During these twelve or
fourteen years the lyric note is not obtrusive; it is usually
subordinated to character and suited to action.
His third and last period begins with "Pericles" and ends with the
"Tempest"; it is characterized, as we shall see later, by bodily
weakness and by a certain contempt for the dramatic fiction. But the
knowledge of the instrument once acquired never left Shakespeare. It is
true that the lyric note becomes increasingly clear in his late
comedies; but prose too is used by him with the same mastery that he
showed in his maturity.
In the first period Shakespeare was often unable to give his puppets
individual life; in maturity he was interested in the puppets themselves
and used them with considerable artistry; in the third period he had
grown a little weary of them and in "The Tempest" showed himself
inclined, just as Goethe in later life was inclined, to turn his
characters into symbols or types.
The place of "Twelfth Night" is as clearly marked in Shakespeare's works
as "Romeo and Juliet" or "The Tempest.
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