The "Spanish Tragedy" and "Hamlet." Author(s): Henry Thew Stephenson Source: The Sewanee Review, Vol.

14, No. 3 (Jul., 1906), pp. 294-298 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27530776 . Accessed: 04/02/2011 18:41
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THE "SPANISH TRAGEDY"

The attribution

AND "HAMLET."
to Thomas Kyd and Shake

lends additional

of the lost play of "Hamlet" interest to the relations between

of many kinds Resemblances speare. works of the two writers. Such a coincidence can hardly be accidental
I had Had But And not been now

Kyd are noticeable

among the as the following

:
heart extreme several hate works :

that Alexandro's thought such envenomed with I see no that words credit have

there's

in the countenance. Sp. Tr. 3?1.

and the words

of Duncan

:
.There's no art in the face.

To

find

the mind's

construction

degree ; it is rather in the similarity of treatment and conception the great between of Kyd and the masterpiece of his successor. play The motive of both plays is revenge, in each for a murder. the dramatists of remarkable In "Hamlet" play and the murder is committed before means. by supernatural is revealed the murder, which forms part of the action, None will forget the burst of of a mysterious letter. is revealed the opening of the In "The Spanish

It is, however, lation between

not

in such verbal

similarities

that we find a re

Tragedy" by means human

at the moment that almost vanquishes Hamlet he grief no attempt of his beloved father's death. hears there is Though as a human character of many sides, to portray Hieronimo fully he experiences sufficient grief and sorrow to cause him to lose his mental
semble.

balance

sion of his wits

he is soon in full posses Yet temporarily. to his wife that their cue is to dis and suggests

I hope to show that there is reason to believe that Shakespeare in mind while writing "Hamlet" had "The Spanish Tragedy" it as a model, he improved it at and that, though he followed as an illustration that at the point It is noteworthy many points. in "Hamlet," corresponding with the above suggestion from

The

"Spanish

Tragedy"

and "Hamlet"

295

Hamlet makes the speech which contains the phrase Hieronimo, "To put an antic disposition on." however, was, Shakespeare, I think, too shrewd a judge of human nature to imagine that just been startled out of sane behaviour by the terrible revelation of the ghost could in the same moment, like as to plan on the instant be so self-possessed the Hieronimo, Hamlet who had ruse of assuming tion is doubtless a future the "wild The antic disposi and whirling words" that his fellows the general incoherent behaviour that has of the line, and which
strain.

cloak of madness.

could not understand, the utterance preceded

occur again under

Hamlet

fears may

a similar

The

author

of the crime

is revealed

to Hamlet

to Hieronimo trustworthiness his belief that the devil

Both persons by a letter. of their information. Hamlet's Elizabethan

? by the ghost the instantly suspect doubt is due to

superstition: namely, the power to appear in the likeness of a possessed dead person in order to tempt a living. This is a doubt shared likewise by Horatio and may well bid Hamlet pause till he have better proof. Hieronimo, from no cause. The however, suspects detail is unmotived. both men suspect, and both men resolve to test the However, Hamlet truth of the information which they have received. most carefully plans the "Mousetrap" it turns out which, though convinces him of his uncle's in an unsuspected way, guilt. Hieronimo in reality convincing this letter asserts does that he must He take time waits nothing. letter comes merely to him quite by accident. is not quite clear. be written It for investigation, but till a second more Just why is intended

in a well-known

should

to Hieronimo, but it is intended by Kyd to convey information to convey an appeal for relief to Lo its writer, Pedringano, by renzo. of the letter is that most calculated the substance Yet to harden Lorenzo's who was before so ready heart. Hieronimo, this as true in every re the revealing letter, accepts as completely his doubts set at rest. Both spect and considers are now ready to act upon their original and Hieronimo Hamlet and both allow their revenge to be delayed till the information ? end of the play. How can we account for this delay ? The answer to the form to doubt

296
er case is evident.

The Hamlet behaviour.

