ir r- the faces, re is yet no DRAMA-its im- should we know of the the characters, which the learned Pheni- And yet are the scholars of our time encing the publication of these bold, original, and most ingenious and interesting VII.-1 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New York MILLER & HOLMAN, EDITORIAL NOTES, 101, 214, 326, 435, 546, American Literature and Reprints.-Pliny Publishers and Critics-Allibone's Critical Squier's Central America-Dr. Kane's New Novels-Edith; or, The Quaker's Daughter- Purchase-Dreams and Realities of a Pastor and Teacher-Early Greek Romances- Napoleon's Confidential Letters-Life of Jeffrey, by Lord Cockburn-The Attaché in Spain-The Day Star-Life of Washing- ton, by Washington Irving-Grace Green- wood's New Volume of Tales-Woman's Faith - Creole Orphans-Lost Hunter- Natty, a Spirit-Zoe-Sumner's Speeches. Travels.-Ewbank's Sketches of Brazil- Jarves's Parisian Sights and French Princi- ples-The Kansas of Mr. Green-Mrs. Ferris' Mormons at Home. Philosophy.-Schweg- ler's History of Philosophy-Mr. Tappan's Elements of Logic. Science.-Elements- Analytical Mechanics, and the Spherical Astronomy-Annual of Scientific Discovery -Gosse on the Ocean. Miscellaneous.-- Mackie's Life of Schamyl-Fourth Volume of Poe's Works-Maginn's Shakespearian Papers Dr. Raphall's Jews - Young's American Statesmen-Barnard's Journal of A Perceptible falling off of "Sensation Books" -What is Likely to take their Place? Our Young Writers-A few Words as Hints- Appleton's Cyclopædia of Biography--Liter- ary Criticism, and other Papers, by the late Horace Binney Wallace-Dr. Gilman's Con- tributions to Literature--At Home and Abroad, by Margaret Fuller-Liberty and Slavery, by Professor Bledsoe-List's Na- tional System of Political Economy Ida Pfeiffer's Second Journey-The Madeira of Mr. March--Lieut. Brewerton's Kansas-- Bohn's Libraries-Smyth's Lectures on the French Revolution-Beaumont and Fletch- er-Defoe's Works-Memoirs of Philip de Comines-Motley's Dutch Republic--Harp- European Literature England.-Burton's Art Matters.--The End of the Opera-What The Opera.-Mr. Paine-Banks and Richard- son vs. Meyerbeer and Rossini-Mr. Paine in Boston-What Boston did for Mr. Hac- Jenny Lind once more in America-Now in London-Madame La Marquise de Candia -Drury Lane-Madame Alboni-A New Opera Buffa-Fiorini-Concerts with Us-- The Philharmonic-Mr. Gottschalk--Rachel leaving Havana-King Charming and the Blue Bird-Pocahontas-A New Piece at the Français-Jaconde The Varieties-Le Royaume des Calembours-London, and the Cloth of Gold-The Theatres-Cold Terms-Mr. Brougham-Mr. M. Vickar- Mrs. Bennett-Barrow's Comedies-A Bur- lesque on Don Quixote--Blondel-A Child's Theatre The French Gymnase des Enfants -Boston Importation of Sculpture by the The World of New York.-March, a Blusterer and a Nuisance-A Herald of Spring-The Cold and the Ills it brings-The Charms of Winter A Christmas Dinner-Christmas Around the Register--A Hole in the Floor -Lord Palmerston's Definition of Dirt-- Snow in New York and Snow in the Country The Streets, their Appearance-Snow-clad Roofs Two Weary Months---Welcome is March, Harbinger of Spring-Our Opera House--Madame Lagrange-Philadelphia and Boston-Miss Hensler-Brignoli Ro- vere and Didiée-Arditi's New Opera-- Rossini and Meyerbeer-Our Philharmonic Concerts Classical Berlin--Old Print of Albert Dürer's Mr. Bristow-Gottschalk -The Varieties - Wallack's-Burton's- The Broadway--Miss Keene--Mr. Lenton -Duke Humphrey's Dinner-She Stoops to Conquer Mr. Walcot-An American Comedy Mdlle. Rachel in America-Pri- vate Theatricals- Good Pictures in America Our Sculptors-Engravings after Cole's Voyage of Life, by James Smillie. . 331 The Past Winter Our Highways-Broadway like the Boulevards, Paris--" Was the Fact"-Our Grandmothers-A New Eng- land Legend-Winter's Tale-Burton, Miss Laura Keene, and Wallack-Mr. Walcot- Knights of the Round Table-Heir-at-Law -Poor Plays and Poor Actors-Their Fault --What is Needed--Craving for Amuse- ment The Academy-Astor Place-Clin- ton Hall-Mr Curtis's Lectures-Cordial Criticisms- Crawford's Beethoven "Inau- guration" in the Music Hall of Boston. 445 A Welcome to May-The Ancient Holiday- PUTNAM'S MONTHLY. A Magazine of Literature, Science, and Art. VOL. VII.-JAN., 1856.-NO. XXXVII. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE AND HIS PLAYS; AN INQUIRY CONCERNING THEM." OW can we undertake to account HOW for the literary miracles of antiquity, while this great myth of the modern ages still lies at our own door, unquestioned? This vast, magical, unexplained phenomenon which our own times have produced under our own eyes, appears to be, indeed, the only thing which our modern rationalism is not to be permitted to meddle with. For, here the critics themselves still veil their faces, filling the air with mystic utterances which seem to say, that to this shrine at least, for the footstep of the common reason and the common sense, there is yet no admittance. But how can they instruct us to take off here the sandals which they themselves have taught us to wear into the inmost sekos of the most ancient sanctities? THE SHAKESPEARE DRAMA—its import, its limitations, its object and sources, its beginning and end-for the modern critic, that is surely now the question. What, indeed, should we know of the origin of the Homeric poems? Twentyfive hundred years ago, when those mys tic characters, which the learned Phenician and Egyptian had brought in vain to the singing Greek of the Heroic Ages, began, in the new modifications of national life which the later admixtures of foreign elements created, at length to be put to their true uses, that song of the nation, even in its latest form, was already old on the lips of the learned, and its origin a tradition. All the history of that wonderful individuality, wherein the inspirations of so many ages were at last united-the circumstance, the vicissitude, the poetic life that had framed that dazzling mirror of old time, and wrought in it those depths of clearness-all had gone before the art of writing and memories had found its way into Greece, or even the faculty of perceiving the actual had begun to be developed there. And yet are the scholars of our time content to leave this matter here, where they find it! With these poetic remains in their hands, the monuments of a genius whose date is ante-historical, are they content to know of their origin only what Alexander and Plato could know, what Solon and Pisistratus were In commencing the publication of these bold, original, and most ingenious and interesting speculations upon the real authorship of Shakespeare's plays, it is proper for the Editor of Putnam's Monthly, in disclaiming all responsibility for their startling view of the question, to say that they are the result of long and conscientious investigation on the part of the learned and eloquent scholar, their author; and that the Editor has reason to hope that they will be continued through some future numbers of the Magazine. VOL. VII.-1 |
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