THE HESPERIAN.
A Large amount of Shakespeare literature is being
added to our library. Besides the complete sets of
Hudson, White, etc., and Furness' variorum editions
of separate plays, many of the most valuable works
of the great Shakespearian specialists are being pro
cured and "Shakesperiana" appears regularly in the
reading room. The work in this line is to be pushed
by our professor of English Literature and can not
but result in good. Yet it is well enough to remem
ber that a vast amount of useless and nonsensical
labor has been expended at times in "the anatomiz
ing of William Shakespeare," and that "Shakespeare
maniacs" are as ridiculous and as inconvenient as
monomaniacs of any other description. The man
who could think of at least four interpretations for
every passage in the Bible, and a hundred different
meanings for many single sentences therein, was not
more mischievously intelligent than some of the mod
ern commentators on Shakespeare. At one time the
Italians in their excess of zeal, came near "comment
ing" all the sense out of Dante's Divine Comedy,
and were not the average reader of English a little
less impulsive than some of the literary specialists the
author of Hamlet might fare as hard.
Two or three years ago when speaking of the
coming necessity of another literary society, an alum
nus remarked that he hoped that the time of its
formation was yet far distant, as it would add an
other evening to commencement week. The mis
fortune, then impending has at last befallen us.
Three literary society exhibitions will have to be
listened to, or at least attended, by all loyal friends
of the University, besides the baccalaureate address
and the commencement exercises. To intensify the
long drawn out agony there will be various late
houred banquets. Last year the alumni so effectu
ally entertained the graduating class on the night
before commencement as to keep them up till after
two o'clock A. M. of commencement day. That
this was a kindness to the class, we are inclined
to doubt, and some of the members ot the class are
entirely confident that it was not. It is a great pity
that each of our three societies feels called upon to
do just exactly as fhe others do and thus fill up three
evenings with exercises that except to interested
parties are practically the same; and it is also a pity
that only one of the commencement exercises can
take place in the day time. Is it brains or gas light
that gives the charm to the closing exercises of the
year?
The closer organization of our Alumni is a thing
greatly to be desired. The plaintive wail about their
inability to carry out their plans which one of them
inserted in the annual last year, should never be
repeated. The number of our graduates is now large
enough so that a goodly number of them ought to
get together at each commencement and reenforce
their enthusiasm for their alma mater. The very
cheapness of the education afforded by state institu
tions seems to produce in some minds a cold indif
ference towards the giver, that is, the state. We are
apt to look upon the civil government as cither a task
master or as a- machine constructed especially for
the use of politicians. Whatever it gives us we are
accustomed to look upon as so much found, a thing
to be by us appropriated but for which no thanks are
due. Through the strife of local factions the amount
of our biennial appropriation is fixed, and it comes
to seem as though generosity had nothing to do with
it. But that college which calls forth no feeling of
ardent attachment is a poor specimen, is, in fact a
failure. The line of reasoning which brings us to
the conclusion that the state is not generous is super
ficial and false. The wrong conception to which it
leads will pass away as the University becomes bet
ter established, and in the meantime all the alumni
should unite in an attempt to keep up an acquaint
ance with the institution and with each other.
THE CHARACTER OF HORATIO.
When an artist sets about the painting of a landscape his
first care is to rightly conceive the proper conditions of light
and shade, those that will most correctly produce the required
effects in the finished picture. Where some prominent fea
litre in the scenery is delineated, there must be the greatest
attention paid to the tones and shadows. By the brilliant and
sombre hues of foreground and background are the difficult
problems of representing distance and nearness most readily
solved.
The same rule of taste governs literature. As the artist in
colors throws deep shadows behind the foremost objects so
the artist in thought, in creative word-painting, brings togeth
er different ideas, different images, different personalities, and,
by vivid contrasts, bring out the silent points and gives to
the imaginery men and women are almost real and life-like
individuality.
In Hamlet the characterization of Horatio furnishes an ex
ample of what has just been said. Shakespeare has drawn
the noble friend of Hamlet as a figure in the background, has
painted him in neutral tints. Horatio is primarily a shadow
thrown into the picture to intensify the striking features of the
hero prince. Where Hamlet is hasty, Horatio is self-restrained;
where Hamlet is excited, enthusiastic, delerious and
almost raving, Horatio is calm, unemotional, collected and
reserved. The mental hurricane that sweeps over the life of
Hamlet is made only more intense in its effect upon the read
er's mind by the peaceful, even, unruflled life of Hamlet's
friend. Horatio, then, is in many respects opposite to Ham
let. Doth have their points of similarity, else how could they
be warm and trusted friends? Their differences are far more
striking than their resemblances and on account of those dif
crcnccs is Horatio important in the drama where he plays a
part.
That an object is in shadow does not prevent a painter
from giving it distinctness and many characteristics of form
and shape. If you have ever examined well-executed night
scene you will see how much may be almost concealed and
yet almost revealed. The ability to attribute well-marked
prominence to an object while, at the same time, it is shrouded
in obscurity is a task worthy of a genius.
Shakespeare has succeeded most admirably in giving those
few masterly touches to the character of Horatio which cause
it to assume some definite shape and proportion and that, too,
without removing it from the twilight dimness of the back
ground Much may be inferred from what Horatio says, but
still more from what he leaves unsaid, A single, delicate
stroke of the poet-painter's brush reveals far more than could
one, guided by a less skillful hand, in half a hundred.
With the first appearance of Horatio he commands at once
our respect and admiration. The practical common-sense,
