The National Register.
London, England, 1808-05-22 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL REGISTER.

THE THEATRE.
COrENT-GARDEN.
Although it is not usual for Newspapers to give any accounts
of the performances exhibited for benefits, yet when suclinatriar:
,edv Shakspeare's King Lear is acted, and acted in so dm
able a style as it was on Wednesday evening, we feel that we
should do an injustice to our Readers in passing even a benefit
unnoticed. The principal Characters were thus cast :
King Lear, Mr. Kemble.
Mr. Claremont.
Duke of Albany,
Dake o f Cornwall, Mr. Jefferies.
Earl of Gfoster, Mr: Murray.
Earl of Kent, Mr. Cooke.
Edgar, Mr. C. Kemple.
Edmund the Bastard, Mr. Brunton.
Oswald, .Mr. Farley.
Mrs. Humphries.
.Goneri/,.
Prgan, Mrs. St. Leger.
Cordelia, Miss Smith.
This play is certainly to be ranked among the most splendid
productions of Shakspeare a genius. Perhaps, indeed, here, as
in his other plays, the story is not conducted in what we now
call a dramatic manner ; that is to say the main effects are not
regularly disposed in such a way as to relieve the minds of the
sneetators by an artificial alternation of incident and dialogue.
Tate, by his alteration, has much improved the order of Shaks-
peare ; but it is to be wished that he had inserted less new mat-
ter. We are glad to see the dreadful catastrophe of Shakspearc's
(erip..iiial softened into a pleasing conclusion ; but the loves of
Fd,;(te and Cordelia are exceedingly heavy and uninterestieg,
and are too like the other loves that one finds upon the stage, to
be very like nature. Love is indeed a passion, which, when ne-
v and simply represented, is capable of exciting a stronger,
more various, and a more universal interest, than, perhaps,
any other affection of the mind : but the magic lies in the its-
'Jure, not in the name ; and love, when it does not resemble
nature, is the :•top-gap, not the assistant of the fable. To
persons who have not been in tbe habit of considering these
subjects, it may perhaps seem a little extraordinary, that au-
diences, who so perpetually express the loudest disapprobation.
at unnatural representations of any other passion, should not
detect and denounce false expressions of love. We answer, that
•audiences have no mode of estimating the truth of the exhibi-
tions that are presented to them, except the comparison of those
exhibitions with the feelings of their own hearts. If then a
passion be described to a spectator, of which he has no proto-
t. in his own heart, how shall hejudge whether the descrip-
tion be accurate? No man can decide on the likeness of a por-
trait, who has never had an opportunity of seeing the original.
Such is constantly the difficulty that an audience must encounter
in judging the representations of love. Hope, and fear, and
anger, and joy, all have felt, and all may judge in representa-
tion : but love is a passion too exalted for vulgar minds, com-
posed of particles too fine to be caught by common senses : a
passion that few have ever beheld in its purity, and that fewer
still have, in its purity, ever felt within themselves. But love,
when feelingly represented, touches so many of the sprinsp: of
the human heart by its association with other passions, as jea-
lousy, despair, joy, or grief, that it has an effect even upon the
minds of those whom, when it is unmixed, it cannot move. If
it be naturally conceived itself, it will blend readily with the
annexed passion : if it be conceived by a poet ss ho has studied
it only front books, it will with difficulty be joined to the asso-
ciated feeling. Thus the grief of true love is universally inte-
resting, : not because every body has felt true love, but because
every body has felt grief, and the added hue of trite love, like
the first tints of a picture, gives brightness to the other colours,
thaugh it be not in itself perceived by the unpractised eye. On
the oilier haul the griefs of love that is not real, move no sensa-
• lion in the mind. The love is nothing, and the grief seems
causeless. The uninformed spectator does not see more beauty
here than the most feeling metaphysician : but he does not con-
demn, necanse he does not discern the fault. The general effect
is cold : the scenes produce no emotion in any body : and the
piece goes off flatly.
Such is the case with the lore-scenes of Edgar and Cordelia.
But whatever we nuts say of the manner in which the plot of
this tragedy is connected, whether by Shakspeare or by Tate,
we cannot but speak of the poetry with enthusiasm. The sub-
limity both of intellectual nod descriptive writinz-, the discri-
sniuntive delineation of character. the keen conception of
sat.zical iusauity, the illustration of. MLA and parental fc:lintl

and duty, in short, all the noblest excellences of Shakspeare's
mind blaze gloriously through this splendid tragedy.
Mr. Kemble, in the character of Lear, had wound himself to
the top of his compass; and he exhibited, in a manneradmirable
and astonishing, all those touches of nature, and all those bursts
of poetry, that combine in so remarkable a degree to render
Lear the most sublime of dramatics characters. if in any ex-
pression Mr. Kemble fell beneath tired exalted excellence to
which the representation of such a part required that he should
adhere, it was in his attempts at a tremulous tenderness. The
tones of his voice are not well adapted to convey tender feelings
and perhaps he would do better in laying less stress upon those
passages which, however admirably he may conceive them, his
physical powers will not enable him to express. Mr. Kemble
is not the zephyr, but the storm : sublimity is the characteristic
of his genius, not sweetness. His curse on Goneril, at the con-
clusion of the first act, was one of those mighty bursts of, mag-
nificent passion, which immortalize the actor, by elevating and
transporting the audience. The imagination of the spectator is
upborne into the grandeur of infinite expanse; and thejudgment
of the critic, though not overthrown, is hurried away. Perhaps
the effect of this passage was heightened by the air of infirmity
which Mr. Kemble threw into the whole character.
Mr. Cooke was a little too sly for the plain. blunt Kent; but
a good deal of his acting was very forcible. His first dress was
handsome; but his disguise made him look like Bobadit.
Mr. C. Kemble acted Edgar with judgment and with genies.
Ills rapid and impassioned utterance in those scenes where
Edgar affects madness, formed an admirable contrast with the
real and quiet insanity of. Lear. Ile who assumes a passion
generally expresses it more loudly than he who truly feels it.
Miss Smith was the Cordelia. Cordclia should be more tender
and more passionate than M iss Smith represents her. Miss
Smith has a habit of acting from her ear, rather than from her
feeling, and perpetually throws the emphasis of a sentence on
those words where the harmony of the passage seems to want
energetic tone, rather than on those w here the passion re-
quires a rapid, forcible, or tender utterance. It seems to us
that she would do wisely if, in herself, she were to

preparing .
study the sense before she learns the words, instead of letting the
beauty of the words get the previous possession of her imagina-
tion, and exclude the sense.
An interlude was then performed, called The Day after the
Marriages or, the Wefe s first Lesson. It is a pretty little
drama, and has a good deta the air of a French piece, A lady
of violent temper is, on the second day of her honey-moon, com-
pletely cured by her husband, who, counterfeiting a similar
vehemence of disposition, does so much mischief, as folly to con-
' vince his bride that she had better correct herself. Mr. and
Mrs. C. Kemble played these parts in a lively wanner, and the
interlude went off very agreeably.