Moral Phenomena and the Form of Inner Experience in Hamlet, The Art of the Fugue and The Tears of Saint Peter
Abstract
In this book, I present a theory of art as a means of revealing the form of inner experience. Division of the work into two parts reflects a basic distinction between literary and physical art forms. Hence the first part shows how the relations between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia reveal the form of inner experience in the dramatic action of Hamlet; while, in the second part, this form is revealed in another way in music by Bach and Orlando di Lassus.
With respect to the first part, the form of inner experience is defined so that its conditions are clarified in a manner that shows how they are related to the portrayal of reflective life in drama. This makes it possible, in Part 2, to concentrate on the dependence of physical art forms on the interaction of physical modes such as sound, time and movement as a key to the expression of inner experience in music.
The discussion of Hamlet develops ideas already presented in Sensory Knowledge and Art, a book to which I will sometimes refer.
Introduction
In this enquiry, I aim to show how meaning in art differs from the logic of ordinary propositions about character and human values, by looking into examples from drama and music. A sense of the divergence of art from other kinds of discourse enhances the ability to respond to it as a portrayal of reflective life in action and thereby discover some of the distinctive ways in which it can explore moral phenomena and the form of inner experience. In this respect, by bringing to light aspects of personal and interpersonal experience and psychology that are otherwise obscure, I expound a particular kind of insight into human life and experience.
In the first part, the logic of dramatic form is revealed in a complex pattern of interconnected threads which are centred on relations between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia. This pattern is specifically related to the inner experience of characters and how it is shaped by a subtle play of interpersonal involvement. At the same time, the form of the work avoids a simple moral definition of character in the dramatic action. Thus, in the discussion and analysis of the play it emerges that Shakespeare’s mastery of dramatic form is responsive to the interaction of moral phenomena and the form of inner experience upon which genuine insight depends.
There is a change of emphasis in the second part, as we move from one kind of art form to another. For here study of the literary portrayal of human life in action is replaced by an enquiry into powerful expressions of its physical portrayal in music. This begins with a discussion of The Art of the Fugue, and we see how musical form can be employed to create an aural expression of various kinds of imagery from experience. Examples include allusion to a murmuration of starlings which evokes the inner motion of purposeful reflection, dance-like and repetitious movement to suggest a hedonistic loss of identity, and a falling body resisting its descent into the depths in a tragic disintegration of the person.
The other work of art I consider is The Tears of Saint Peter by Orlando di Lsssus. Here the physical portrayal is inspired by the dramatic poetry of Luigi Tansillo, and so, in this case, there is a fusion of dramatic and musical forms. This means that the music, which is the dominant form in Lassus’s work, can now achieve what is particularly suited to physical forms, namely an immediate sense of what inner experience is to the individual subject in particular circumstances. Here we also see the psychological power of inner events in themselves, over and above their moral content – and this is a counterpart to elements in Hamlet. Moreover, in both The Art of the Fugue and The Tears of Saint Peter we can trace the interaction of physical modes such as time, space, vision, sound, movement, volume and mass – whereby physical art forms explicitly portray reflective life in action.
The Form of Inner Experience in Drama
Hamlet
Definition of the Logic of Dramatic Form
In Hamlet, a specifically moral inner conflict is presented at the beginning of the play, and explored consistently throughout the shifting events of the action. In this respect, exposure of the necessity for moral virtue – and its complexity in actual experience – is central to the portrayal of reflective life in action. This stands for a much deeper and more subtle representation than we would see in a mere display of moral virtues and vices in the characters.
Moreover, we can appreciate that this dramatization of a conflict between the necessity for moral virtue and how it may be distorted by experience invokes a transcendental perspective by revealing inner experience as it interacts with and is shaped by social relations (in this case by filial relations together with status). However the dramatic action is driven by Shakespeare’s personal inclinations, and this is inescapable, the strictly personal is transcended by a form in which moral inner conflict in the action represents the nature of reflective life for a person. The dramatist’s exploration of the conflict and its psychological depth ensures that his passion for the form, and its insight into life, surpass all other personal inclinations. Even though the play must be given its moral and psychological substance by the author’s feelings and attitudes, the dramatic portrayal of reflective life does not simply represent them; rather they are drawn upon to inform the psychology of a character and his feelings and attitudes.
Hamlet’s relationship with his mother is interwoven with his relationship with Ophelia. In this connection, there is a powerful cohesion between the development towards his climactic encounter with Gertrude in Act 3 and a more allusive portrayal of his relationship with his lover and accomplice. The latter relationship is remarkable for its depth and subtlety in view of the lack of direct contact between the characters. Both in Act 3 scene i and the play-within-the-play, Hamlet and Ophelia are engaging in a performance, and we see no direct expression of their feelings for each other. Nonetheless, the dramatic action creates a strong sense of their attachment and how it is destroyed.
There is a tie in the logic of dramatic form between reason and feeling. This is primarily because moral intuition based on experience generates the moral judgements that determine our perception of the character’s actions and psychology. We can only think that slavery is wrong if we can imagine the experience of being enslaved – otherwise it might be justified as a pleasantly secure form of employment – the loss of freedom could be presumed to be outweighed by something more important. In this respect, sensitivity to imaginative self-awareness in dramatic form leads us into a knowledge of human life and experience that is unlike, say, a ‘logical’ belief in the social harmony promised by the individual’s subordination of personal ends to the common good.
In Hamlet, dramatic form is a counterlogic, and its opposition to propositional logic is implied in the sensitive exploration of reflective life in action. It is not simply that the play opposes certain ideas, its form opposes a standard way of reasoning and exposes its limitations in the understanding of ourselves and the world. Specifically, this is achieved by portraying in terms of each other the values of a community and the inner experience of the individual. Thus, dramatic form penetrates the superficial logic of our ordinary moral and practical judgements and plunges us into the intricate reflective life from which they emanate. With respect to the idea that social harmony is promised by the sacrifice of self-interest to the common good, it should be acknowledged that this general truth is by no means secure. While it may seem obvious that such sacrifice is common, appears to be normally justified and is certainly preferable to a universal pursuit of self-interest at all costs, license for a sober pursuit of self-interest that is not immediately justified by appeal to the common good may be necessary to a healthy community.
For example, when a young person pursues an aim in life it is impossible to know whether the accommodations of a community will be justified. To take an extreme example, though the young Cézanne had admirers, recognition of his ability as a painter was a long time coming, especially by the art establishment from which he persistently invited attention. In the meantime, while his art was developing he was supported by his father, and a member of the Academy might have claimed that it would have been in the interests of society if the painter had followed his father’s wishes from the start and become a lawyer. Clearly, this example highlights the fact that what is justified for the individual is not always self-evident and different observers can come to opposing conclusions, even when they might all seem to be qualified to make a judgement. Furthermore, while the common good is served by the contribution of each according to his abilities it is also served by allowing the individual to discover what his or her abilities might be and what suits him best. This obviously represents a conflict in what is in the common interest, and there are different ways in which the common good can be in conflict with self-interest.
Though individuals may differ in the seriousness with which they exercise their freedom of choice in this matter, and some are cavalier or outrageous in their ambition, self-interest can be quite sober and reasonable even when the person is destined to fail. Moreover, self-interest can take the form of retreat from the challenge into a safe alternative, which may deprive the community of a genuine talent. Thus, the range of possible ways in which self-interest can be related to the common good, together with the impossibility of always knowing just how the common good will be served by a person’s actions, compromises the maxim. While there are many things to support it – a parent must frequently sacrifice self-interest for the good of its children, and we must recognize the possessions and well-being of others regardless of our own impulses and desires – a healthy community will permit some leeway to self-interest when its consequences for the common good are uncertain. Therefore, in some relevant circumstances, this freedom from the necessity to subordinate self-interest to what appears to be the common good can itself be in the interests of the common good.
This example is characteristic of the qualification that is appropriate to propositional logic as it applies to human life and experience. At first, it seems obvious that the subordination of self-interest to the common good is a moral imperative with which it is impossible to argue, but this is because we are attracted to the relation between them only from certain points of view and not from others. Because the logic of generalization about the relations between self-interest and the common good lacks the subtlety to encompass the complexity of reflective life, and its conflicting moral demands upon the individual, a proposition in the form of a reliable maxim cannot always be possible.
Sensory Intuition in the Logic of Dramatic Form
The logic of a certain kind of language, such as that of the proposition or that of dramatic form, simply refers in these remarks to how that language can make good sense. This may refer to the avoidance of irrationality and rules that are connected with it, like self-contradiction and non-sequitur; but it is more important to discover the senses in which the logic of the language is true to the nature of what it intends to illuminate. In this connection, the logic of dramatic form might superficially appear to be less precise than the language of physics. However, dramatic form is concerned with human life and experience, and in these matters its logic is greater in subtlety and scope than the kind of logic that is appropriate to the analysis of physical phenomena and their relations. A formal precision of which the logic is too coarse for the subject matter is of limited use.
We might begin the investigation of dramatic form by making an obvious but important distinction. For we should immediately recognize that its logic is concerned with something that is far more complex and intricate than narrative or story-telling, the succession of one event following from another. These are essential but only represent an aspect of the logic of dramatic form.
To see that a particular object is of the right size, shape and material to be a cup could involve calculation of some kind and therefore a form of computation. However, in order to perceive this object in the first place – and therefore to measure it in relation to its purpose – it is also necessary to recognize a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee, and recognition is not a computation. It is a direct intuition of an object that gives it an identity or character, and this character does not require computation or even judgement, but is spontaneously realized in an act of sensory perception. When we see a cup, we see a vessel for drinking tea or coffee and this gives us the criteria – should we need them – for computation. Thus, the criteria are the basis for computation and do not themselves arise out of computation, and this means that experience cannot be essentially computational.
In the sense that sensory perception is not computational we can see that it constitutes a form of knowledge that cannot be translated into something else – like a physical description as we might find in scientific analysis. For example, in addition to their physical properties, colours have a psychological significance. A direct perception of the colour red enables us to check the associations that might be made with that colour; enabling us to see that red goes with certain feelings like anger or sexual passion or empathy or a sense of danger. Someone can know these things by being informed of them without being able to check this information by knowing red as a visual experience. However, in the absence of sensory knowledge we cannot know the unique alchemy of colour in Rembrandt, Turner, Cézanne and Gauguin, or how colour, tone, form and space combine to create a definite aesthetic effect, or how harmony, rhythm, melody and tempo combine to give depth of expression to the music of Bach, or how sound, rhythm, phrasing and caesura combine to affect cadence and meaning in a sonnet by Shakespeare. Because such artistic phenomena are intrinsically psychological, and every successful employment of the sensory elements is unique, there is no set of rules for creating or responding to the precise integration of these elements; the aesthetic significance cannot be captured without including a direct sensory experience that cannot be translated into strictly physical language. In view of these observations about sensory knowledge and inner experience, we can see that a non-computational intuition of oneself and the world corresponds with the logic of dramatic form as an alternative to propositional logic.
The Logical Interdependence of the Physical Object and Sensory Perception
The separateness of mind and the incipient object, so that the former acts upon the latter, is what enables them to generate the character and identity of phenomena – something physical is given its character by the act of sensory perception, which is psychological (Nelson 2017). We can see, therefore, that the integration of sensory perception and materiality depends upon a clear distinction between the two, the psychological action cannot include anything physical and the incipient object cannot include the act of realizing the physical object as something in particular. This separation of functions is highlighted by the fact that in different sentient beings, say a person and a lizard, the same incipient object is realized as different physical objects (a lizard cannot see a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee). Therefore, both idealism and materialism are disqualified, and so are other fusions like neutral monism, and panpsychism. Experience is not another physical object and neither is it a part of a physical object. Realization of a physical object depends upon an absolute ontological distinction between the act of sensory perception and the materiality of the object.
Hence, we should observe the logical interdependence of inner experience and materiality that is implied in the realization of the physical object by an act of sensory perception. This is supported by the impossibility of translating sensory knowledge into knowledge of the kind that we see in science, the knowledge of calculation and computability of physical interactions. So, there is a close connection between the distinct roles of mind and materiality in the perception of a physical object and the untranslatability of sensory knowledge. If mind and materiality were merged as in neutral monism and panpsychism then sensory knowledge could in principle be analysed by a computer, since then the monistic entity could be analysed as a physical entity with an experiential extension. The latter would be translatable as instrumental to something merely physical.
