The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-02-01

has ever got around the distressing way in
which Hamlet talks 10 ophelia in that
passage Your explanation ought 10 be
listened to-" was suggested.
Mr.. Sothern leaned forward and talked
eagerly. II have got around it TO my per-
sonal satisfaction. he said. what
troubles me is. do 1 play the passage that
my idea convinces the audience? Let me
explain my conception
During the soliloquy the King and
Polonius are concealed, and it is my idea
that Hamlet knows nothing of their
presence during the ensuing scene with
opheIia, though one of the guests at this
dinner would have 1t otherwise. Now, dur
ing the soliloquy. Hamlet. emotionally SEN
sitive enough before, has worked himself
up into a mood that trembles on the edge
OF suffering. Lonely. craving love. and
sympathy. in just that mental condition
where no power under heaven could have
prevented his speaking in tone of affection
to ophelia. the one being in the world to
whom he could turn now. OpheIia sudden
~ enters and he says:
-'-Sc far opheIia,-Nymph. in thy prisons.
BE all my sins remembered.
'And what does Ophelia reply to this
speech. trimming with tenderness?
Good my lord,
How does your honor for this many day?
IAN utterly commoni lace remark that
must have Jared on Hamlet's mood; must
have been bitter disappointment. And he
replies, not in feigned madness, not because
he has seen the eavesdroppers, but simply
because he is so disappointed, and in tone
of sarcasm:
II humbly thank you; well. well. well.
And then Ophelia, still further increas-
ing his disappointment and acting in just
the opposite fashion from that he yearned
for and expected. offers him back his gifts.
What is more natural than his reply? Al
most any one, so driven, would have so re-
piled:
mo- not L;
never gave you aught.
"a sudden, yearning outputting of tender
ness on Hamlets part was met, as he
thought, by indifference and unexpected
lack of reciprocal affection, and the emo
ton was driven back sharply upon itself,
where II at once bred thoughts of his
mothers act ard caused the added agony
OF beholding in ophelia, as it were under a
new, strange light. creature capable of
just the same infidelity. What follows is
to me as natural as IL is pitiful. 1t is not
distressing, as Professor Kittridge says,
because it is cruel, but merely because 1t
is so deeply and truly pathetic. Cruelty
would not have prompted him to send
Ophelia to a nunnery That speech was
prompted by his desire to keep Ophelia the
pure ideal OF his love. Indeed, kindness,
not cruelty, is behind it.
well, that is my conception of the scene.
and it is a conception / cannot feel is
wrong. So, when these men at dinner who
had seen me play 1t still persisted in other
views. lad but the one choice of belief
that had not played it well enough. One
can doubt his conception or his execution;
but if h. is sure OF the one and still does
not convince his audience, something must
be the matter with the other 1t is this
constant. nightly effort to make ones exc
cution tally with ones conception that
makes the part of Hamlet constant
struggle. but constant intellectual delight
week after week. as long the play is
given"