Sewanee

Review

"Mousetrap" on his uncle's scene beyond

is finished

and

to sit quietly by till the has planned then compare notes with Horatio But he is himself affected by the

the limits of his endurance. the By interrupting causes the court to disperse with too soon, Hamlet proceedings not Claudius, has made an exhibition the impression that Hamlet, of himself. Hamlet is himself of his uncle's convinced Though the affair that he will guilt, he realizes that he has so bungled to convince be unable others of anything but his own inability to act with reason. In the reaction of despondency he allows to be drawn away from Denmark himself but the moment his ; returns he hastens back to accomplish his revenge. spirit Hieronimo Why scene to the above Spanish quite so evident, yet a similar in the corresponding appears portion of "The of his the completion upon Immediately delays is not resolves that his to appeal will to the king. He be successful.

appeal to the point, he is so wrought Yet, when he comes up by his that he cannot say what he intended to say, and at last emotion dashes off the stage hysterically As in "Hamlet," the mad. to that intend left upon the court is exactly opposite impression In the sequence, however, Hieronimo ed by Hieronimo. merely remains quiescent until the end of the play. He has no excuse for inaction. requests
defence.

Tragedy." Hieronimo self-conviction, has every reason to believe

When

her to wait two scenes the wild

Bel-Imperia upbraids him and to expect great things, cannot be that This dismissed

for his delay but he offers a word

he no con

These cerning Hamlet detail

without

behaviour

and Hieronimo.

the question of Hamlet's insane in the sense that Lear is insane; nor is he believed in sane by any of the shrewder intellects of the play ? nor is Hier The key to their wild behaviour is the same. Both have onimo. exceptionally

characterizes both occasionally is not the place to consider in not He is certainly madness.

The revelation of the ghost, the passionate natures. act so powerfully and the burial of Ophelia upon "Mousetrap," nature that he temporarily Hamlet's looses self-control, control, same is true of he immediately The however, which regains. the character of Hieronimo.

The There

"Spanish

Tragedy"

and

"Hamlet"

297

are a few other similarities after the failure the queen, him for his

between

the two characters.

Immediately versation with father come "Do

of the "Mousetrap," during a con a vision of his Hamlet conjures up

long delay. come," says Hamlet, "your tardy son to chide, lets go by The important act That, lapsed in time and passion, of your dread command?" after his failure to ing Immediately his appeal to the king, Hieronimo convey conjures up a vision you of his come, son come to chide him for his Horatio," in this justice says Hieronimo, upper earth, To art thou "And delay. "from the depth To ask for tell thy father thou art unre

to chide

venged?" Hamlet

following of Fortinbras's debt tivity which When of

is spurred back the "Mousetrap" soldiers

to activity from the fit of despondency sight of a company by the accidental who remind him of his own unfinished

Hieronimo is spurred back to ac revenge. Similarly the sight of a handkerchief in his son's blood by dyed he accidentally draws from his pocket. the end of both Hamlet the play is reached and and Hieronimo recognize the offenders are the necessity of Hieronimo delivers

killed, some public of their actions. justification own plea. For this, however, Hamlet's his Horatio Yet he dies, begging sufficient. him:
Absent And To thee from in this harsh tell my story. felicity world

span of life is in to do the office for

awhile, draw thy breath

in pain

is not one likely to hazard in mind this close parallelism that Shakespeare's play may bear less resemblance It is than to "The Spanish to the lost "Hamlet" Tragedy?" in all its larger and that the first quarto, which hard to believe With the inference broader so closely resembles the sceond, bears any close if considered in the the play by Kyd. This, an almost inconceiv of the above list of parallels, implies light On the other hand, one can easily able degree of self-imitation. not only plots, but who borrowed that Shakespeare, imagine qualities to resemblance other dramatic model the most details that proved tragedy popular successful, of his time, would take for his to it in and adhere

298 the main meo done with

The

Sewanee

Review for instance, in "Ro what he had already the unpoetic transformed in our minds

the same fidelity illustrated, Yet he did in "Hamlet" and Juliet."

in "Romeo and Juliet." He dross of the original into the poetic ore associated genius. only with Shakespearian Henry
The University of Indiana, Bloomington.

Thew

Stephenson.