The obvious analogy is with an organism. Here we can see the mind as an epiphenomenal extension of the body; or we can see the body as an extension of the mind. In the latter, we can see the behaviour of the organism as a psychology of impulses, thought, desires and feelings which are continuous with physical actions reflecting the ‘soul’ of a sentient being. In this respect, the language for understanding the organism would encompass its physical actions as an expression of its psychology. Both of these conceptions become contentious if the logical interdependence of inner experience and materiality is observed. Moreover, the logical interdependence of these elements is interactive in the realization of the physical object by an act of sensory perception. This is more than an epiphenomenal extension of the physical or a physical expression of psychology, and cannot be limited to a monistic entity that is physical according to one perspective and psychological according to another. In short, there is in the sensory perception that realizes the physical object something more than a merging of the physical and the psychological in which one merely accommodates the other.
The logical interdependence represents an indissoluble duality that entails a further duality, between the realization of the physical object and a primary form of self-knowledge. Because sensory perception gives the object its identity and character it shows a sentient being something of its own character, and can give us subtle intuitions about ourselves when the object is another person. In this respect, realization of the object entails a subliminal form of self-knowledge – which sometimes reflection can turn into actual self-knowledge. For example, my disliking the taste of fish tells me not only about a personal preference, which is an uncontroversial kind of self-knowledge. It also tells me of an aversion that has its origins in my early experience, especially as it is only one aversion of many to varieties of food. Knowing that my own make-up and past history give what I eat its identity and character confirms the interdependence of sensory perception and the physical object. And, since this interdependence implies an absolute ontological distinction between the two elements of inner experience and materiality, idealism, materialism, neutral monism and panpsychism, or any other theory that merges the material with sensory perception, must also be incompatible with a basic form of self-knowledge.
The action, therefore, is not a merging of elements but a transformative contact between contrasting elements. So, if both the physical object and a primary form of self-knowledge reflect the logical interdependence of inner experience and materiality then this interdependence must be true of all phenomena in all respects. A building is realized by the logical interdependence and so is a brick that helps to make the building; by the same token, so is an atom that helps to make it. There would be a logical inconsistency if the building were composed of some kind of entity in which the physical and psychological merge with each other – in terms of their composition we could never make a coherent transition between this entity and the building as a physical object.
To illustrate this opposition, we can compare two ways in which sentience might take place. First, the merging of inner experience and materiality is implied in a theory which begins with the idea that fundamental particles possess some degree of sentience. In time this grows with the cumulative integration of particles as the forms of life increase in complexity and evolve into organisms and eventually into animals that fully experience a world and themselves. A very different possibility is the evolution of physical systems into a life which originates experience as one of its elements. In this case, life is not present in any form in the particle itself and initially is only a prospect towards which the evolving incipient object is inclined (just as an oak tree, with its many attributes, is a prospect towards which an acorn is inclined). For this conception, the occurrence of life and sentience coincide as complementary elements and allow for the realization of oneself and the world as a possible outcome. Here, the physical object can be directly associated with the kind of being for which it is significant.
Dramatic Form and the Objective Portrayal of Reflective Life in Action
We can see that Shakespeare is unerringly precise about the psychological interior of Hamlet’s perception of his mother, and in dramatic invention the logical interdependence does not mean a loss of objectivity. The same interdependence applies to my seeing a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee, and that is not a merely subjective perception. We can consider it to be objective in the sense that a cup is seen impersonally in this way by a community, and this makes it rational. So, while the character’s judgement is not the result of reasoning the author’s psychological insight depends upon both reasoning and the logical interdependence.
There are strong psychological reasons why this objective perception could not be shared by a non-reflective animal like a dog or a cat. If we take a case of human insight the distinction is quite obvious, as, for example, when the friend of an ambitious painter observes the mingling of intense pleasure with uneasiness in the latter, as they view a powerful work by Cézanne or Turner. Here the interdependence is essential to the friend’s perception; a dog or cat could not know the experience of aspiration and vulnerability to the achievement of others that makes this observation possible. The friend’s awareness of what transpires is not simply subjective because it can be true of the situation – he is experientially equipped to respond to it objectively.
Thus, an accurate sense of oneself enables the dramatist to understand the mind and behaviour of other people. While Hamlet judges his mother by feeling and sensory perception as it is realized in memory and imagination, Shakespeare’s creation of the character depends upon the physical realization of a person with a particular psychology. The portrayal of Hamlet’s reaction is convincing to a community of readers because it has recourse to the feeling and sensory perception that can influence anybody’s judgement of another person. When he draws a character, the dramatist makes use of the logical interdependence, and the characterization demonstrates the action of this interdependence in the formation of a judgement. If the dramatist is Shakespeare this psychological turning of oneself inside out can be profoundly illuminating.
The individuality of the artist is essential to the representation of individuality in the character. This does not make characterization autobiographical, Shakespeare’s individuality is as essential to the (satirical) creation of Polonius as it is to the creation of Hamlet. A landscape by Cézanne is certainly an expression of the artist’s individuality, and this makes the painting a reflection of the act of visual perception in an individual. In both of these cases, individuality enables the form that is used by the artist to portray reflective life in action as a precisely specified experience. Inclusion of the artist’s personal history and cultural background does not threaten the objectivity of the portrayal since they, too, are essential elements in the individuality of the person represented by the form. Shakespeare enjoys a seemingly inexhaustible recourse to ways of transposing his own individuality into characters who have an independent identity and thereby portray reflective life in action, without their being autobiographical or merely the expression of subjective feelings and attitudes. In particular, this requires a profoundly sensitive integration of inner experience with the social and cultural conditions of the world to which the character belongs.
Hence the transposition of individuality does not entail that the artist has had the experiences that are given to the character. In the characterization of Hamlet, for example, it is not necessary for Shakespeare to have been betrayed by his mother in some deeply disturbing manner; what is necessary is a psychological disposition that enables the author to know how the character might react to such disillusionment. It is extremely likely not only that Shakespeare could understand the inner experience of his character, which includes the deceptive and self-justifying response that we see in Hamlet’s decision to regard his mother’s frailty as sexual in nature. This insight could not be convincing if it were based solely upon observation of others; it also depends upon self-knowledge, and it is in this sense that the individuality of the artist informs that of the character. Shakespeare makes an oblique allusion to this fact in Hamlet’s self-aware comparison of himself with the heroic persona of Hercules.
In general terms, his author’s individuality is more openly transposed in Hamlet’s characterization than in any other character in the plays, and, significantly, he might well be the subtlest and most substantial. Like Shakespeare, Hamlet is a student of the theatre and this is displayed in his gift both for acting and for writing dramatically. The latter is alluded to in his contribution to the play within the play, but the transposition is most striking in the many ways in which histrionic performance dominates his interaction with the other characters. A virtuosic mastery of disguise is complemented by his author’s wit and linguistic invention, and in this we feel the presence also of Shakespeare’s commanding intellect. It is possible, moreover, to connect the actor in Hamlet with what we have seen of his transfer of anguish at his mother’s betrayal to the play-acting that he inflicts upon Ophelia, which might include the self-dramatizing judgement of Gertrude’s motivation (Act 1, scene ii). And it is consistent with the elusive nature of his own identity that the guise of misogyny which makes him forget his love for Ophelia should follow his self-awareness about the perception of Gertrude just mentioned. Alternation between commitment to extreme attitudes and moments of insight into the meaning of his own actions is characteristic of a brilliant mind that is able to see into the moral volatility that animates his protean behaviour. Just such a mind is what is needed to create the character.
To summarize the position that is taken here: in order to achieve a convincing portrayal of reflective life in action the dramatist must create characters who are individuals, and this depends upon the transposition of elements from the individuality of the dramatist to that of the character. In particular, a transposition of this kind is necessary to reveal the character’s inner experience, since the dramatist’s self-awareness is the only reliable way into that aspect of the portrayal. Another person’s inner experience only rings true when it chimes with what we know of ourselves, either through memory or a strong sense of recognition. Furthermore, in order for the portrayal of inner experience to be true it must be consistent with the psychology of the character, and we have seen that relevant patterns of behaviour in Shakespeare’s experience have also been transposed into Hamlet’s. The success of this transposition depends on a dual perspective: ‘Frailty thy name is woman’ has one meaning for the character, as an expression of his attitude and feeling at the time he speaks, while to the reader and audience it can also reveal a psychological motivation that reflects that character’s individuality and circumstances. Clearly, this kind of dramatic invention is deeper and more refined than autobiography, and depends upon both an unusual self-knowledge in the artist and a mastery of the form into which that self-knowledge is transposed.
This argument elucidates the sense in which the logic of dramatic form creates a portrayal of reflective life in action. Though the play itself might include a social critique, the transposition of individuality that enables the dramatist to portray inner experience resists the temptations of personal desire and preference. In this respect, an artist’s self-exposure precludes the indulgence of self-gratifying illusions about himself and the world. So, while moral judgement is intrinsic to our responses, dramatic form can be faithful to the moral complexity of experience – specifically by allowing the disclosure of character to emerge from the disorder and conflicting passions of human interaction. To this end, a coherent characterization that includes our inner experience objectifies the inner life of the dramatist, and does so by making vision prevail over other personal inclinations. Thus, the transposition that gives the character his individuality lets us speak of Hamlet’s characterization as an objective portrayal, and, at the same time, this characterization is an objective portrayal of the form of inner experience in a reflective being. Both of these aspects of dramatic portrayal will be defined in the following enquiry into the interplay between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia.
The Main Relationships in Hamlet
The interdependence of sensory knowledge and a person as its object is the source of an objective portrayal of human life. In Hamlet, this is executed in a number of situations involving different kinds of interaction. In order to be solid and objectively true, characterization has to be psychologically consistent and sensitive to the interdependence, and the analysis that follows will show how this occurs in certain scenes of the play. Specifically, the realization of another person’s character by an act of sensory perception entails that the perceiver is more than a set of moral qualities. The spontaneous realization of personal qualities in sensory perception is informed by inner experience and is not a voluntary expression of moral attitudes and inclinations. What is objective lies to a significant degree in how judgement (including moral judgement) is influenced by the cognitive nature of sensory experience. This argument shows that it is not simply the dramatist’s detachment that makes the characterization objective – what Shakespeare knows of himself in defining Hamlet’s perception of his mother is theoretically recognizable to any of us and therefore rational.
Thus, we will see the interplay of Hamlet’s relationships with Gertrude and Ophelia as a central structure in a true portrayal. With respect to this intention, it is a theme of Hamlet’s opening soliloquy that judgement of his mother’s character depends upon a physical realization of her in his memory and imagination. Accordingly, attention to the logical interdependence between sensory perception and the object will enable us to see how the form of inner experience affects Hamlet’s perception of Gertrude and Ophelia throughout the play, and, in particular, how his perception of the former affects his perception of the latter.
Hamlet
O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew !
Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His canon ‘gainst self-slaughter ! O God ! God !
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable,
Seem to me all the uses of this world !
Fie on’t ! Ah, fie ! ’tis an unweeded garden,
That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this !
But two months dead ! Nay, not so much, not two,
So excellent a king that was to this!
Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother,
That he might not beteem the winds of heaven
Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth !
Must I remember ? Why, she would hang on him
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on; and yet, within a month –
Let me not think on’t. Frailty, thy name is woman !
In a little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father’s body,
Like Niobe, all tears – why she, even she –
God ! a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourned longer – married to my uncle,
My father’s brother; but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules. Within a month,
Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing of her galled eyes,
She married. O, most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets !
It is not, nor it cannot come to good.
But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue. (Act 1, scene ii, lines 129 – 159)
In these lines, we can see the interdependence of sensory perception and the object in Hamlet’s memories and imagination as he crystallizes his thoughts in a vividly physical realization of his mother’s character. The explicitness of this realization can be seen as highlighting the nature of our judgements when we think of another person, wherein the evocation of a physical presence is normally indistinct. What matters to the form of inner experience in this instance is that the other person’s character does not appear to us as something that is insubstantial and interior; without the physical realization Hamlet could not form an understanding of Gertrude at all. Furthermore, the soliloquy reveals how mental imagery that is dependent upon sensory perception can intensify our conception of the other person, and in this respect emotion and attitude feed on sensation.
We can see these connections emerge from line 137, when his thought turns from feelings of desertion and disillusionment to the memory of his parents in happier times. Naturally, he forms a physical image of them, and in keeping with the impulse the image is sensuous and emotional. This way of portraying the interdependence arises from a mastery of dramatic form; the interfusion of feeling with memories and imagination truly represents our inner experience and how the person appears to us. In this connection, Hamlet’s imagery has another aspect that is also true of our experience. For in the unfolding of this soliloquy we become increasingly aware that the soliloquy is a fantasy in which he accuses his mother of treachery and betrayal. Marriage to Claudius enables her to share the crown, and earlier in the scene we see that Hamlet is now a feared pariah with a legitimate grievance who is forbidden to leave the country. In reaction to this, the image of his father as a loving and protective husband contrasts his moral virtue with a clinging embodiment of physical desire, and initiates the transformation of a happy memory for Hamlet into a judgement of weakness upon her sex (in line 146).
