My most honored friends, I share with you this
day of our Lord the 23 of January a most felicitous event of yestereve. When
with our own dear cousin and the right honorable Lord Mayor I assayed to
frequent the Globe Theatre during a performance of William Shakespeare's
Hamlet, a happier time I have not spent. The performance was nigh unto four
hours, yet willingly I could waste my time there on another occasion. Having
seen Kyd's Spanish Tragedy a fortnight ago, I anticipated a tale of revenge and
tragedy that would make my pulse, yea, my very heart, race. But what happened
in Act the Third could not have surprised me more. The character of the new
king did not die in the midst of the “Murder of Gonzago.” Aye, murder most
foul, it was, for in the story’s glass playgoers all saw the selfsame tale that
fretted and strutted itself upon the stage—a tale not of bawdry but of a king
bereft of life by one closest to himself.
My friends and I thought the character of Hamlet
one of exquisite introspection, such that he would fain have contemplated that
most heinous of acts and that which the Almighty has fix’d His canon against,
even self-slaughter. Indeed, Hamlet did himself agonize over this very thought
in a speech beginning “To be or not to be” with such piteous dolor as would
make one cry “Woe!” Our happy group did find the presentation of the ghost most
frightening (more real and more ominous than that of Don Andrea or Revenge),
Ophelia’s drowning most tragical (more so than the fearful end of Isabella and
of Bel-Imperia in Kyd’s tale), Hamlet’s woeful end most regrettable (far
surpassing any sorrow at Hieronimo’s death), and indeed the entrance of
Fortinbras most heroical and hopeful for the state (beyond what lay in store
for that wretched Spain).
For me the high point of the drama was the woeful
moment in the final Act when Hamlet and his wretched mother realize too late
that her husband, the wicked king, has murthered them both alike. The envenomed
tip, the poisoned cup, the knowledge betwixt them both did force mine eyes and
the eyes of all around me weep to look upon the sight. The actors did make us
every one believe that they were in verity the persons whose grand story they
represented so that we Fortinbras did say “Go, bid the soldiers shoot,” we
looked around to spy the regulars discharge the guns.
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