefully drawn dramatic line
forces
and
and his unfolding
allowed the supernatural
in "The Tempest,"
plane, in the realm of
nearer to the method
of
same
at
the
time
works,
and
between his supernatural
dramatic
he might
facts. Where
have
to run riot in results impossible to nat
"Supernatural
in Shakespeare
Soliciting"
327
a temperance
he yet preserved
and a moderation
ural agencies,
are remarkable, when we consider
the character
of his
which
creations
have been
might
In "Jerusalem
De
in the "Faery Queen," we are
in supernatural
in "Paradise Lost," and
livered,"
not shocked
a novel
strous
most
of meaner
to revel
tempted
of
a man
and how
as the spectator
to
ought
wrought
careful
with
of a drama would
monstrous
creations
two dramas,
in which
be?by
In these
results.
supernatural
the manner
about
mould
results.
the reader
be?and
mon
producing
has
Shakespeare
he has been consider
agencies,
of their use.
His
supernatural
or
so
are
so
that the
filmy and insubstantial,
agencies
grotesque,
feels that he has dozed, nodded and dreamed
spectator almost
some light airy dream?when
Puck has flitted across the stage?
ately
when
ary
has
Caliban
the
nightmare?when
drowsiness,
In "The
about
magic
into
crawled
the
senses
scene,
were
some
during
benumbed
moment
summer
by
the eyes yet open and the brain still conscious.
a delicious web of
the dramatist weaves
Tempest"
leaving
a solid
play opens with a bit of
can find flaw in. In the next scene
tissue of fact.
The
no expert
in
robes with magic wand.
on
wizard
Thence
appears
Prospero
the drama runs its course under the spell of a weird and pervasive
practical
navigation
charm
that fills us with
hither
and
all the delights of dreamland.
Prospero
raises and lays the storm, calls spirits from the vasty deep, sends
to plague Caliban, to lead the shipwrecked mariners
his minions
thither
about
together,
and his drunken
isle, to bring prince and
to daze and mislead Caliban
the enchanted
to confound
maid
companions,
summon gods
treason,
to provide
serve
music,
and to call nymphs
celestial
celestial feasts,
and goddesses,
and naiads to featly dance upon the yellow sands of the shelving
events upon a magic
shore. Magical
island ! All magic
and
an
!
all
And
for
sweet
haze
of
the
mystery
yet
overhanging
the entire drama, through which
spirit of incantation,
investing
we
see
structed
every
event
substratum
at
distorted,
of
dramatic
bottom
fact,
a
lies
practical
a
firm,
chain
well-con
of
unfold
life relations, about which
all this magic
is thinnest
ing human
mere
of
frill
web
and
gossamer
delightful
fringe.
In "A Midsummer
there is more of magic
Dream,"
Night's
and
less of dramatic
fact;
in "The Tempest,"
there
is more
of
Sewanee
Review
less of magical
result.
The
328
fact and
dramatic
While
events
shape
to
his
occult
which Prospero
powers,
directly
assigns
importance that might
yet there is no event of any great dramatic
not have fallen out in due course of nature. The usurpation of An
and their landing
and Miranda
of Prospero
tonio, the banishment
a
of
the
desert island, the hymeneal voyage
upon
king of Naples,
the storm, the shipwreck, the escape, the dispersal upon the island,
themselves
and Caliban,
the sweet and natural
the conspiracies
of Antonio
ro
the denouement,
Ferdinand
and
of
and
Miranda,
courtship
are but ordinary
in themselves,
facts of life that might
mantic
run
have
well
the
same
course
without
magical
intervention.
the events are in themselves
romantic, how dry and
Although
seem if now divested
barren
of all the exquisite
they would
that
the
of
invests
facts with a subtile
poetry
Prospero
magic!
charm and then blows it away with a breath at the end?into
air,
a solid basis of fact.
It is like the making
into thin air?leaving
of the ring
in "The Ring
and the Book:"
-
and duly
gold's
alloy,
a manageable
Effects
mass,
once
But
his work
ended,
He
With
there's
Oh,
O'
the
forth
And
the
alloy
self-sufficient
While
The
repristination.
proper
fiery acid
mingles
the
Just
o'er
its
a
thing
a spirt
the
ring,
face
flies
unfastened
now
gold
both,
tempering
then works;
shape
in fume,
remains.
train of human motive, desires, purpose, and action has all
itself out just as these might have done in ordi
the time worked
nary
life.
Ariel
down
as a poetic investiture none of that wondrous
its weird
from the light, delicate
creations,
to the grotesque
and earthy Caliban,
is absolutely
Except
with
supernatural,
to
necessary
running
Trinculo
In
the
dramatic
results
from the pure and graceful
and
sought
Miranda
of
natural
down
creations,
to the swinish
Stephano.
"A Midsummer
the dramatist
revels in
Dream,"
Night's
a wild, poetic debauch, a very midsummer
nightmare,
beginning
m the capital and ending
in the capital, leading the bewildered
and enchanted
and
spectator, meantime,
through wild wood
bank, into fairy bower shadowed with
tangled grove, by moonlit
lithe vine, rank weeds and lush grass, dewy and fragrant beneath
"Supernatural
in Shakespeare
Soliciting"
to repose upon flowery meads,
the starlight,
to
of hound and horn.
the
music
listening
or
329
in leafy forest,
of
exuberance
An
magic about a thin dramatic thread ! From the time we leave the
suburbs of Athens with the lovers until we return to Athens with
the merry royal hunting and bridal party, we are in an enchanted
all is grotesque
the atmosphere
land, where
Not merely
wild and extravagant.
as in "The
is magical
incantation.