The definition of Gertrude’s treachery is quite specific, and closely related to Hamlet’s conception of her attachment to Claudius. She is not represented as vicious, or devious, and neither is she seen as calculating in the pursuit of her goal. Rather the emphasis is placed on frailty, as Hamlet refers in different ways to an absence of character and moral strength. Her uncontrollable excess of tears is intense but short-lived, and there is nothing lasting in her attachment to the dead king, nothing that would represent loyalty and a genuine concern. In significant human relations, there is a suggestion of treachery in drifting from one passion to another without purpose or integrity, and what Hamlet sees in the response to her husband’s death applies equally to her betrayal of Hamlet, her son.
Thus, in Hamlet’s fantasy his mother’s tears are unrighteous because they reflect not the grief of a devoted wife but a flimsy surrender to feeling. Reference to the speedy transition from mourning to re-marriage is repeated in lines 152 to 156, which represent a climactic completion of his thought. Hamlet employs his sharpest imagery to imagine Gertrude as a practised exponent of sexual conquest, while the physical energy of lines 156 and 157, heightened by a special sense with which he uses the word incestuous, make sensory perception a powerful vehicle of emotion in the resolution. In spite of his excitement, Hamlet unfolds his thought in a manner that is highly organized and intelligent, and this enables him to perceive his mother’s behaviour according to his will. The imagery that supports a general perception of her as morally vacuous is perfectly suited to the conclusion that her replacement of King Hamlet by Claudius is inspired by lust – in this particular the portrayal is forceful and consistent, and, with respect to depth of character, in keeping with what we are shown of Hamlet’s attitude by later developments.
However, though Hamlet’s perception is inspired by memory and imagination, a detached observer might not be so easily persuaded. Building an image of Gertrude as morally weak and libidinous does not show that she is drawn to Claudius by sexual attraction, and he gives no concrete evidence for this belief. The action of the play strongly suggests that Gertrude has married Claudius as soon as possible in order to hold on to power. Moreover, Hamlet implicitly concedes the vulnerability of his position when, in line 153, he compares his unheroic fabrication with the labours of Hercules. Therefore, in relation to the argument that is presented in this discussion, the reader’s objective point of view reveals a complex interplay of thought, feeling and sensory perception in Hamlet’s inner experience, in which the essential role of physical realization is highlighted by his fantasy, memory and imagination. As the expression of such inner experience, these psychological features exemplify the logical interdependence of sensory perception and the other person as the raw material of dramatic form.
With respect to the main interest of this discussion, the delineation of Hamlet’s actions, character and experience is consistent with the structure of sensory perception. To understand it, we should consider relations between such perception and a detached analysis of the other person. If, therefore, the physical object possessed its own character and our perception of it were merely a representation, then he would not see a Gertrude irresistibly drawn to Claudius. Hamlet’s assumptions would ultimately depend upon an abstract psychological analysis that would lack authority. For example, the questionable proposition that all women are morally unstable where sex is concerned, and therefore that Gertrude must be personally attracted to Claudius. As it happens, Hamlet’s judgement is enlivened by the character that is given to her by his memory and imagination. It is by means of this authority that the taint of sexual frailty dominates his view of her. Thus, by adhering to the actual structure of sensory perception Shakespeare demonstrates how inner experience is instrumental to our judgements about each other. Here the judgement is overreaching, but this kind of perception can equally be a reliable source of knowledge about things and people, and is quite distinct from calculation and psychological analysis.
Act 1, scene iii
In the structure of the play, Hamlet’s soliloquy is immediately followed by a parallel scene that ties his situation to that of Ophelia, and this parallel is significant to Hamlet’s relationships with the women. Our recognition of the significance depends upon seeing how the initial circumstances affecting Hamlet and Ophelia act as a prompt to our understanding of their association in the unfolding action. Otherwise, there is no reason to include this scene in the play. Thus, it is clear that behind the valedictory occasion of Laertes’ returning to France there is a deeper interest in the intention of her brother and father to separate her from Hamlet. The enquiry that follows will show that she quietly mocks their efforts and that she will not act upon their guidance. This is an important indication of where Ophelia’s affiliations lie, in spite of her appearing to spy for the king.
At the beginning of this scene, Laertes delivers a lengthy sermon, and she makes a trenchant reply.
Ophelia
I shall the effect of this good lesson keep
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother,
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,
Whiles, like a puff’d and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads
And recks not his own rede. (Lines 45 -51)
Ophelia responds to Laertes by choosing to be unceremoniously worldly. We see her mockery in the obvious contrast in tone and in her impassive response to what she knows to be a pretence of concern for her welfare. Her unwillingness to argue about the position of Hamlet and her relationship with him, or about the preservation of her ‘chaste treasure’, might be seen as an understandable reaction to her brother’s effrontery. But the circumstances suggest a deeper and more disturbing reason. An assembly of the court attended by Laertes and Polonius (Act 1, scene ii) has ended with Claudius denying Hamlet the liberty of returning to Wittenberg, and this is a clear sign that he is imprisoned in Denmark so that he remains under the King’s anxious eye. Therefore, Hamlet is now an enemy of the state and a pariah to the prevailing authority. This means that there is no longer any immediate prospect of the kind upon which Laertes has based his argument that Ophelia will be cast aside in the interests of some greater imperative.
In connection with this argument, it can be assumed that Ophelia is well aware of her lover’s loss of status as it is inconceivable that the crestfallen Hamlet should not have confided in her, and we might assume that he has done so long before the king’s announcement. Thus, it follows that Ophelia can see through Laertes and knows that he is trying to rescue himself and the family from an undesirable association. In the view of Polonius and Laertes, Hamlet has become a perilous liability and could be the cause of their ruin.
Ophelia begins her speech with a deliberate ambiguity. In its obvious sense, ‘effect’ refers to what Laertes intends, and this makes the first sentence compliant with his purpose. However, given what we know of the situation, ‘effect’ also refers to the effect that his speech has on her and here the meaning is in direct opposition to the obvious sense. Against her show of compliance, Ophelia tells herself that she must use her response to his ‘lesson’ as a reminder to suppress any feeling that might betray her collaboration with Hamlet. The seeming compliance is needed in order to shield her true affiliation.
Ophelia’s reference to ungracious pastors shows Laertes that she does not need a lecture about the ways of the world and passes the enquiry back to him and his circumstances. The sting comes in the expression ‘puff’d and reckless libertine’, which insinuates that by returning to France he will be tempted once more, and that his susceptibility is closely related to what we have just seen of his character and personality. Thus, ‘puff’d’ refers not only to his anatomy but also to his psychology, in which lofty condescension exemplifies a male assumption of superiority. In this respect, the reckless attitudes of the libertine are assimilated to a more general conception of masculine egotism. Laertes has the tables turned on him, since it is he and not Ophelia who is in danger of being naïve and ignorant.
This subtle and disciplined response to Laertes is succeeded by a freer treatment of Polonius, upon whom she uses her wit to surreptitiously ridicule and unsettle. Being careful not to lose her own composure, Ophelia mimics her father’s wayward rhetorical posturing in a way that creates doubt and confusion and thereby unsettles him. In Sensory Knowledge and Art there is an extended analysis of her mischievous play and the ways in which it induces a sample of his tortuous polemical style. Thus, the scene ends with a deliberate ambiguity that indicates the main reason for including this action in the play. On being instructed that she must end all contact with Hamlet, Ophelia appears to comply, with ‘I shall obey, my lord’. But if we remove the comma, she is saying, ‘I shall obey my lord’, and when spoken the ambiguity is easy to conceal – the two senses can sound exactly the same. Polonius has just referred to Hamlet as Lord Hamlet, so Ophelia is privately saying, ‘I shall obey my lord, Hamlet’. Hence the scene that introduces Ophelia makes it clear that she is Hamlet’s accomplice in the action that follows, and this is essential to our understanding of what happens between them and how it is related to his feelings about Gertrude.
In the parallel between this scene and the scene it follows, Ophelia’s perception of Laertes and Polonius is similar to Hamlet’s perception of Gertrude. There is a consistent use of dramatic form to portray character in these relationships, and it is not the case that Hamlet is simply at the mercy of will and feeling while Ophelia is detached and purely rational. From the nature of her engagement it is clear that will and feeling play an essential part in Ophelia’s defence of her independence – without them she would lack the energy and imagination to withstand the coercion of her brother and father. In the absence of will and feeling there would be no awakening of the self-awareness and past experience that is necessary to insight into their character and motivation – her mental strength depends not simply on reason but on the interaction of reason, will, feeling and sensory perception. In this respect, her reasoning and Hamlet’s reasoning about his mother are the same; both are objective in the sense of being true to our perception of the object – in particular, the object as it is determined by an act of sensory perception and the inner history of a sentient being.
Thus, the divergence does not involve any difference in the structure of a person as an object of perception. Rather, the difference lies in the physical images of Gertrude that are created by Hamlet’s memory and imagination, in which he ‘sees’ her as weak and inconstant; the drive that is generated by will and feeling results in an imaginary perception, the type of which plays no part in Ophelia’s experience. An acute reader knows that her perception of Laertes and Polonius, including their look and sound, is perfectly in keeping with how they appear to a clear thinking and intelligent observer, and is thereby a reliable basis for an objective judgement. Therefore, an elusive interaction of reason, will, feeling and sensory perception is presented in the parallel dramatic action of scenes ii and iii of Act 1.
By being sensitive to the circumstances and inner experience of the characters, this interaction produces a delusory perception in one and a true perception in the other. And from its psychological detail we can appreciate the distinctive vision with which the dramatist is able to portray a person’s inner life. Of particular significance is the insight that Hamlet’s delusory perception is neither simply irrational nor hallucinatory, but arises out of the nature of ordinary experience. Insofar as the physical object is given its character by an act of sensory perception his images of Gertrude are a variant upon such perception, which makes them a direct and sensory confirmation of his judgement. The images are delusory because the interdependence of reason, will and feeling that makes our sensory perception possible also creates an instability that sometimes dismantles its rational basis.
Contrary to Aristotle’s definition of tragedy as a resemblance that shows us the fall of a good man we see in Hamlet something far more complicated. It is more revealing to explore the complexity of our moral judgement by engaging with the perception of ourselves that lies within in our sensory perception of others, and we have seen how this is achieved in the play. So, when we observe a cup we give the object its character and this enables us to see it as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee; but in seeing a person our perception itself is of much greater significance. Rather than simply presenting the individual as having certain moral qualities Hamlet involves us in the instability that threatens our moral judgement when we attempt to form a clear conception of someone else. This is particularly revealed in Hamlet’s remembered and imagined images of Gertrude (Act 1, scene ii), which invoke the shadowy sense of ourselves that often accompanies our sensory perception of others. In Hamlet’s experience, we see also how the compelling force of his image of Gertrude as sexually voracious in lines 156 to 159 makes his perception of himself all the more shadowy, as it suppresses the fleeting awareness of his own frailty in lines 151 to 153.
The second and third acts of the play are dominated by a dissembling response to the spying activities of the King, the Queen and Polonius; Hamlet and Ophelia collaborate in a succession of attempts to deceive and unsettle. In this connection, Hamlet anticipates their scheme when he lets slip to Horatio and Marcellus his intention to assume an antic disposition (Act 1, scene v, lines 170 – 173), and this phase of the action adapts the character of Amleth, the trickster in The History of Denmark by Saxo Grammaticus. Hence there should be no surprise when, in Act 2, scene I, Ophelia tells her father, with a sense of alarm, that Hamlet has appeared to her in a state of physical and mental disorder. This is her first positive action as his accomplice and the details provide an opening for what is to be a sustained comedy that is carried along by the resourceful deception of Claudius, Gertrude and, above all, Polonius. It is for his benefit in particular that the notion of a lovesick Hamlet is created. In this connection, it is significant that Ophelia’s disclosure follows immediately upon her father’s detailed instructions to Reynaldo for a surveillance project upon Laertes.
The tenor of Ophelia’s speech in this scene is exemplified in the following,
‘That done, he lets me go
And,with his head over his shoulder turn’d,
He seem’d to find his way without his eyes
For out adoors he went without their helps
And to the last bended their light on me.” (lines 96 – 100).
