The National Register. — London, England, 1809-08-27 00:00:00

NAT-MA RKET. The character of the dramas of - Shakspeare are not merely virtues and vices, passions and habits, personified; -they are actual human beings, with all the individual pecu liarities that identify a particular man. Scarcely any other author, except Homer, bath entered into these nice discri minations that distinguish men, who are actuated by the same passions, from one another. If the distinctions of age and occupation, are tolerably preserved, most writers -think that they have sufficiently obeyed the precept of Horace; they draw proud characters and humble charac ters, they depicf revenge, and love, and hatred ; they set every attribute of human nature separately upon the stage, but no human being ; no compoeition of those attributes, •which are always, in less or greater proportion, combined together in every human heart. It therefore happens that au actor who may have attained great reputation in charac ters drawn by other authors, and yet wholly fail when he at tempts to enter into the closer delineations of our Uninor tal dramatist. Many a performer would be able to repre sent, in a very perfect manner, the Zanga of Dr. Young, who would be scarcely tolerable in the logo of Shakspeare, and entirely unsufferable in .Sity/ock. Yet we find that ac tors too frequently generalise their ideas of the passions and qualities, and that it becomesat distinct sort of praise to say that any man is great in the characters of Shak speare ; a good Falstaff or a good ShNleek is often the dis tinctiou of wen of a peculiar turn of mind, who perceive those certain touches which are concealed by the prevail ing colour of the ruling passion, but which arc absolute ly necessary to the real portraiture. To be great in many of Shakespeare's characters, requires the ersatility of a Garrick ; but to be great in many Of the characters in other plays, may not absolutely demand even the abilities of Mr. Young. Mr. Young is undoubtedly an actor of considerable me rit. He not only understands the leading passion which he is to represent, but he frequently enters into its modifica tions: this, however, lie seems to do with his understand ing rather than with his imagination,—by rule and .me thud rather than by his feelina-s. lie has particular tulles and particular actioin for such and such gra dations of sentiment, besides an indiscriminate gogling of his eyes for every thing. lie is, according to the un meaning jargon of the day, a chaste aeil elegant. actor, suited to a respectable walk in the drama, like a trained horse, to go through a certain set of parts, hut to put him into a play of Shakspeare's is like turning a trained horse into a wood, where alt his amblings and curvetting, would he of little service to him in picking his way among those that are overgrown with. the luxuriance of nature. Both his action and his recitation resemble those of a school boy at his • holiday speech.—His emphasis is always t! , :e emphasis of rhetoric, not of feeling, and if he speaks of his head he points to his head: he cannot say, " Ay, his breast so says the bond," without laying his hand upon Lis breast ; and this probably he thinks is what; Shak speare means by " suiting the action to the word." The first scene where Bassani° comes to borrow the money, was given correctly enough in the character of a Jewish usurer; the words " I will buy with you, Ste." were given too seriously. There is a sort of Stock - Exchange jo eoseness in the character of Shy/ock, which Mr. Young did not apprehend; the apologue concerning Jacob and Laban is clearly of this cast, which was spoken much too seriously, even in that speech in which the passion of revenge seems to exult in the opportunity that presents itself, there is a s!rong strain of humour. It is indeed the humour of a. fiend, but it is nevertheless natural to the individual cha racter. The revenge of Shylock is low malicious spite, ready to seize upon any means, however weak and extra vagant, and - this sort of revenge is always accompanied render . pally lest sight of these malicious jokes, and frequently recited them as if he were playing Limo. Even the anathema, " cursed be my tribe if I forgive him," ought not to be accompanied with serious tragic action. • Shylock inhirttee ing it, conceives no awful idea of vengeance; it is the agi tation of malice that impels this exclamation. The sue gestioa of the pound of flesh as the condition of the bond, is in the same manner, a sly malicious thought, which ate Jew is actually pleased with, and therefore his humour is not merely assumed to conceal his design, but the spiteful joy of a low, cunning, and depraved•heart. Theexclama lion " 0 father Abraham, what these Christians are t" is not meant to be aside, aor to be expressed in a stiff and . sea •• rious style : it is open and satyric, and should be uttered with the grin of malice which sees its prey approaching the trap. In the next scene in which ,Vrylock reproaches Launcelot, who has quilted his service, Mr. Young wes again as much upon stilts as if the play had been the composition of Mr. Dimond or Monk Lewis. akdock is angry, but still satirically huinourous in his anger. In the short scene with Jessica, the actor overlooked numerous sharp passages sylich belonged to Sky/ack, and indeed in many of the outs scvent scenes we continued to have more of Mr. 'Voting ; and much legs of Shakespear's Jew, than we hoped or ex pected. We hardly could have imagn:ed that the anger of olcl Shylock would have changed him into a youthful ranters bad Mr. Farley indeed played the character for his own be. nefir, we should have wondered but little at the rapid rant,- ing style in which we heard that fiue speech given, which begins with, " If it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge."--" Bath not a Jew eyes )- blustered out Mr. Young, and pointed to hiseyei.--" Bath not a Jew heads?" and the actor straightway pointed with one hand to the other. lie might as well have stripped himself to frave iheWn his " organs and dimensions," or have imitated, eating and stabbing at the words, " fed with the same fooil t h e n w ith the same WC:I/1011S," but he contented with pointing down his throat at the former part of bees sentence. Such action may serve for signs among (lima! people, or uncouth savages; it is also tolerable in a school boy, who cannot use his arms more griicefulty or more impressively, but in an actor who pretends to imitate the actions of human sacieiy, it is ridiculous ; yet we know th a t suc h mai t re has numerous advocates. We have' seen it taught, and we have heard it defended, hut we never yet saw any man in his most animated and agitated movea merits make use of similar gestures. The gestures of pas• sign never stop for such detail : when eager and violent; they are the organs of feeling and sensibility, never of reasoning and demonstration. TiL scene between akefack Tubal was too much in Mr. Young's respectable ;walk of acting for the avaricious Jew. Roth his irritation and i l i s. j o y Were t oo l o fty. The joy and anger of S:eatoep are incan, selfish and despicable The exultation of the Jew and the sarcasms on which that e:;ultation dwells were expressed with that tame ness which is known by the cant term of chaste acting; and in the scene before the Duke, we have seldom seen an actor more at a loss than Mr. Young appeared to be. The speech " I have possessed your grace of what I purpose," was mere declamation, as also was that of What judgment shall I d rea d, d o i n g n o wroag." The most commendable passage was the answer to Gratiano :'" Till thou enlist rail the seal, from onny bond"---which was expressed with much sarl castle phlegm. We do not, however, approve of Shylock' S or rather Mr. Young's taking the bond from his pocket and ' pointing to the seal such action is mere conceit, and ofa& worthy those teachers of Rhetoric, Messrs. Thelwali, Trarer, efc. "1 cannot find it---'tis not in the bond," way well given, and many of the short speeches which afforded no room for declamation were uttered with much fuelieg. To say that Mr. Young does not correctly conceive the part of a/Vet*, will certainly riot be speaking too strongly against his performance, fur we Are willing to gili,w that r. THE NATIONAL REGIBTEL • THE4TRIC4LS. • with a sly, satyric manner of diction; which, when the oh- server is apprized of the motives beneath them, render MR. YOUNG'S SHYLOCK• i those motives more detestible. Mr. Young continually lost sight of these malicious jokes, and frequently recited • NAY-MARKET. them as if he were playing :Limo. Even the anathema The character of the dramas of Shakspeare are not " cursed lie my tribe if I forgive him," ought not to be merely virtues and vices_ naseinna und hatit. . arettnmaniod with .prima tracrir rtinn_ . Kholnrle