The first demand we make upon whatever claims to be a work of art (and we
have a right to make it) is that it shall be _in keeping_. Now this
propriety is of two kinds, either extrinsic or intrinsic. In the first I
should class whatever relates rather to the body than the soul of the
work, such as fidelity to the facts of history, (wherever that is
important,) congruity of costume, and the like,--in short, whatever might
come under the head of _picturesque_ truth, a departure from which would
shock too rudely our preconceived associations. I have seen an Indian
chief in French boots, and he seemed to me almost tragic; but, put upon
the stage in tragedy, he would have been ludicrous. Lichtenberg, writing
from London in 1775, tells us that Garrick played Hamlet in a suit of the
French fashion, then commonly worn, and that he was blamed for it by some
of the critics; but, he says, one hears no such criticism during the
play, nor on the way home, nor at supper afterwards, nor indeed till the
emotion roused by the great actor has had time to subside. He justifies
Garrick, though we should not be able to endure it now. Yet nothing would
be gained by trying to make Hamlet's costume true to the assumed period
of the play, for the scene of it is laid in a Denmark that has no dates.
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