Here she speaks like a little girl who is caught up in things that are beyond her grasp, and ends with a quaintly outmoded conception of vision. However, we already know that she is quite in command of worldly things and has a considerable mastery of the language. Thus, it is clear that she is fabricating her reaction to an invented scene and that this would be obvious to Polonius if he were not so confident about his position in relation to her.
This theme is extended in Act 2, scene ii by Polonius’s presentation of a note from Hamlet to Ophelia to the King and Queen.
Polonius
I have a daughter – have while she is mine –
Who in her duty and obedience, mark,
Hath given me this. Now gather, and surmise. (reads)
‘To the celestial and my soul’s idol, the most beautified Ophelia.’ That’s an ill phrase, a vile phrase; ‘beautified’ is a vile phrase. But you shall hear. Thus: In her excellent white bosom, these, &c.
Queen
Came this from Hamlet to her?
Polonius
Good madam, stay awhile; I will be faithful. (reads)
‘Doubt thou the stars are fire;
Doubt thou the sun doth move;
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt I love.
dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers.
I have not art to reckon my groans; but that I love thee best, O
Most best, believe it. Adieu.
Thine evermore, most dear lady, whilst
this machine is to him, HAMLET.’
This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me;
And more above, hath his solicitings,
As they fell out by time, and place,
All given to mine ear. (lines 115 – 127)
Only the most insensitive reader could fail to respond to the comedy in Hamlet’s exhortation of love, and it is equally certain that Ophelia could not be taken in by it. We need simply consider his normal speech and virtuosic wit to realize that these trite and clumsy lines could not be seriously intended by the most lovesick Hamlet. Even Polonius, who is taken in, can see that there is something wrong with the use of ‘beautified’, though he does not mention that it contradicts the writer’s purpose. Nobody who understands the meaning of this word would use it as a term of romantic endearment. Thus, ‘beautified’, and the phrases ‘I have not art to reckon my groans’ and ‘whilst this machine is to him’ embellish the absurdity of the note as a whole. In addition to this expression of the disruptive intentions of the lovers, these lines make an important connection between the credulity of Polonius in accepting the letter at face value and his confidence in the dutiful loyalty of Ophelia. This is given a special emphasis by his affirming her obedience to him twice in the extract.
At the end of this meeting the King, Queen and Polonius agree to further the investigation by placing Ophelia in Hamlet’s way during his customary walk (llnes158 to 166) and eavesdropping upon their conversation. Common sense suggests that Polonius should have to arrange for the encounter some time in advance so that Ophelia would be ready for it, and this means that she would have time to warn Hamlet of the King’s plan. Thus, the relevant scene confirms that he does indeed know that he is being spied upon, as, with Ophelia’s collaboration, he appears to extemporize a performance that is directed towards the eavesdropping audience. In this connection, his ‘soliloquy’ is not a dramatically arbitrary meditation on the nature of life and death by a melancholy prince; rather, as we will see, it is structurally integrated into the complex action of the play.
Act 3, scene i
Hamlet
To be, or not to be – that is the question;
Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die, to sleep –
No more; and by a sleep we say to end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to. Tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;
To sleep perchance to dream. Ay, there’s the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause. There’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time.
Th’oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of despis’d love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death
The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns – puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pitch and moment.
With this regard, their currents turn awry
And lose the name of action. (lines 56 to 87)
Hamlet presents an elevated reflection upon life and death as a parody of the humanist philosophy that we find in essays by Erasmus and Montaigne. We can appreciate that he does so deliberately in a number of interrelated ways. To begin with, the theme is decidedly weak, since it is not our concern about what follows death that deters us from committing suicide but a strong attachment to life. Whatever our misfortunes and disappointments they are vastly outweighed by the will to live, and a compilation of unpleasant and disheartening experiences would make little impression on most of us. Parody is immediately suggested by the oratorical language in which Hamlet frames his speech, and we might contrast its comic effect with the inner speech of the genuine soliloquy that we have seen in the first act. Thus, the tone of this mock-soliloquy is established in the opening lines with their arresting declaration and rhetorical flourishes – such as ‘To be or not to be – that is the question’, ‘nobler in the mind’ and ‘slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’. Continuation in this vein is accompanied by a sense of light-headed, impromptu elaboration which suggests a pleasure that is taken from toying with ideas. In particular, in the repetition of, ‘To die, to sleep’ in line 64, in which Hamlet recovers the thread of his thinking in order to develop the argument; the connection of sleep with dreams leads into disturbing thoughts about what follows life, (Ay, there’s the rub’). We see the same improvised quality in the many ways in which the same idea is repeated in different words, and in how being carried away by speculation creates a loss of clear focus in what is being said. This is especially true of the close, where Hamlet allows the explanation to drift into a confusion of ending one’s own life with ‘enterprises of great pitch and moment’. We might recall from the opening soliloquy that Hamlet rejects suicide on the grounds that God has ‘fix’d his canon ‘gainst self-slaughter’. Consistency within the argument or with his own attitudes has little to do with what he is saying.
Hence the meaning of this speech does not lie in its theme; it lies in the use that the speaker is making of his theme. While giving the impression that his ‘despair’ is caused by Ophelia’s rejection, its meaning lies in the circumstances of this speech, including his knowledge that the King, Queen and Polonius are spying on him. In this light, our interest in Hamlet’s motivation turns from the theme of his musings to their form, and this is specifically related to what the eavesdropping trio have been led to believe about him. We know that their presence on this occasion has been prompted by Ophelia’s false rumour of a lovesick Prince, which has been substantiated by a letter designed by the lovers to mislead. We have also seen that this letter gives the impression of a mentally and emotionally frail and disordered individual who can barely express himself in words. Now, only a few days later, the spies are invited to witness a virtuosic performance of supreme self-confidence which seems to be boundlessly resourceful and is characterized by rhetorical skill and a complete mastery of the language.
Even the logical flaws and air of absurdity give the speech a comic vitality which the speaker controls with great ingenuity. For example, the development of his theme from line 70 culminates in, ‘Who would these fardels bear,’ (line 76) to ‘puzzles the wlll’ (line 80). The modulation of figurative language in these five lines turns comic excess into an exquisite reflection that is deeply persuasive to the ear and thereby creates uncertainty in his audience. Thence his conclusion, in lines 82 to 87, moves from the contemplation of life’s blows to an unsubstantiated judgement of universal significance. Here, ‘conscience’ is used in the sense of inward knowledge, which in this case refers to knowledge of our weakness in the eyes of God. But Hamlet’s analysis of conscience by means of metaphor is deliberately confusing. For if such knowledge makes us cowards and our exercise of conscience is equated with the ‘native hue of resolution’ being ‘sicklied o’er by the pale cast of thought’ then the argument is both self-contradictory and blasphemous. For we know that to live by observing ‘his canon’ it is essential to follow the guidance of conscience, and that according to Christian doctrine this could not be interpreted as cowardice. Hamlet lures his audience into an imaginary insight spun from his powers of invention; he transforms a demonstration of mastery into a mesmerizing spell. Thus, the speech is given its meaning by a desire to mystify and unsettle, as a preliminary to the ‘assault’ upon Ophelia that will add further shock to their sense of his mental state and character.
Ophelia begins the exchange by pretending that they have been apart for some time, ‘for this many a day’, and, unconvincingly to an innocent observer, is holding some letters which she has ‘longed long to re-deliver’. This is supposed to be a chance encounter and yet Ophelia has prepared for the occasion by bringing along a prop that will serve to generate conversation between them. Hamlet’s obstructive response is therefore an opportunity for her to enact the part of a victim of love; the emphasis upon her loss being merged into a moral reproach that is unjustified if, as the eavesdroppers believe, it is she who has ended the relationship.
In connection with all of these details there are no innocent observers, as the spies can see both the letters and enactment as devices by means of which Ophelia intends to draw out Hamlet’s condition, while Hamlet himself is fully aware of their real purpose. The only incongruity is that if Hamlet were innocent, as the spies imagine, then he, like any innocent observer, might wonder why she is carrying around a number of his letters to her. Hamlet immediately plays upon this incongruity.
Hamlet
Ha, ha! Are you honest?
Ophelia
My lord?
Hamlet
Are you fair?
Ophelia
What means your lordship?
Hamlet
That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty.
Ophelia
Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty?
Hamlet
Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness. This was sometime a paradox, but now the times gives it proof. I did love you once.
Ophelia
Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so.
Hamlet
You should not have believ’d me; for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it. I loved you not.
Ophelia
I was the more deceived.
When we know that Hamlet is aware that he is being overheard, and with keen attention, the logic of these lines is clear. Ophelia’s having the letters on her person is suspicious, and so his enquiry ‘Are you honest?’ is a challenging threat to the King’s design, while Ophelia plays her part by feigning incomprehension. Hamlet intensifies the eavesdroppers’ discomfort by asserting that honesty does not have the power over beauty that beauty has over honesty; suggesting that the King deviously uses the power of Ophelia’s beauty in order to carry out his investigation. Hamlet makes the connection in, ‘This was sometime a paradox, but now the time gives it proof.’ In his allusive way, he is taunting the King over a habit of deception, and this is abruptly turned into a moral reproach by the admission to Ophelia, ‘I did love you once’. Thus, his playing the situation as though she is fallen helps to substantiate the general truth that ‘virtue cannot inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it’. Because beauty and innocence cannot resist, youth too will join the ‘old stock’ and taste of corruption. Here a direct allusion to Gertrude and Polonius is obvious and intended to disconcert, and assault upon the former is a shaping influence in the exchange as a whole. So, Hamlet follows the logic of his argument by taking back the admission of having loved Ophelia, implying that he has only made use of her, and releases an outpouring that blurs the distinction between acting and giving vent to real feeling.
Hamlet
Get thee to a nunnery. Why would’st thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest, yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me. I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious; with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where’s your father?
Ophelia
At home, my lord.
Hamlet
Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool nowhere but in’s own house. Farewell.
Ophelia
O, help him, you sweet heavens!
Hamlet
If thou dost marry, I’ll give thee this plague for thy dowry; be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shall not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go, farewell. Or if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go; and quickly too. Farewell.
Ophelia
Heavenly powers, restore him!
Hamlet
I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another. You jig and amble, and you lisp, and nickname God’s creatures, and make your wantonness your ignorance. Go to, I’ll no more on’t; it hath made me mad. I say we will have no more marriage; those that are married already, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go.
This excursion into the nature of honesty is a further contradiction of the earlier image of a lovesick Hamlet, developing the mesmerizing effect of his mock soliloquy at the beginning of the scene. There is a thematic connection between the contemplation of suicide and Hamlet’s various ways of attacking the institution of marriage, and his pretence of nihilism is, in both cases, levelled at the degenerate activities of his eavesdropping adversaries. Hence there are moments when it appears that he is communicating with them through his exchanges with Ophelia, especially in the first speech in this passage. The phrase, ’it were better my mother had not borne me’ is intended to make Gertrude feel uncomfortable, while the following sentence is clearly aimed at Claudius, who is spying because he fears that Hamlet may be ‘proud, revengeful and ambitious’, and therefore a threat. The question at the end of this speech, ‘Where’s your father?’ makes a sudden shift in order to unsettle, as it suggests to the spies that Hamlet knows perfectly well where Polonius is situated.
However, within the attempt to confuse the eavesdroppers Hamlet’s preoccupation with honesty takes another turn. There is a particular vehemence in the speech that begins, ‘If thou dost marry’ and introduces the main idea with, ‘I’ll give thee this plague for thy dowry’. Hamlet’s tone invites us to consider what is conveyed in the idea and the effect that the lines might have not only on the spying King and Queen but also on Ophelia. Thus, we can appreciate that espionage, and even spying upon those around us, is almost inseparable from misrepresentation. It is quite rare to hear about someone being spied upon in order to discover his or her virtues, while rumour and gossip select the features of a person’s character in order to condemn, and suppress whatever might qualify or explain. Hamlet is saying that however blameless you may be your marriage will be defiled by the other people you move among, and completes the idea by asserting, in so many words, that you will not be chaste and pure anyway. Moreover, his rhetorical design and choice of words single out marriage by using ‘calumny’ in a way that suggests calamity. This is an exaggeration, as misrepresentation of one kind or another is pervasive in all of our relationships and its presence in marriage is no more disastrous than elsewhere. Nobody can escape it and generally it is only a minor distraction.
