venger. This interpretation
is contradicted by the very play itself. "At Hamlet's side is the
thoroughly healthy Horatio, almost a standard by which his abnormality
may be measured. At Lear's side stand Cordelia and Kent, faithful
and sound to the core. If the hater of mankind, Timon, had written
a play about a rich man who was betrayed by his friends, he would
unquestionably have portrayed even the servants as scoundrels. But
Shakespeare never presented his characters as all black. Pathological
states of mind are not presented as normal."

Collin admits, nevertheless, that there may be something
autobiographical in the great tragedies. Undoubtedly Shakespeare felt
that there was an iron discipline in beholding a great tragedy. To live
it over in the soul tempered it, gave it firmness and resolution, and it
is not impossible that the sympathetic, high-strung Shakespeare needed
just such discipline. But we must not forget the element of play.
All art is, in a sense, a game with images and feelings and human
utterances. "In all this century-old discussion about the subtlety of
Hamlet's character critics have forgotten that a piece of literature is,
first of all, a festive sport with clear pictures, finely organized
emotions, and eloquent words uttered in moments of deep feeling." The
poet who remembers this will use his work to drive from the earth
something of its gloom and melancholy. He will strengthen himself
that he may strengthen others.

I have tried to give an adequate synopsis of Collin's article but, in
addition to the difficulties of translating the language, there are the
difficulties, infinitely greater, of putting into definite words all
that the Norwegian hints at and suggests. It is not high praise to say
that Collin has written the most notable piece of Shakespeare criticism
in Norway; indeed, nothing better has been written either in Norway or
Denmark.

The study of Shakespeare in Norway was not, as the foregoing shows,
extensive or profound, but there were many Norwegian scholars who had
at least considerable information about things Shakespearean. No great
piece of research is to be recorded, but the stimulating criticism of
Caspari, Collin, Just Bing, and Bjornson is worth reading to this day.

The same comment may be made on two other contributions--Wiesener's
_Almindelig Indledning til Shakespeare_ (General Introduction to
Shakespeare), published as an introduction to his school edition of
_The