The tragedies of Shakespeare are
devoid, one might say, or at least comparatively devoid, of all
preconceptions. He was free to choose what subject he liked and to treat
it as he would; and no sense of obligation to religious or other points
of view, no feeling for traditions descended from a sacred past and not
lightly to be handled by those who were their trustees for the future,
sobered or restrained for evil or for good his half-barbaric genius. He
flung himself upon life with the irresponsible ardour of the discoverer
of a new continent; shaped and re-shaped it as he chose; carved from it
now the cynicism of _Measure for Measure_, now the despair of _Hamlet_
and of _Lear_, now the radiant magnanimity of _The Tempest_, and
departed leaving behind him not a map or chart, but a series of mutually
incompatible landscapes.
What Shakespeare gave, in short, was a many-sided representation of
life; what the Greek dramatist gave was an interpretation. But an
interpretation not simply personal to himself, but representative of the
national tradition and belief.
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