On the other hand, his identification of spying with calumny is not difficult to understand. Hamlet examines honesty from a number of different angles in this exchange; and the connection between misrepresentation and spying is related specifically to his being spied upon by his mother, who has chosen, at his expense, to further the interests of Claudius. There is, however, a dramatic complication in the very strength and conviction of Hamlet’s argument, for, though Ophelia knows that he is performing a part, she cannot but recoil from his attack on marriage. It is clear that the deeper his involvement in the argument the greater his rage against Gertrude, and this obscures from him the reaction that might be expected from Ophelia. In turn, he loses the self-awareness that accompanies our perception of others, and is no longer in touch with his own feelings for her.
Hamlet’s amnesia in this scene marks a critical moment in his association with Ophelia. For we can see quite clearly just how much of his purpose and motivation he has disclosed to the King and Queen. Already he has given them several reasons to suspect him of a complicated move against them and one which could be interpreted as a direct threat to their power. Of the eavesdroppers, Claudius is the most acutely aware of the implications of Hamlet’s antic behaviour, and in Act 3, scene i he tells Gertrude and Polonius of his intention to remove the threat. Whereas he formerly wished to confine Hamlet to the court he now finds the protean unpredictability of his enemy too burdensome and looks to exile as a solution. Therefore, insofar as Hamlet has skilfully contrived to unsettle the King, he must be aware that he has imperilled both himself and Ophelia, and that he should be careful to conceal her involvement as his accomplice. However, in their next meeting that we see, his failure to protect her is strongly implied in a series of exchanges that accompany the dramatic fire that is set alight by his use of the play-within-the-play.
Act 3, scene ii
Queen
Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.
Hamlet
No, good mother; here’s metal more attractive.
Polonius
[To the King.] O, ho! do you mark that?
Hamlet
Lady, shall I lie in your lap?
Ophelia
No, my lord.
Hamlet
I mean, my head upon your lap?
Ophelia
Ay, my lord.
Hamlet
Did you think I meant country matters?
Ophelia
I think nothing, my lord.
Hamlet
That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs.
Ophelia
What is, my lord?
Hamlet
Nothing
Ophelia
You are merry, my lord. (lines 105 t0 117)
Hamlet’s reply to his mother is not simply a metaphor, the ensuing exchange with Ophelia shows that he is employing a homophonic pun involving the closely related words metal and mettle. Thus, Polonius takes the phrase in its obvious sense, to mean, ‘here’s a sexually more attractive alternative’ and he awakens the King to this confirmation of his theory about Hamlet. In doing so he alerts all who are present to what is being exchanged between Hamlet and Ophelia in the lines that follow. The more complicated and intended meaning of the phrase conveys Hamlet’s recognition of Ophelia’s spirit and courage in acting as his accomplice, her mettle, and this is more subtly related to ‘metal more attractive’. In seeing her, he is immediately attracted to an idea, and his words associate the invisibility of magnetism with the invisibility of a thought. Hamlet realizes that he can make use of Ophelia’s allegiance to unsettle the King in advance, and soften him up for the climactic moment in the play-within-the-play.
These circumstances make it clear that the exchange between Hamlet and Ophelia has not been prepared, and therefore that she has not been given time to consider the consequences of this attack upon the King. Her being given no warning means that she has little understanding of what Hamlet is up to as she tries to cope with his public involvement of her in his outrageous innuendo. For example, the expressions country matters and nothing (no thing) are familiar ways of referring to women’s parts; with characteristic ingenuity, he bends her responses until she is unable to resist and is forced to play along with him (‘You are merry, my lord.’). At this point, he has achieved a measure of success in showing that Ophelia only appears to be on the side of the King but is really on Hamlet’s side. A much stronger exposure of this tie comes during the performance.
Ophelia
You are as good as a chorus, my lord.
Hamlet
I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying.
Ophelia
You are keen, my lord, you are keen.
Hamlet
It would cost you a groaning to take off mine edge.
Ophelia
Still better, and worse. (lines 239 to 243)
Ophelia’s obvious capitulation reveals to the King and his followers that she and Hamlet are lovers, and their earthy intimacy shows that she has only been an ally to the King in name. Thus, Hamlet has lured her into giving herself away and done so quite deliberately, as a psychological device intended to further his overall design. The exchange, moreover, takes place just moments before the conscience of the King is securely caught by the performance and it is tumultuously brought to an end.
From such an incorporation of Ophelia into his attack upon Claudius we might assume that he is cold-bloodedly sacrificing her to his own ends. However, we cannot understand his actions in this scene without a wider and more generous conception of his motivation. In this connection, we might recall Hamlet’s formulation of a plan to expose the King during the soliloquy in Act 2, scene ii.
Hamlet
Hum – I have heard
That guilty creatures, sitting at a play,
Have by the very cunning of the scene
Have been struck so to the soul that presently
They have proclaimed their malefactions;
For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak
With most miraculous organ. (lines 584 to 590)
In the lines that immediately follow, Hamlet qualifies his position by referring to the possibility that he has been deceived by the Ghost or by his own weakness and melancholy (lines 591 to 600), but the concluding partial couplet shows confirms trust in the course of action that he has chosen. Hence a strong feeling that the King will be unable to resist is tied to the conviction implied in the lines quoted – namely, that in the theatre a direct confrontation with his actions can drive a guilty man to confess. Just as, in the opening soliloquy, Hamlet sees his own weakness in portraying Gertrude as lustful but continues to nurse the idea, so he nurses the belief that the play-within-the-play will force a confession from Claudius.
Thus, Hamlet assumes that Ophelia is safe from the King’s retribution because the performance is about to make him bowed and contrite. This belief is re-enforced by the psychology of Hamlet’s elaborate plan. By the time he permits Ophelia to appear as his accomplice, he has expended a great deal of time and ingenuity on his design and each stage of its execution has fallen out as he planned. This gives a sense of inevitability to the prospect that he will reach his goal and that a new order will be established. So, Hamlet is not sacrificing Ophelia, but her security and his own depend upon his judgement that the King will be broken by the performance.
These intricacies in relation to Ophelia can be seen as one thread of the inner state which evolves in Hamlet as his plan unfolds. The danger in what he has undertaken combined with his apparent success evokes an obvious excitement in him – especially in the elation he shares with Horatio in lines 265 to 288. However, within this complex of deliberation, impulsiveness, anticipation and disorganized emotion Hamlet is engaged in a high wire act over which he has limited control, both with respect to what is external and with respect to what may be unconsciously brewing in himself. So, when, after being summoned by Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and then by Polonius, Hamlet goes to his mother to face her interrogation, the high state he is in turns into an inwardly generated vertigo that has appalling consequences.
To be psychologically specific, Hamlet’s state of mind is most powerfully affected by the crosscurrents of three obsessions, 1) the action that he has initiated against the King, 2) an unspoken desire to undo his mother’s act of betrayal in marrying Claudius, and 3) a sense of uneasiness about his failure, highlighted just moments earlier, to exact his father’s revenge. These currents are deeply intertwined, not only because his plan to demoralise the King is an elaborate substitute for direct action, but also because the second obsession subliminally inhibits his ability to act decisively; he can undo his mother’s betrayal only if Claudius is alive (Nelson 2017). Thus, in the closet scene (Act 3, scene iv), the disorder of Hamlet’s state of mind comes out in many ways.
Enter Hamlet
Hamlet
Now, mother, what’s the matter?
Queen
Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
Hamlet
Mother, you have my father much offended.
Queen
Come, cone, you answer with an idle tongue.
Hamlet
Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
Queen
Why, how now, Hamlet!
Hamlet
What’s the matter now?
Queen
Have you forgot me?
Hamlet
No, by the rood, not so:
You are the Queen, your husband’s brother’s wife;
And – would it were not so! – you are my mother.
Queen
Nay then, I’ll set those to you that can speak.
Hamlet
Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge.
You go not till I set you up a glass
Where you may see the inmost part of you.
Queen
What wilt thou do? Thou wilt not murder me?
Help, help, ho!
Polonius [Behind]
What, ho, help, help, help!
Hamlet [Draws]
How now! a rat?
Dead for a ducat, dead!
[Kills Polonius with a pass through the arras.
Polonius [Behind]
O, I am slain!
Queen
me, what hast thou done?
Hamlet
Nay, I know not:
Is it the King?
Queen
O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!
Hamlet
A bloody deed! – almost as bad, dear mother,
As kill a king and marry with his brother.
Queen
As kill a king!
Hamlet
Ay, lady, it was my word. (lines 7 to 30)
Attention to these lines will show that though he is summoned by Gertrude to appear and explain himself, the motivation for what happens in this scene lies in Hamlet’s obsession with the desire to undo her betrayal. This begins with his obvious refusal to explain his part in the performance, which reverses the spying activities of the King by exposing him as the murderer of King Hamlet. The initial exchanges between mother and son reflect the logic of this situation from the start; in lines 9 to 12 Hamlet responds to accusation with accusation, and when he disdains her authority she threatens to ‘set those to you that can speak’ – meaning guards who can make him listen and reply. Thus, when Hamlet answers threat with counter-threat, in the form of setting up a glass ‘Where you may see the inmost part of you’, Gertrude fears for her life. And his impulsive action against the spy who is hiding behind the arras is a further retaliation against the forces that oppose him.
In spite of the sense of purpose in Hamlet’s reversal of his mother’s intentions, his wild attack and what follows show that an inwardly generated vertigo has taken control of him. The lack of emotion or remorse at what he has done is both strange and shocking; lines 24 and 25 are detached and impassive, while Ophelia is a distant memory. Furthermore, this mood is continued in the reply to Gertrude that follows, in which the gravity of his action is submerged by his preoccupations, and in lines 27 and 28 he implicitly accuses her of the murder of his father. Here the loss of balance is clear; Hamlet is elated that his trust in the Ghost has been validated and the Ghost has commanded that Gertrude should be left alone. In this connection, Hamlet forgets a strong indication that she has played no part in the murder.
Notwithstanding interruption, Hamlet’s deeply considered purpose is in two parts: the first is to show in a stark and disturbing manner the moral offense that lies in his mother’s marriage to Claudius, and the second is to persuade her to engage in a form of redemption, one that, for Hamlet, will undo her betrayal. From lines 40 to 88, he delivers a perfectly composed argument that is rhetorical and enriched by visual demonstration, and its control is clearly owed to its having been rehearsed. With characteristic strength of description, image and comment he draws his mother into the orbit of his inner experience and, by removing the disguises by which we neutralize our moral indifference, exposes her ‘inmost part’ as he has promised to do. Hence, Gertrude’s anguished reaction is provoked not only by an awakened conscience, but also by the torrent of feeling in Hamlet’s assault, and therefore by recognition of the pain she has caused him. So, in response to his hysterical supplement to the theme of sexual inclination, she is only able to repeat her plea to be spared further punishment (lines 94 to 96).
Moments later, as he turns his fire upon the King, an interruption occurs in the form of hallucination.
Enter GHOST
Hamlet
A king of shreds and patches –
Save me, and hover o’er me with your wings,
You heavenly guards! What would your gracious figure?
Queen
Alas, he’s mad!
Hamlet
Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
That, laps’d in time and passion, lets go by
Th’important acting of your dread command:
O, say!
Ghost
Do not forget; this visitation
Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose,
But look, amazement on thy mother sits
O, step between her and her fighting soul!
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.
Hamlet
How is it with you, lady?
Queen
Alas, how is’t with you,
That you do bend your eye on vacancy
And with th’incorporal air do hold discourse?
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep;
And, as the sleeping soldiers in th’alarm,
Your bedded hairs like life in excrements
Start up and stand an end. O, gentle son,
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper
Sprinkle cool patience! (lines 102 to 124)
To Hamlet’s particular kind of vertigo, the timing of this hallucination is dramatically significant. It comes at the end of a long attack upon Gertrude, and almost immediately following his extreme vilification of her intimate relations with the King (lines 91 to 94). The imagery is an invective triumph of his troubled imagination, and we know from the opening soliloquy that Hamlet is unsure about this perception of his mother. In the time that has elapsed it has become even more compelling because it provides him with the means to undo her betrayal. So, this is what produces the hallucinatory experience; his high wire act has led him to a moment of crisis in which his most urgent inclinations collide with anxiety concerning the truth of beliefs upon which they depend.
