THINGS AND THOUGHTS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2719, 25 April 1906, Page 77

THINGS AND THOUGHTS.

By John Christie. j THE LYRIC ELEMENT IN SHAKE- "- .- * SPEAK.E. ~> \ - ' VI. "-• Perhaps there are, even in Shakespeare, — only two other characters who draw such jmusic' as -this from the lyric strings of a terokea heart. One of these is Othello, as he bends, in maddening despair over the "dead body of Desdemona: JSovt, how dost thou look now? O ill-starr'd wench, /Pale as- thy smock! "When we shall meet at V conipt, i " This lock of thine will hurl my soul from - "heaven, And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl! ! The other is Constance, in "King John," I ■where — while playing with conceits and .fancies as .though, it we-re trying thus to beguile itself of the full oonsciousness of its dverwhelinirag^,grjL«,f— tjhe^ mother's heart break^rlnio Jike that of aiiotheir^^he^fTsrhojjweeps^ap her children, . aiid not. only vili' riot, but cannot, be cpm:fofted;V i-^J u&Lhvii <n m --•' And,<fattfer/earSiinSi:; -G^haveSheard you cay That we sKalhJsee and- know" our -friends m heaven,,^ t , ,' ,u»s^ • -{'-fii '< -If thaifri>e>'trufi t ;I. shall, sea'^my. boy again,-, . /For' since the forth' 'of < Catn/'the first , niaie "child, "' *' ' ■ i " l '- J-'lA\\J -' lA \\ -V- J - To him that did but yesterday suspire, There "was not such a gracious creature born. But now will canker-sorrow eat my hud, ! And chase the native beauty, from his cheek, Acd he will loolr as hollow ,as a ghost, i And .so he'll die; and, rising so again,- I "When , 1 shall meet him in the court of j heaven j I shall npt know him; therefore, never, never i . Must I .behold my pretty Arthur more. j vn. But' in, what diverse keys is this lyric element ".in 'Shakespeare- found expressing itself. In. Wo'jsey's'ehant of self-pity and ,6elf-realisati'6n! we I'mv'e, 'finst, the ascending notes of'-ia "mighty* funeral march, and then the djdog''wa§>lof ll ani"aiituinxi wind : . Fafewel/, -a" 'long ' farewell) to '.all my great- ] jie^si v C ' -' i' J '.'"""' " This ikithe: state of man: #d-day he puts . • forth , The,. teadcr.,le^v£s ; of hopas^ Ao-mqrrow blossoms, , ... > "And bears his' blushing .horiorirs "thick upon j * Limr". ' ' * "* ' ' ; ' The third day conies a. irost, a killing frost, j And/ -when he thinks^ good^easy man, full j - _ 1 surely "^c-""""""""*:' — "t '" , His greatness a-ripening, ,. nips, his Toot, And then he "fallaj as I do. I have ventured, ! ' Like little wanton boys that swim ou bladders, - This many summers in a. eea of glory, But ,far beyond my depth; my high-blown pride ' v js> - ! At length, .yroke .under mey and now has left me/ ' '<■ > i - Weary .-and' old with; service, ?to the 'mercy j Of a rude, gtre&xj, that must for ever hide-mc. | "" Vain pomp and. glory 6f< this world, I hate | ye: I feehxay -heart. <new-open'd'.'. " * ■ ' Father abbot, An old man, broken with the storms of state, Has 'come to lay his weary bones among ye ; . Give him a little earth for charity! . - And what swan ever died io such music as Cleopatra? Give me jny robe, pui on my crown; I have . Immortal longings in mej now no more - lhe jaice oi Egypt's grape shall moist this | lip: . j Yare, yare, good Iras; quick. Methinlcs I | hear Antony call; I see him. rouse himself To praise my noble act ; I hear ,him mock • The luck of Csesar, which' the gods give men To excuse xheir after wrath; husband, I i come: . < j Now to-that name'my coursge proves my title! i I am fire and air; my other elements I give.to baser ]ife. So; have you done? Come, then, and take the last warmth of my lip 3. Farewell, kind Chanman ; Iras, long farewell. Even a wretch who has not the courage to die to save a sister fr&m endless shame may (as Shakespeare shows) have music in him, in the way of nature; which, when feeling is at the lyric level, necessarily finds a lyrical outlet. Hence Claudlo in "Measure for Measure" : Ay, but to die, and go, we know not where; To He in cold obstruction and to rot ; This sensible warm motion to become A- kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit Tt bathe in fiery floods, or to reside In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice; To be imprisoned in the viewless winds, . And blown with restless violence round about The pendent world ; or to be worse than worst Of . those that lawless and incertain thought Imagine howling: 'tis too homble! The weariest and most loathed worldly lif« That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment Can lay on Nature is a paradise To- what we fear of death. vm. And, in fulfilment of the same law, old Northumberland's speech to the messenger who comes to him from the battlefield where H&tspur has been slain Iras the soughing heart-swell of a Celtic coronach — lie is gone, and for ever ; he will return n j more : How doth my son and brother? Thou tremblest, and the whiteness in thy cheek Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand. Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless, So du'.l, so dead in look", so woe-begone. Drew Priam's curtains in the dead of night, And would have told him half his Troy was burnt ; But JPriam found the fire ere his tongu-e, And I my Percy's death ere thou report'st it. This thou -wouldst say, "Your son did thus and -thus ; Your brother thus: so fought the noble Douglas!" Stopninf my greedy ear with their bold deeds : ' But in the end. to stop my ear indeed, " T'fc-ou hast a siph. to Wow away this praise, Ending, with,. "Brot,her, son, and all are dead.** r^iHoispuiiif himself, too, becomes lyrical rh«n tfafe -occasion "calls-, because, though ■ He j|''ifna-wa.re < of the' fact, he cannot help IF 'if ' lle?*' tfi£ l *stirHng ; ; practical „ .man of ,*ction^ who. laughV.jatv the 'persons he elseTCh'j^^ 'ternis metre bkUad-nKHi|pers. - ,Pcr r

haps, bad it been his good fortune to have been born after Shakespeare's time, and to have lived long enough to bs able to read him with affection and judgment, he might have learned that even a soldier must sicgiugly express himself, when Nature or I Nature's true interpreter, the supreme drai matist, requires him. Of course, the lyric vein in a Hotspur is not quite the same as the lyric vein in a Macbeth, a Hamlet, | a Lear, or an Othello ; but it is still a lyric vein, and will be found expressing it-self in accordance with the need and the circumstance of the Hotspur nature. As witness : O gentlemen, the time of hfe is short! To spend that shortness basely were too long, If liifc did ride iipon a dial's point, Still ending at the arrival of an hour. An' if we lire, we live to tread on kings ; If die, brave death, when princes die with us! Isow, for our consciences, the arms are fair, When the intent of bearing them is just. And, Sound all the lofiy instruments of war, And by that music let us all embrace ; For, heaven to earth, some of us never shall A second time do such, courtesy. And. in addition to what is thus expressed. Shakespeare here gives us what is unexpressed — the poetry of 'Hotspur's unconsciousness, or freedom from suspicion that he himself will be one of these who AviJl never again exchange greetings with their friends. IX. Even villany will iww and then lyrically express itself. Of this we have a notable instance in ''Richard the Third," who can. sa to speak, "coo you as gently as a ."tucking Anyway, what poetry, what lyric movement, we have heie : Now is the winter of our discontent 3lade. glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried. Now are cur brows bound with victorious wreaths ; Our bruised arms liung up for monuments : Our stem alarum? changed to merry meetings. Our dreadful marches to delightful measures. Grim-vissged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front ; And now, .instead of mounting barbed steeds To fright the souls of fearful adversaries, He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber To the lascivious pleasing of a lute. How comes it that such a ruthless criminal, such a social curmudgeon as Richard con thus singiogly express himself? Doubtless, there are people who will argue that such melodious i speech, such beauty of expression, is out. of keeping with such a character. But the odd* are against them, not only on Shakespeare's' account, but on that of" Nature herself. Think of Burns, think of Byron, think of Verlaine, and other utterers of "dulcet and 'harmonious bicnfch." and of the want of harmony betv.cen their genius for this and too many of their moral and social characteristics. It i« the old j>sycho-chemico mystery of your priceless pearl in your putrefying oyster; or, in ether words* it is not quite an uncommon' thing for the heart of a Nero and the voice of an angel io inhabit the same body. There is, therefore, warranty for the* combination in such characters as Richard the Third, who can talk tike singinjr seraphs and ensile like shining saints when moved by passion or policy. This very villain of a "Richard can, in the full tide of his mephistopbelianism, appeal so lyrically to the feelings of the woman whose husband and husband's father he has foully irxurdered that he need's must chant forth — "Was ever woman in this lnimour weoed 9 Was ever woman in this humour won? ' I'll have her; but I will not keep her long! ; She herself, poor thing, touches the core J of the matter, later on, when she saye — j My woman's heart Grossly grew captive to his