begins to chaff it,
calling it "old mole"; one moment he loves Ophelia, another moment he
teases her, and so forth. There is no possibility of finding any
explanation whatever of Hamlet's actions or words, and therefore no
possibility of attributing any character to him.

But as it is recognized that Shakespeare the genius can not write
anything bad, therefore learned people use all the powers of their minds
to find extraordinary beauties in what is an obvious and crying failure,
demonstrated with especial vividness in "Hamlet," where the principal
figure has no character whatever. And lo! profound critics declare that
in this drama, in the person of Hamlet, is expressed singularly
powerful, perfectly novel, and deep personality, existing in this person
having no character; and that precisely in this absence of character
consists the genius of creating a deeply conceived character. Having
decided this, learned critics write volumes upon volumes, so that the
praise and explanation of the greatness and importance of the
representation of the character of a man who has no character form in
volume a library. It is true that some of the critics timidly express
the idea that there is something strange in this figure, that Hamlet is
an unsolved riddle, but no one has the courage to say (as in Hans
Andersen's story) that the King is naked--_i.e._, that it is as clear as
day that Shakespeare did not succeed and did not even wish to give any
character to Hamlet, did not even understand that this was necessary.
And learned critics continue to investigate and extol this puzzling
production, which reminds one of the famous stone with an inscription
which Pickwick found near a cottage doorstep, and which divided the
scientific world into two hostile camps.

So that neither do the characters of Lear nor Othello nor Falstaff nor
yet Hamlet in any way confirm the existing opinion that Shakespeare's
power consists in the delineation of character.

If in Shakespeare's dramas one does meet figures having certain
characteristic features, for the most part secondary figures, such as
Polonius in "Hamlet" and Portia in "The Merchant of Venice," these few
lifelike characters among five hundred or more other secondary figures,
with the complete absence of character in the principal figures, do not
at all prove that the merit of Shakespeare's dramas consists in the
expression of character.

That a great talent for depicting character is attri