Hamlet is fully aware that his actions have been an evasion, and so his first reaction is to confess his fault, to which the imagined Ghost provides an immediate confirmation. However, this opening is only a pilot for the correction of his treatment of the Queen; for as long as the hallucination enthrals him, Hamlet is compelled by the Ghost of his own imagination to admit the need to revise his view of her. This accounts for the sudden change in tone when he addresses her, in line 116. Meanwhile, Gertrude struggles with the extraordinary situation and her reaction shows that the ghost that appears is indeed in Hamlet’s mind; but she also makes an allusion that contradicts his perception the marriage. In line 123, the use of ‘flame’ echoes Hamlet’s reference to flaming youth (line 84) and thus implies that the flame is not in her passion for Claudius but rather in her son’s hectic imagination. Her response is muted because she wishes to avoid explaining why she has married. Of course, both Gertrude and Hamlet know that it has been to hold on to power and privilege, and she has already expressed her guilt over the consequences for him.
When the hallucination ends and Hamlet is no longer affected by its subconscious origins, he returns to his main objective. In passing, he responds to Gertrude’s a use of ‘flame’ when he tells her, ‘Mother, for the love of grace,/ Lay not that flattering unction to your soul,/ That not your trespass but my madness speaks:’ (lines 144 to 146), and this re-iteration of his fantasy is a necessary prelude to the completion of his attempt to redeem her.
Hamlet
Good night – but go not to my uncle’s bed;
Assume a virtue, if you have it not.
That monster custom, who all sense doth eat,
Of habits devil, is angel yet in this,
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock or livery
That aptly is put on. Refrain to-night;
And that shall lend a kind of easiness
To the next abstinence; the next more easy;
For use almost can change the stamp of nature
And either curb the devil, or throw him out,
With wondrous potency. Once more, good night
And when you are desirous to be blest,
I’ll blessing beg of you. For this same lord
I do repent; but Heaven hath pleas’d it so,
To punish me with this, and this with me,
That I must be their scourge and minister.
I will bestow him, and will answer well
The death I gave him. (lines 159 to 177)
In these lines, Hamlet enters the language of holy solicitude as he plays confessor to his mother’s imagined depravity. Having invented the precise nature of her fall from grace, he now frames her redemption in terms of religious ideas and imagery. Thus, the moment of fulfilment for Hamlet is characterized by a further expression of rhetorical skill that serves a precarious grasp of what is real in his situation. In this respect, the plausible invention in his analysis of habit creates a setting for the notion that his mother’s failings exist and can be conquered. His facility and imagination thereby become the means by which his ‘reality’ is established, and give him the authority to offer spiritual guidance. This complex of unsettling deformations represents an occasion for the unconscious disclosure of his character, made all the more starkly contorted by its being spoken to his mother. We cannot avoid seeing him through her eyes. Then, the proposal that once Gertrude has reformed they might exchange blessings is followed immediately by repentance for the murder of Polonius, a gesture that is reversed by proclaiming himself to be ‘scourge and minister’ of the unworthy. However, it also introduces a moment of sober self-awareness – in lines 158 and 159 the first thought of Ophelia appears in this scene, in his recognition that the murder has ended their passion.
By the end of the third act, we can see the extent to which Hamlet is exposed to the instability of our perception of others, and our perception of ourselves. The dramatic structure is one in which his sense of others and of himself are disturbed by events, and as he attempts to act upon them he becomes more and more deranged. His vertiginous experience in Act 3, scene iv is therefore the culmination of difficulties that are partly created by that instability. When he has reached the point of realizing his objectives the whole enterprise is in the process of dissolving into thin air. The plan to catch the conscience of the King collapses and, when it is brought clearly to light, the undoing of Gertrude’s betrayal is based on an illusion. Furthermore, in the course of this descent Hamlet’s failure to see truly into himself and others is directly responsible for the ways in which he loses touch with Ophelia, and then loses her altogether.
In the first three acts, we have seen in some detail how the relations between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia affect each other and determine the actions and experience of the characters. In Acts 4 and 5 we see how Hamlet’s failure changes the complexion of this set of relationships, and at this point the action is led by the relationship between Ophelia and Gertrude.
Act 4, scene v. Elsinore. The Castle
Enter Queen, Horatio and a Gentleman.
Queen
I will not speak with her.
Gentleman
She is importunate, indeed distract.
Her mood will needs be pitied.
Queen
What would you have?
Gentleman
She speaks much of her father; says she hears
There’s tricks i’ th’ world, and hems, and beats her heart;
Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt,
That carry but half sense. Her speech is nothing,
Yet the unshaped use of it doth move
The hearers to collection; they yawn at it,
And botch the words up to fit their own thoughts;
Which as her winks and nods and gestures yield them,
Indeed would make one think there might be thought.
Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.
Horatio
‘Twere good she were spoken with; for she may strew
Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.
Queen
Let her come in. [Exit Gentleman
[Aside] To my sick soul, as sin’s true nature is,
Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss,
So full of artless jealousy is guilt,
It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. (lines 1 to 20)
In these lines, the scene begins with somewhat indefinite suggestions about what is happening. This indeterminate mood is introduced by Gertrude’s refusal to ‘speak with her’, which we might immediately relate to the King and Queen’s awakening to Ophelia’s treacherous allegiance with Hamlet (Act 3, scene ii). Therefore, in Gertrude’s curt expression there is a strong sense of justified grievance and an implication that the suppliant has put herself beyond the pale. However, in the Gentleman’s response lies the possibility that there might be something more in the situation, especially in the tension between Ophelia’s disordered mental state and an underlying rationale and purpose.
Thus, within her various kinds of physical and psychological distortion and aberration there is a contrasting thread of sense that is reasonably consistent. If we take the starting point of his speech from line 5, her preoccupation with her father gives an orientation to the speech itself, and we might consider that it is in relation to him that there are tricks in the world. In this respect, the world for Ophelia has become disturbingly unstable; her erratic behaviour and manner are at one with ‘Spurns enviously at straws, speaks things in doubt / That carry but half sense.’ Here the word enviously is used in the sense of carefully or cautiously, and so what is described is an anxious recoil from things that are actually harmless. In the light of what we know has happened to Ophelia, her expression or enactment of psychological fragility and dread is not inevitably a sudden and inexplicable descent into madness.
These observations add a further significance to Gertrude’s ‘I will not speak with her’, insofar as the unsettling tricks in the world may well be associated with the death of Polonius, and this seems to be confirmed by her aside when she agrees to admit Ophelia into her presence. In connection with the aside, it is evident that Gertrude is not uneasy because her son has murdered Ophelia’s father, since this could not be seen as her sin, or a reason for her to be sick in her soul. Rather, she is cut to the quick by conscience, and, in her closing couplet, is doubtful about her evasively refusing to see Ophelia. The word jealousy is used to mean anxiously possessive, and so ‘artless jealousy’ means uncontrollably fearful of showing her guilt. In order to understand what really troubles her we have to go further into the scene.
Enter Ophelia distracted
Ophelia
Where is the beauteous Majesty of Denmark?
Queen
How now, Ophelia!
Ophelia [Sings]
How should I your true love know
From another one?
By his cockle hat and staff,
And his sandal shoon.
Queen
Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song?
Ophelia
Say you? Nay, pray you mark.
[Sings] He is dead and gone, lady,
He is dead and gone;
At his head a grass-green turf,
At his heels a stone.
O, ho!
Queen
Nay, but, Ophelia –
Ophelia
Pray you mark
[Sings] White his shroud as the mountain snow-
Enter King
Queen
Alas, look here, my lord.
Ophelia
Larded with sweet flowers;
Which bewept to the grave did not go
With true-love showers. (lines 21 to 38)
Though her behaviour is distracted, when we know what Ophelia is saying it is clear that her speech (and song) is well-organized and skilful; in describing her as speaking things in doubt, that carry but half sense, it is likely that the Gentleman mistakes her allegory and allusiveness for incoherence. She is feigning madness so that she can confront the King and Queen, and this takes the form of working upon their conscience by insinuation. Thus, her songs give expression to ways in which there are tricks in the world, and the second song shows us what lies behind Gertrude’s uneasiness.
In lines 23 to 26, Ophelia alludes to her suffering as a result of Hamlet’s amnesia and negligence. Pilgrims wear a hat that is decorated with cockles, which is therefore taken as a symbol of true devotion. So, one of the tricks played upon us by life is to be taken in by our superficial perception of others; Ophelia has been so sure of her love for Hamlet that she has risked everything on his behalf. In the second song, she is thinking of her dead father and the incompletion that gives a special bitterness to this reflection. Line 27 is given an unexpected twist by her inclusion of ‘not’, for this insinuates what is shortly to be admitted by the King; namely, that the body of Polonius has been buried in secret and without ceremony, on the King’s authority. Ophelia sees this as a punishment for her association with Hamlet, and her insight in this respect is powerfully supported by Gertrude’s inner torment. Here the trick that is played upon Ophelia is the resourceful manipulation of circumstances by vengeful and malevolent tyrants; this is much closer to sin and sickness of soul than an interment in ‘hugger-mugger’ for purely political reasons. On the appearance of Laertes, she returns to lament their father, with the intention of spurring her brother to their own revenge.
The disguised antipathy between Ophelia and the King and Queen, and the tortuous psychology that shapes it, has much to do with Ophelia’s death. For though its exact nature is left obscure we can be sure that she does not die the ‘poetic’ death that is described by Gertrude in Act 4, scene vii. Apart from her unreliability and motives for concealing the cause, the description gives itself away; its detail could only be accessible to an observer who calmly stood by and watched Ophelia drown, and no-one would admit to this kind of inaction. The policy of concealment is brought out more obviously in her burial, in which Laertes and Hamlet, for their own separate reasons, seek to spoil the discreet ordering of events that has been set up by the King and Queen. In this scene, Hamlet’s anguished guilt and anger are reflected in his wild behaviour, but later in Act 5 we see a deeper psychological consequence of what he has done to Ophelia.
Act 5, scene ii
Horatio
You will lose this wager, my lord.
Hamlet
I do not think so; since he went into France I have been in continual practice, I shall win at the odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all’s here about my heart; but it is of no matter.
Horatio
Nay, good my lord –
Hamlet
It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving as would perhaps trouble a woman.
Horatio
If your mind dislike anything, obey it. I will forestall their repair hither, and say you are not fit.
Hamlet
Not a whit, we defy augury; there is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now; ‘tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now, if it be not now, yet it will come – the readiness is all. Since no man owes of aught he leaves, what is’t to leave betimes? Let be. (lines 201 to 210)
This exchange follows the comedy of Osric’s invitation to Hamlet to compete with Laertes at the behest of the King. Behind the language of extravagant formality that dominates the tone of this meeting it is clear that Hamlet is being placed in a position of some peril, and this fear informs Horatio’s opening assertion. In this case losing the wager means more than simply losing a sporting contest, as Hamlet himself is fully aware. He indicates this when he repeats the ridiculous terms of the so-called wager in lines 151 to 160 of this scene, and notes the attempt to sound plausible (‘that’s the French bet against the Danish’). Notwithstanding his grasp of the situation, Hamlet takes Horatio at his word and confidently affirms that given the odds he can master the challenge. At this point, Hamlet’s speech takes an abrupt inward turn, referring in a general way to his feelings (lines 202 to 205).
Horatio misunderstands this turn, assuming that the ill ‘about my heart’ is a sign of misgiving about the encounter, and takes this as a cue to call it off. But Hamlet’s ‘thou wouldst not think how ill all’s here about my heart’ does not suggest a feeling of uneasiness or suspicion concerning his present situation, it reflects a prevailing and deep-seated mood, and its arising as a non-sequitur strengthens the impression that he needs to make it known. Then, the reason for his attempt to play down this experience is that to explain it would require him to explain what he has kept secret from Horatio, namely Ophelia’s part in various attempts to unsettle the King. This concealment comes out in the action leading up to the dramatic performance in Act 3, scene ii, lines 54 to 84 (Nelson 2017). In the scene itself, Hamlet’s instability is evident in the contrast between his desire to protect Ophelia and his almost immediate exposure of her before and during the performance.
In trying to pass over an experience that is clearly significant to him, Hamlet calls it, ‘such a kind of gain-giving as would perhaps trouble a woman’.
Etymologically, ‘gain’ in this sense is short for ‘against’ – meaning ‘in opposition to’ – and what is against giving could be withholding and it could be taking away or losing. Therefore, by using the word gain-giving he does not mean misgiving or suspicion; rather, he refers to the loss of spirit that is a consequence of losing Ophelia and the way he has lost her. The void into which he has cast her is now his void, and he can see, no doubt, how close his amnesia of her has been to his mother’s amnesia of himself. Thus, when he tells Horatio that he defies augury and implies that all is in the hands of providence, Hamlet knows that he is putting himself at the mercy of Claudius, and that he has become an amorphous residue of the resourceful and energetic protagonist of the previous action.