honey words. Is this, however, not only an exemplification of a grim humour that runs all through Nature, for doss the rascally old thrush not sometimes win the maiden hen-bird by the cunning use of a melody that is unapproachable by his inexperienced younger rival? Shakespeare himself speaks of the "ancient eloquence" of old men in connection with, the courtship of young women ; Ohauoer makes mirth of the circumstance ; and the ballads, folk-songs, and proverbs of almost every country in the world abound in references to the subject, anent which one of the rural heroines of Burns sings by way of protest : The blude-rea rose at Yule may blaw, The simmer lilies bloom in gnaw. The frost may freeze the deepest sea. But an auld man shall never daunton me. To dannton'rne, and me sac young, Wi' his fause heart and flatt'ring tongue, That is the thing you ne'er shall see, For an auld man shall never daunton me. Still it moves ; Nature is not awed' from the career of her humour, any more than Benedick was, by quips and sentences and paper bullets of the brain ; indeed, the repetition of these, age after age, only testifies to the success of her persistency in the matter. So, politic scoundrels like Richard the Third "and frosty Januaries enamoured of rosy Mays continue to simulate feeling at that lyric level whence it flows naturally into poetry, or, if not into poetry, into a persuasiveness which passes for it, and makes a somewhat _ similar impression on the emotions of the listener. X. Of all the passions, love lives more than any other on the lyric level of emotion. "Romeo and Juliet," pre-eminently a love play, might be cited in support of this statement. Yet its lyrical quality in the matter of expression can hardly be shown by means of quotation. This is because there is so much, turbulence in the feelings and so much turmoil in the action of the chief characters. These are constantly expressing themselves lyrically, but they are constrained by the situation to do so after th-i manner of "sweet bells jangled out of tune." So, though the whole play might bo cited as a- crowning instance of the lyric element in Shakespeare, it would have to be taken in. its .entirety, and not this or

! that pasage only, though here and there a i magical line or two, like Juliet's esclama- , tion, might be specially dwelt upon : Hist, Borneo, lust! O for a falconer's voice, To lure this tassel -gentle back again! But of lovers in the lyric vein many examples might be given, though two or I three will suffice for the present purpose. \ Fur instance, Ba-vsanio, in the "Merchant of Venice"' : , ' In Belmont is a lady rightly left ; And she is fair, and fairer than that woid, Of wondrous virtues; sometimes from her eyes I did Teceive fair speech.ess messages : Her name is Portia ; . . ancl her sunny locks Hang on her temples like a golden fleece. ' Or Florizel, to Perdita, in ''The Winter's Tale" : I What you do Still betters what is done. "When you speak, sweet, I'ld have you do it ever: when you sing, I'ld have you buy and sell fo, bo give alms, Pray so ; and, for the ordering of your affairs, To sing them too; when you do dstnee, I wish you A wave o' the sea, that you might ever* do but that; move still, still so, And own no other function : each your doing, So singular in each particular, i Crowns what you are doing in the present j deed, , That a.l your acts are queens. Or Lysander, in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" : Ay. me, for aught that I could ever lead, Could ever hear by tale or history, The course of true love never did run smooth ; But either it was different in blood. Or else misgrafted in respect of years. Or else it stood upon the choice of friends, Or, if there were a sympathy in choice. War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it, licking it momentary as a sound. Swift as a shadow, short as any dream ; Brief as the lightning in the collided night, That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth, j Ancl ere a man hath power to say. "Behold!" The jaws of darkness do devour it up. XI. But perhaps it is when he is at work within the sphere of what Matthew Arnold rails natura l magic that the lyric element in Shakespeare is rn,cst convincingly in evidence. The melody arises mystically here and there, or steals haunt in<rly through immemorial wood) or vale ; all the horns of Elfland are blowing in the morning air, or its silvern flutes are heard resounding tlrroutrh immaculate moonlight from its far-withdrawing glades. Listen to Hippo - Ivta and Theseus in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" : Hip.