OUTRAGE ON ‘HAMLET’

Evening Star, Issue 19782, 4 February 1928, Page 16

OUTRAGE ON ‘HAMLET’

REMARKABLE GERMAN FLAY BERLIN CRITICS’ CENSURE As patriotic Germans have long known, the best things in their “ Shakespeare ” were put there by Schlegel and Tieck. Recent y, however, it has been increasingly recognised that this gifted pair did not go far enough in their improvements, says the Berlin correspondent of the London ‘ Daily Telegraph.’ Theirs was an epoch 'of literary piety which imposed hampering restraints on translators. The daring of adapters grew proportionately with the sense of needier drastic treatment of the obsolete English dramatist, and a real step forward in the direction of an unexceptionable Gorman “Shakespeare” has been made with Gerhardt Hauptmann’s rewriting of ‘Hamlet,’ which was produced for the first time in December at the State Theatre at Dresden. Unfortunately, although the public was respectfully appreciative, the critics sent clown specially by all the leading Berlin papers are, almost without exception, emphatically condemnatory. Their opinions may perhaps be summed up in the phrase that the best things in Schlegel and Tieck wore certainly not put there by Gerhardt Hauptmann. . Hauptmann started on his perilous adventure from the idea, which probably no one will contest, that the ‘ Hamlet ’ which the world knew .today is not word for word identical with Shakespeare’s original. From a careful study of the text he cairm to the conclusion that errors of copyists and liberties taken by managers and actors had not merely mutilated words and distorted sentences, but transformed the whole action of the drama. A GREAT “DISCOVERY.” Hauptmann's chief “discovery” seems io have been that it was not Laertes, but Hamlet himself, who headed the revolt against King Clauddus. To clear up this point, on which fi the critics admit the plausibility of ■Hauptmann’s theories, large passages of dialogue are taken out of the mouth of Laertes and put into that of Hamlet. Incidentally the monologue, “To be or not to be,” is transposed into the fifth act. But the temerity of Hauptmann’s “ adaptation of Shakespeare for the German stage ” has not stopped short at comparatively trifling transpositions of this kind. His theory, demands a much clearer delineation of the political background of the play than is provided by the traditional text, and this ho has been able to achieve only by the introduction of new characters and the interpolation of supplementary scenes, with necessarily fresh lines. Indeed, one critic has established the fact that in the new ‘Hamlet’ Shakespeare writes 2,500" lines and Gerhardt Hauptman 450. NEW SCENES AND CHARACTERS. This thin edge of the German wedge which is being driven into the_ English poet comprises no fewer than six brand new scenes. In one of these we make our first immediate acquaintance with the King of Norway and two hitherto completely unknown characters. One of these is a mere courtier, but the other “identifies himself ns the English Ambassador by the riband of the Order of the Garter on his knee.” Another unknown Englishman crops up in a new scene in the third act to discuss with Laertes the disintegration of the Danish kingdom. There is also a fresh scene—perhaps really necessary in this case—-to prepare the unsuspecting audience for the assumption by Hamlet of the role of leader of the' revolt. As the mere producer Herr Hauptmann naturally had not nearly so wide a scope for the exercise of his gifts, but even here one or two of his innovations are rather startling breaches with tradition. _ Thus, Hamlet wears through a portion of_ the play a flaming red mantle, which must be _ unpleasantly suggestive of Mephistopheles. Mad Ophelia makes her entry escorted by a couple of nuns, and it is irreverently asked what these two guardians were doing when the unhappy girl committed suicide. “THE MONSTROUS ERRORS.” There can be little doubt that the respectful applause at the final curtain was a tribute to the past achievements of Hauptmann, who is still looked up to as the grand old man of German literature. It was not unchallenged, and there was some hissing between the acts. Most of the critics are none the less hostile because they are polite. One of them admits that “it is difficult to write calmly about the monstrous errors of this Hamlet.” One critic docs-- not write quite calmly about these errors, for he says: “Beneath Shakespeare’s verses is heard the rustling of all eternal things, but only paper rustles beneath Hauptmann’s, which are _ worse than anything he had written previously—■ empty, without form, without strength, and without soul,” Evidently the German dramatist has not added to_ his reputation by his attempt to improve the work of his great English exemplar.