*
This discussion of Hamlet shows us how the dramatist is able to portray reflective life in action, and to do so in a way that skilfully incorporates the social, cultural and psychological attributes of character and the world to which it belongs. In this connection, the portrayal goes well beyond the attribution of virtues and vices and other psychological qualities, and immerses the viewer or reader in the complex interplay of forces that determine a character’s decisions and how he or she takes action. Thus, Hamlet’s amnesia and failure to see Ophelia’s position and protect her from Claudius and Gertrude can be traced to his reaction to their marriage, and then to his designs against them – in this, we see how the dramatic portrayal of our life in action exemplifies a distinctive form for the representation of human experience. Such representation is both more exploratory and more precise than a sense of how one interest might obscure another or the knowledge that we do not fully understand our own motives. Hence the rich interactions of character and situation that are accessible to a great dramatist exceed the psychologist’s scientific experiments and the prophet’s aphoristic pronouncements. And no matter how ingeniously and persuasively it is devised, a moral and psychological description cannot be on quite the same footing as Shakespeare’s dramatic portrayal of reflective life in action.
Hamlet is seen as being too weak to act, particularly by himself, but the portrayal of reflective life in action shows us that there are physical and psychological constraints upon his freedom to retaliate. Furthermore, within these constraints and up until the final act, his bold and assertive behaviour tests the limits of his situation; his guise of self-tormenting life denial in the mock-soliloquy that opens Act 3, and elsewhere, is a way of toying with bands of spying collaborators in order to mislead and unsettle them. So, to interpret the character only in broad moral and psychological terms is to miss the point altogether, as the precise definition of unfolding experience and its social and cultural context is itself a deeper and subtler alternative to the attribution of general features. In this respect, the play creates a finely drawn portrayal of an individual’s experience, and resemblance is subordinate because his inner life owes its realization to the author’s intuition. For example, Shakespeare’s insight into Hamlet’s reaction to Gertrude’s betrayal does not arise out of a likeness, but from the author’s sense of how this individual character might feel and act.
Furthermore, it is more than a matter of contingency or chance that Hamlet loses control of action that he generates in the play. For in Hamlet, dramatic form represents the form of reflective life in essential ways. To be specific, a reflective life is one that is valued in itself, and this means that the individual is necessarily entangled in the lives of others who also experience life as being valued in itself. Without this entanglement, there could be no development of a rich and interesting life at all, as a full life depends upon the many-sided interaction between individuals, and, for each individual, a number of different kinds of relationship. In this connection, Hamlet subtly dramatizes the limitations that entanglement places upon our understanding of ourselves and others, and therefore of the world to which we belong.
At the beginning of the action Hamlet’s inability to understand his mother’s feelings develops, as we have seen, into an uncertain grasp in his perception of her and of his own motives. His failure of insight influences both how he goes about exposing Claudius, and the execution of revenge. However, this is only part of a more extensive and serious dramatization of how our understanding is affected by entanglement in the lives of others. Most significant is the relation between Hamlet’s acceptance of Ophelia’s support and his uncertain knowledge of how Claudius will react to the assault upon his peace of mind in the play-within-the-play. In the excitement of executing his design against the King, Hamlet assumes that a successful outcome will protect Ophelia. This confidence is ill-judged, as we see that Claudius is not to be deterred from his ambition, and Ophelia’s punishment is included in his response.
In Act 3 we see a further development of dramatic form as a reflection of the form of human life and experience. If we consider the form of a play in its most general sense it is obvious that ‘play’ alludes to an activity in which invention and imagination are set free to shape and orient that life and experience. Hamlet unmistakably draws attention to this element in the creation of the play in its central character; Hamlet is based on the ingenious trickster Amleth and, as we have seen, Shakespeare makes the character a resourceful player in the realm of personal relations. Thus, the invention of psychological attitudes and impersonation is natural to him and is effortlessly conveyed in what, in Act 1, he calls his ‘antic disposition’. We also see that the play-acting is psychologically complicated by a strong tendency for lines to be blurred between his performance of a role and the expression of real feeling – this is impossible to miss in Act 3, scene i, in which the pretence of verbal aggression towards Ophelia is heightened by an oblique attack on Gertrude and Claudius. Here the action departs from a clear delineation of psychological and moral features, and the uncertainty that is conveyed by this complication has a deep significance for the characterization. Its pervasiveness suggests that the player in Hamlet is engaging is a high-wire act that is perilously sustained. (In this we can see that Shakespeare’s dramatic play with the characterization determines the psychology of his character.)
Hence the development in Act 3 sees, in a succession of scenes, the character in a state of inwardly generated vertigo which includes the killing of Polonius, hallucination of the Ghost and the loss of reason, as he labours to undo his mother’s betrayal. A progression towards this vertigo is evident in the high shared with Horatio in response to the King’s moral collapse during the performance of The Murder of Gonzago. Then, overhearing his contrition in scene iii gives Hamlet a false assurance that he has broken Claudius. In the illusory success of elaborate play-acting a confusion between what Hamlet enacts and what is real also becomes increasingly acute in relation to Ophelia. This is especially so in his failure to fully recognize her situation as his accomplice, for Hamlet’s amnesia is not simply caused by his concentration upon the King, he loses touch because the execution of his design elevates the drama he is creating over his ties in the real world.
Shakespeare’s mastery of dramatic form does not reveal aspects of the form of reflective life that we cannot know from reflection. But the microscopic portrayal of such life in action shows us how the interrelations of inner experience, social involvement, culture and interpersonal relations are delicately held together in our life and experience. The consequences of Hamlet’s perception of his mother for his relationship with Ophelia, and ultimately for himself, could only be clearly defined by a profoundly sensitive use of dramatic form. In this respect, the subtle portrayal of reflective life in action is capable of showing us the nature of our life and experience in ways that we might otherwise never be able to see. In Hamlet, we are shown how the perception of ourselves and others is constantly influenced by inclination that is determined by the interrelations; Hamlet’s perception of Gertrude is powerfully affected by the combination of their social status and filial relationship, and, in this respect, the culture to which they belong shapes their perception of themselves and each other. Conditions of the same kind can be applied to his relationship with Ophelia, and to all of the other relationships in the play.
Therefore, it is important to recognize that experience and behaviour in the characters of the play are determined by events and their social and psychological background. This is especially true of Hamlet, whose actions are typically based on more than a preconceived conception of his character and psychology. For example, each of his soliloquies is different in its expression of his nature: in the first there is a genuine inwardness in his tormented perception of his mother and fantasy of passing judgement on her; then, at the beginning of Act 2, he enacts a mock soliloquy that is aimed at the eavesdropping King and Queen, and Polonius. In Act 3, his soliloquy which begins, ‘O what a rogue and peasant slave am I’ expresses an impulse towards the formation of a plan to expose Claudius, while, in the following act, ‘How all occasions do inform against me’ begins a soliloquy in the aftermath of action, in which the insistence upon inner strength is shown to be hollow. Instead of an unfolding of events that demonstrates psychological consistency in the hero, consistency lies only in the various ways in which changing circumstances create a range of responses that can be seen to belong to the same person.
Hence, characterization in terms of moral virtues and their simplified psychology is replaced by a more objective portrayal. As we have seen, it is objective not in the sense that it is true independently of human interest, but in the sense that the characters are true to the form of human life and experience. Rather than conforming to an action that gives them perspicuous moral and psychological features, character is largely defined by realistically shifting circumstances which are often unforseen, involving a tension between the necessity for moral virtue and pursuit of a life that is valued in itself. For while this reflective life knits us together in shared experience, and makes morality necessary, drama comes alive when one person is in conflict with another. In this respect, Shakespeare is less interested in moral appraisal than in the intricacies of such conflict in the individual lives of his characters; this provides him with the basis for a true portrayal of reflective life in action. In this connection, his far-reaching enquiry into our perception of others reveals the tension between virtue and life, and thereby the logic of dramatic form deepens our insight into the nature of life and experience. Thus, Hamlet’s loss of spirit does not arise out of a moral violation that is punished by his author’s dramatic manipulations, things fall out in this way because his moral failure undermines the natural but inadequately recognized inclinations of his own reflective life.
A corollary of this moral and psychological realism lies in the association of meaning with dramatic form. Judgements about the characters are often based on superficial responses to language and behaviour; for example, the mock soliloquy at the beginning of Act 3 is assumed to be a piece of serious philosophical reflection, or Hamlet’s assault upon Ophelia in the same scene is taken to be an expression of misogyny. In this essay, I have shown that the relevant speeches are specifically aimed at Hamlet’s audience behind the arras, and cannot be equated with his personal views. Concerning the idea of Hamlet as a misogynist, we might counter this judgement with his attack on Polonius (Act 2, scene ii) for the older man’s bullying exploitation of his daughter. But in either case the dramatic circumstances play a decisive part in the meaning of what is said and its significance to creation of the character.
To close, it has been shown that the logic of dramatic form emerges clearly from an analysis of the triple relationship between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia. As a structural element of the action, the interplay between these characters has given us a coherent and substantial experience of Hamlet as a portrayal of reflective life in action. Thus, it also shows, in a way that is counter to the logic of propositions, how dramatic form can be profoundly illuminating when the richness and subtlety of inner experience is generated by complex interactions that are psychologically and socially well-defined.
What makes the characterization in Hamlet objective is its powerful integration into a world that is convincingly established by the use of dramatic form, so that the inner experience of an individual is shaped by a viable society and culture. From this grows a particular way of seeing into the form of inner experience for a person, by incorporating with great precision and accuracy his or her sensory perceptions, memories and imagination and the deviant patterns they assume in accordance with action that is contingent and unpredictable. In this connection, portrayal of the form of inner experience in Hamlet draws upon the intuitive self-knowledge of the dramatist to a deep artistic purpose, and elevates the enquiry beyond mimesis and the mere delineation of resemblances.
The Form of Inner Experience in Music
Why physical modes must be media of sensory perception.
In order for the physical object to be realized by an act of sensory perception the strictly physical must be receptive to this action. Without the physical modes of space, time, light, movement, temperature, shape, volume and others we could not perceive the object and thereby give it an identity and character. This implies that these physical modes are also media of sensory perception, and that as such they are able to interact in the realization of an object. In other words, sensory perception on its own cannot force space, time, light, movement and other modes to interact in the perception of a physical object; there must be a corresponding action in the material that is transformed.
For example, it is not difficult to see that, in our perception of a cup, certain physical modes, like space, time, light, shape, volume, solidity, size and balance are related to each other by their being media of sensory perception. In this respect, the phenomenon can be defined as a composite of interacting physical modes, and this explains why we can see immediately that a particular cup is well-formed or badly balanced (shape affecting balance), or made of the wrong material and likely to leak or dissolve in hot water (material affecting shape), or that it is too large or too small, or too thick to hold much liquid (shape affecting volume). It is only because physical modes are media of sensory perception that they can be simultaneously assimilated in this way into our perception of the object. Moreover, insofar as these physical modes would not be media of sensory perception for a lizard it would not perceive the same interaction between shape, solidity, hardness size and balance and therefore, even physically, it would not see the same object.
In the film The Third Man, the dramatic event of Harry Lime revealed standing in a doorway is dependent upon the interaction of light, movement (significantly minimal) and time, and they interact because they are media of sensory perception which coalesce with a precise effect upon the identity and character of the event. Therefore, in a form of causation that is synchronous and not sequential, physical modes as media of sensory perception bridge the gap between their interaction in the subject and a response in the material without which there could be no interaction.
We can see mind interwoven with the physical in the confluence of sequential and synchronous causation when we give the physical object its identity and character. In this connection, it is not necessary to frame the event in terms of overt observation, for handling and use will also demonstrate the confluence in our experience of, say, a cup. For example, the interaction of shape, size, solidity and balance in the object can be realized in the ways in which it is held and used when we are drinking from it, and here sequential and synchronous causation flow into and out of each other in obvious ways. Generally, this confluence occurs without our noticing, and the interrelation is commonplace in our experience of physical things. Therefore, when we reflect on the object as we handle and use it, we see that our inner experience is woven into the physical nature of the object, and, by extension, into our conception of the world. Thus, we see mind in the physical object itself, and this is contrary to the popular notion that everything is physical.
Moreover, this example strongly suggests that between the sequential and synchronous causation there is no priority of one over the other, since it is only in the interaction of physical modes that the physical object is transformed from something incipient to a properly defined object. The physical object arises from contact between sensory perception as the expression of inner experience shaped by past history and the material as determined by laws of nature.