The most essential
and distorted,
and setting
all is spell, charm and
Tempest,"
parts of the meagre
plot are worked
means.
we
When
we
chantment,
ished?Bottom
the
upon
rub our eyes and
an
merely
left Athens
who
awake
but no
ass
out by actual
morrow
clear
supernatural
all
of
look about us to find
the
without
ass's
the
head,
all at cross purposes, now sweetly
fairy king, queen, nor court, nor
en
this
it all van
lovers,
congenial
and
sportive Puck
is
"A Mid
this
between
difference,
however,
anywhere.
"
summer Night's
Dream
and "The Tempest."
When
Prospero
had blown off the iridescent bubbles of his magic
and drowned
arts with his book, magic
his wizard
robe and staff, the fact
fabric was left just like any ordinary
fact-fabric of this world of
When
the spectator wakes upon
intermingling men and women.
agreed,
There
the morrow
after
Titania
Oberon,
a midsummer
and
sportive
dream
night's
where
Puck,
in fairyland,
men
and
with
women
to strange metamorphoses,
due to the kindly or
exposed
mirth
of
jealous fancies of the royal fairy, or to the malicious
i of
a
in
all
lau
flower
and
Puck,
fun-loving
dewy, sweet-smelling
wander
one
shrub,
essential
fact?the
love
of Demetrius
and
Helena?re
as an effect due solely to supernatural
In both
power.
an
exuberance
of fancy and imagination.
In both
plays there is
the dramatist
leans strongly towards a highly poetical use of the
mains
The differences
supernatural.
are
element,
chiefly differences
In
other
natural.
plays
In
two
Shakespeare
cases
the
between
them, with
respect
to this
of
super
of degree.
makes
denouement
minor
is made
use
to
the
depend
upon
the prophecy or vision and pregnant disclosures.
Even
in these
the supernatural
in
plays but small part in the drama.
Except
the four plays mentioned
there is no investing
of
atmosphere
such as is actual
in "A Midsummer
supernaturalism
Night's
and "The Tempest/'
and only apparent
in "Hamlet"
Dream,"
and
"Macbeth."
The
330
Sewanee
Review
Tale," III, 2, an oracle tells what the specta
tor already knows,
its chief part being its effect upon the mind
of Leontes,
also a reason for his sudden conversion
furnishing
after the death of his son.
I. In "A Winter's
II. In "Henry VI," Part I, V. 3, the English
and the prevailing
view of the demoniac
character of Joan's power
is in
dicated by fiends, which appear to her upon the field of battle.
to enfeeble her powers,
Except
they play no part.
French
In "Henry VI," Part II, I, 4, Eleanor,
of Gloster,
consults
and dabbles
in magic.
The
incident is brief and plays
but little part.
IV. In "Richard III," V., 3, ghosts appear to both Richard
and
In both cases the supernaturalism
Richmond.
a con
is merely
venient stage expedient
for representing
the dreams of good and
bad men upon the eve of battle.
III.
witches
In "Henry VIII,"
dream of peace is pre
IV, 3, Catherine's
sented in the form of a vision.
This
is a mere stage expedient.
In "Cymbeline," V, 4, a vision of
VI.
ap
gods and mortals
to
a
and
written
tablet
is left, upon whose
pears
Posthumus,
V.
While
this is otherwise
interpretation
depends the denouement.
one of the most delightful
dramas the master
has left us, both
the vision and the interpretation
are unworthy
the great dramatist,
a
mere
invention
to
the
It is
apparently
clumsy
get
play ended.
of
the
pure supernaturalism
poetic kind.
In "Troilus
VII.
2,
and
in V,
and Cressida,"
Cassandra
prophesies
in II,
3.
In "Julius Caesar, IV, 3, the ghost of Caesar appears
This is such stage expedient as we have in "Richard
It is mere personification
of the inner thoughts and senti
VIII.
to Brutus.
III."
ments.
IX. Diana appears to Pericles, V, 2, and gives him such direc
tions as bring about the denouement.
X. The ghost of Banquo,
"blood-boltered,"
appears to Mac
beth.
is mere personification,
This
for stage purposes,
of the
diseased
fancies of Macbeth.
It is presentable
and is sometimes
the actual appearance,
not best pre
presented, without
although
sented so to any modern
audience.It differs in no essential way
from the dagger soliloquy, which
is giving,
in words and actions,
"Supernatural
Soliciting"
in Shakespeare
331
great
and feelings upon the threshold of murder.
as
and Macbeth
Hamlet
speak in their two
speaks
unfolds
therein
with fine art
but the dramatist
soliloquies;
their
inmost
the assassin's
No man
thoughts
ever
selves.
such use of man's
of no other writer who has made
as Shakespeare
has done in "Macbeth"
belief in the supernatural
has dealt in it suggestively
and effec
and "Hamlet."
Bulwer
of
the spiritist problems
tively, but he was merely
dealing with
for its artistic value
the day, rather than using the supernatural
I know
while Shakespeare,
the poetical or dramatic method;
as
as
was
he
poetical, was
profoundly
rigidly practical
strangely,
in another of the many phases he
merely
dealing with humanity
after
either
Latter
in such infinite and picturesque
day
variety.
rate?none
and
fourth
fifth
of
and
novels,
third,
especially many
of first rate?are
full of theosophy,
and
spiritism, mesmerism,
especially of hypnotism.
touched
forms of literature, the novel can least tolerate results
out by other than purely natural means.
And yet the
not
in
the
drama
the
is
hands of great genius,
novel,
excepted,
best fitted, as a romantic history of human life and human nature
Of
all
worked
in their manifold
Shakespeare
for such use of the supernatural
complexity,
has made in "Hamlet" and "Macbeth."
H.
Cedarnwold,
Tennessee.
M.
Doak.
as