- I was with Hercules. and Cadmus once, When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear With hounds of Sparta; never did I hear Such ea'lant chiding: for. besides the groves, The skie?. the fountains, every region near. Seem'd all one mutual cry; I never heard So musical a, discord, such swet thunder. The. • My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind. So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung With ears that sweep away lhe niormng dew; Crcok-knee'd, and dew-lapp'cL, like Thesaalian bulls; , , Slow in pursuit, but niatch'd in mouth like bells,' I Kach under each. .A cry more tuneable I Was never hol'.a'd to, nor cheer'd with horn, i In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly; Judge when you hear. The very music they describe is in every syllable of the speakers. Oberon in the same play Teallv runs a lyric lap, of which precisely the same tlning may be said : IMy gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememI berest i Since once I sat upon a promonlory, , And heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath That the rude sea grew civil at her song. And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, . To hear the sea-maid's musia

Tliis dulcet and harmonious breath pervades, tco, the speech made- in i *Benry-+he-Fourtih" by Lord March to his youngWelsh wife, the daughter of Owen Glen\ dower : But I -will never -be *~truaiHr, love," - Till I have leaned . thy -language;. ,f or .thy tongue ; * I ' -„---- i Makes Welsh as sweet as ditties highly penn'd, Sung by a fair queen in a summer's bower, With ravishing division, to her lute. Kven Caliban, who, however, be it remembered, is capable of saying that he will b i muss hereafter ancl seek" for graces — even Caljbari^ViJes'Ho-.the lyric level,' and that, too, well wifcbin'.the borders of the divine land.'of.;natural magic': Be' not afpard ; the isle is full of noises, j Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and i hurt not. ,i j Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments ! j Will hum about mine ears, and sometimes j voices 1 That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming. The clouds methought wou'.d open and show richas ! Ready to drop upon me, that, when I waked, 1 i I cried to dream again. On a different plane and in ano-t'lief I atmosplieie. there is a memorable lyric quality in the 'lines of Perdita in „ "The Winter's Tale." when she is distributing | flowers at the sheep-shearing feast : Daffodils,,- -. That come before the swallow dares, and take I The winds of March with beauty ; violets dim, ' But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes , |Or Cytherea's breath , pale primroses. That die unmarned, ere they can behold Bright "Phoebus m his strength — a malady Most incident io maid" ; bold oxlips and The crown imperial; lilies of all kinds, The flower-de-Inco being one! Oh, these I lack. To make you garlands of, and my sweet friend, To strew him o'er and o'er. Even the first fifteen words here quoted constitute, in themselves, a lyric poem of urparalleled loveliness, and the- whole passage is instinct with what Milton, in "Comus," calls divine, ■enchanting ravishment". And who, in this connection, could fail to recall the scene at •Belmont, with Lorenzo and Jessica, in "The Merchant of Venice" ? Lor. . The moon shines bright , in such a night as this, When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, And they did make no noise, in such a night TroiLus mcthinks mounted the Troyan walls j And sigh'd his soul towards the Grecian ! tents. Where Cressid lay that night. . . . ' In such a night Stood Dido with a willow in her, hand. ' Upon the wild sea banks, and waft her love To come again to Carthage. . . ,How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! Here will we sit and let the sounds of music Creep in our ears . soft stillness and the ! night • Become the touches of sweet harmony. ! Sit. Jessica. Look how the floor of heaven ' Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold: There's not the smallest orb which thou , behold'st I But in his motion like an angel sings, Still quiring to thq young-eyed cherubims; ! Such harmony is fn immortal souls; But whilst this muddy vesture of -decay" Doth grossly close it in we cannot hear it. '"/'. '■*,'..' - :Sirj Bufc enough, if not too much ; and yet not too much .either, if anything here said pliouilcl have the effect of, inducing any living creature to become a', -loving reverent student of Shakespeare's works ; not only for the sake of their immortal lyric elements, but chiefly for that of becoming better acquainted with God's own men and women through the thousand and one types co marvellously recreated — in scwl and mind and h£art — by the greatest genius That ever lived in the tide of times.