Equal importance between them is consistent with the ontological distinction between inner experience and the material realm (identified here as the incipient object). Because there is no priority there is no basis for merging one realm into the other and thereby establishing the false unification that is proposed in different ways by materialism, idealism, panpsychism and neutral monism. Since an act of sensory perception gives the physical object its identity and character mind and the material do not merge, any more than an act of carving merges with the stone in a piece of sculpture; they are interdependent but contrasting elements. Strictly speaking, we should reject any suggestion that mind, experience or consciousness might be separately perceptible in anything like a physical form, akin to something in the air, a spiritual realm or a hidden substance which somehow constitutes the physical. While a cup is realized by the interaction, the physical modes of space, time, movement, shape, size, solidity and balance their interaction in an act of sensory perception is not itself spatial, temporal, still or moving, shaped, sized, solid or insubstantial, balanced or unstable.
It is an obvious objection that any act of sensory perception takes place in time, and therefore that the act must at least be temporal in nature and so must the interaction. However, though inner experience and the material are absolutely distinct ontologically, the synchronous causation in which physical modes interact could not occur were it not conflated with sequential causation. All of the modes that are involved in synchronous causation are also involved in sequential causation, and so it is in the latter that we find temporality. In the handling and use of a cup, which manifests the presence of mind in the world, the interaction is temporal only by being woven into our sequential experience and behaviour. This is why there need be no independent expression of the physical modes within the interaction itself.
Furthermore, because mind is only perceptible in the actions and inner experience of sentient beings there seems to be no alternative to the assumption that prior to sentience the physical realm must be governed by an inclination towards life. When the relevant conditions are met a living world of sentient beings and physical objects can emerge. Should this possibility be true, an inclination towards life would be sharply distinguished from a quasi-physical mental substance hovering in the air, in the head or in things generally.
From this analysis, we can see that there are two different ways in which the physical can be understood, and that understanding depends upon a recognition of their differences. When the physical object is seen in relation to gravity, or the laws of motion, thermodynamics or physical structure it is understood as being a physical object only insofar as it is physical. Alternatively, the phenomenon is defined as a physical object that is an expression of the psychology of the sentient being that perceives it. In this, the physical is extended by mental involvement to become an object of experience, with the potential for a much greater richness and diversity. Hence, we never actually experience the object only insofar as it is physical; experience is what gives the object its identity and character as a phenomenon. This means that in physical things the material coalesces with the history of inner experience and psychological inclinations that give them value. And, in turn, this means that value and significance are not externally imposed but are intrinsic to the physical object and the world (for example, human world) to which it belongs.
It follows from these remarks that separation of the physical world into a purely material realm and one of value and significance is both misguided and misleading. In particular, we can see the separation in abstract arguments about the things that are fundamental or merely emergent. If the physical object is intrinsically of value and significance then it is misleading to assume that physical elements are fundamental to it while sensory experience and self-awareness are only emergent. Because the world is inclined towards life and experience the possibility of value and significance is always present in some form.
Especially misleading, in this light, is the familiar idea that all actions are determined by an unbroken chain of events, and that therefore human actions are not free because they are determined by an inviolable causal sequence that could not have been otherwise. This view is invalidated by the continuous re-orientation of sequential causation by inner experience that affects the value and significance of things, and thereby makes our capacity to determine the identity and character of the object fundamental to the form of our lives. Our enjoyment of a painting, for example, depends upon the interaction of light, colour, space, contour, volume and surface, and this synchronous causation is woven into the sequential causation of events – such as our continuing to be absorbed in the image. The viewer’s participation in the realization of the image exemplifies an expression of free will that is included in the causal sequence. Similarly, experience of a cup as a vessel for drinking extends the expression of free will to my spontaneous sensory perception of a physical object, and this is below the threshold of my deliberate actions. Such freedom is unaffected by the extent to which I can choose what I am or what I want. Since, in sensory perception, I give the physical object its identity and character, seeing a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee certainly occurs in accordance with my will, but it is not a choice or decision. It is a freedom that arises out of my attunement to the world in which I participate.
Thus, whether the world is there in the absence of sentience depends on what is meant by ‘world’. No doubt something corresponding to the moon, the sky and the earth and solar system is there independently and has been before they were ever perceived. The moon and earth separated by cloud might also be there in some form or other. However, the moon obscured by cloud is only possible when there is a sentient being. In the case of this phenomenon, an appropriate interaction of physical modes is necessary, since a moon obscured by cloud is possible only if space, light, matter, shape and volume interact. A spatial relation must be created between the object obscured and a being for whom the moon might be obscured, and there must be an interaction between position and the light, matter, shape and volume of the moon and cloud. This condition must apply whenever a physical object is obscured. So, if such ordinary phenomena are only realized when there is a sentient being to perceive them then what we think of as a world cannot exist in the absence of sentient beings. The world as we understand it is largely made up of an inexhaustible proliferation of phenomena created by the interaction of physical modes of this kind. In the absence of sentience, the world is only there if what is merely an armature is considered to be the world. Or, to put it another way, in the absence of sentience, by definition, the world is undecided.
However, there are more pervasive and telling ways in which sentience affects the structure of physical objects, and does so according to the identification of physical modes with media of sensory perception. The verb to endure has meanings that can be contrasted in terms that are closely associated with this argument. In one sense, it can simply refer to the continuation of an object or event in time, while in a stronger sense it means something closer to the struggle to survive or to achieve some goal or end. The first sense could apply to the physical object as nothing more than an interaction of physical modes without reference to media of sensory perception, but in the second sense there is no endurance in the absence of sentience and this implies that physical modes are also media of sensory perception. Wherever the word endure means aspiration to some end or purposeful resistance to some opposition, the event is one in which the interaction of physical modes is also an interaction of media of sensory perception, and therefore impossible without sentience.
We can generalize from these distinctions to the influence of psychological dispositions, which might include expectation, approval, anticipation, reservation and doubt, or emotions like desire, elation, anxiety and dread. When in the stronger sense of ‘endurance’ physical modes as media of sensory perception determine the composition of a physical object there is a transformation of the object as it is defined simply in terms of physical modes.
For example, we can imagine a storm at sea in which the crew of a boat struggle to contend with towering waves and their violent impact, together with the confusion of being unexpectedly thrown about in the turbulence. In an experience of this event the interaction of physical modes will clearly be dominated by their being media of sensory perception. The physical object composed of boat, wind, rain and heaving seas will be one in which space, light, movement and the materials, volume and shape of the vessel interact to create an acute sense of instability, peril and unpredictability. If we consider the same object in terms of the physical modes in the weaker sense, without including the media of sensory perception, then, though things corresponding to space, light, movement and other modes interact, there would be no instability, peril or unpredictability in the object. The complete absence of psychological dispositions and emotions entails that the object would be quite different, and that though physical it would be without any identity or character. Moreover, if we were to change the example and imagine a completely still, barren and featureless landscape the same contrast could be made. A landscape also depends upon sentience, and therefore its identity and character depend upon the interaction of physical modes as media of sensory perception.
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Art as a form of knowledge is inseparable from the identification of physical modes with media of sensory perception. Equally, works of art give us an avenue by means of which we can see clearly just how the physical modes as media of sensory perception interact in our ordinary experience. An example has already been offered in my observations about the brief sequence from The Third Man. The ways in which art can reveal to us what is implied in the interaction suggest a development in our understanding of the conditions of knowledge itself. So, analysing the interaction enables us to see into the nature of art as a form of knowledge, and, conversely, seeing in works of art how the interaction is involved in sensory perception enhances our understanding of how knowledge itself is determined by our experience.
It follows that the kind of knowledge that is dependent upon sensitivity to the interaction of physical modes can be seen as distinctively dualistic. For this dependence means that seeing into the form of inner experience in art must be knowledge that is specific to a form of life – only a person or very similar reflective being could have intuitions of the interaction between physical modes akin to the sensory perception that is evoked in The Third Man. It is clear then, that while purely rational thought such as reasoning and calculation is fundamental to knowledge of art, the intuitions of sensory and emotional experience are also fundamental. Hence, in the following discussion of The Art of the Fugue and TheTears of Saint Peter, we will see how, in physical art forms, the interaction of physical modes – as basic to our knowledge of ourselves and the world – is a key to our seeing into the form of inner experience.
The Art of the Fugue
What looks superficially like an elaborate exercise in musical structure is full of feeling and expression, and allusions to liturgy or dance are cyclical elements in the elucidation of forms that are normally concealed within experience. This is possible because, in order for the experience of a sentient being to be coherent, it is necessary for patterns of perceptual perspectives to be repeated in a similar way over and over again. At the same time, significant interaction between individuals must be cohesive in order to make sense, and in music formal patterns are a means of reflecting this. Just as the dramatic tension and vitality in Shakespeare’s mastery of form is essential to his powerful portrayal of reflective life in action, so the formal patterns in Bach’s music are necessary to the portrayal of a compelling interplay of perceptual perspectives. The formal patterns are not merely mathematical but serve a taut organization of expressive internal relations, akin to what we may find in the formal relations in a sonnet by Shakespeare or a painting by Cézanne or Turner. In The Art of the Fugue, a perspective is suggested in the hymn-like main theme, both in its gravity and in its appearing initially as a luminous fragment of melody which, in keeping with fugal form, fades and reappears and fades again. Thus, the interplay between perspectives in the piece as a whole is anchored in a theme which evokes the fundamental reality of human interdependence.
Contrapunctus I creates a balance between order and richness that may be said to express an ideal of reflective life; in this it conveys a sense of harmonious involvement in a perfect society. As the beginning of a sequence of fugues, it asserts a possibility from which the subsequent representations deviate in various ways. The balance is suggested psychologically in the initial statement of the subject and its answer, specifically in an ascent from the alto to soprano voice, and in the movement from one key to another (D minor to A minor) with a change of the opening interval of the subject to that of the answer, from a fifth to a fourth. This enriches the feeling of past experience that is already present in the hymn-like subject. There is no doubt that a sense of time pervades Contrapunctus 1, and to a degree that we do not find, for example, in the exhilarating Contrapunctus 8. But the music does not represent a deliberation upon the past, and certainly not an expression of nostalgia; it is both immediate and steeped in time, and therefore can be understood as incorporating subliminal memory, as for an object to which our perception gives a certain character. Thus, at the outset, we can see an example of the way in which musical form portrays the form of reflective life.
The means by which Bach sustains a sense of the inner substance of the object or idea is tied to the means by which he develops and varies the experience suggested in the music. In this, there is interaction between the cyclical nature of the fugal form and a continuous sense of development, reflecting the form of human action and reflective life. At the same time, a change in the object of thought or perception implies a change in the subliminal memory that gives the object its character. To capture this in the music demands a subtle change in the character of the piece, as each expression of inner experience depends on a renewal in the sense of oneself and the world.
This fugue does not have a countersubject, counterpoint is governed by the creation of melodically sympathetic lines in which variation of both the melodic line and rhythmic contrast tend towards an enrichment of meaning and unity. The lines and overlapping rhythms do not suggest conflicting ideas but rather a support to the main idea, so that each line adds something of its own. This develops the sense of subliminal past experience within the object and helps to suffuse the piece with the psychological depth in reflective experience. The coherence of such expression is further enhanced by Bach’s use of melodic patterns in different parts of the piece and in different relations to each other and to the subject – for example, the pulsating quaver dominated patterns which are often sections of scales, the leaping intervals from short to long notes which are often syncopated or simply tied, and certain passages that appear in different phases of the piece (ascent in the first phase, in bars 17 to 20, takes the form of two quavers, crotchet and minim tied to the following quaver in the soprano with the halves of the bars reversed in the tenor. The same pattern occurs in bars 36 to 40 and again in bars 67 to 69.)
These intentions are immediately suggested by the way in which the counterpoint in the alto identifies the individual in terms of its response to the subject (from bar 5). The alto voice is not set in opposition but evolves by weaving its own character by responding to the melodic shape that has been established for it. In subsequent bars, the main ideas are used with increasing complexity to suggest a positive development in the individual. This is how, in the piece as a whole, individuality is portrayed as growing in response to the life to which it belongs, and making something of its involvement in a community. Hence, we see an identity forming from the start in the syncopated leaping intervals in bars 6 and 7, along with the pulsating quaver passages that also define the character of the piece. Corresponding to this, the statement of the subject in all four voices gives an emphatic voice to the grounding of the music in the idea of human interdependence and its foundation for individuality.
Turning more specifically to structure: this fugue has three phases. In each there is a constructive accumulation of feeling and purpose defined by an alternation between increasing intensity and passages in which strength is conserved as a means generating the next phase. Thus, the latter are not moments of relaxation; there is a continuous feeling of energy and engagement, and this reflects an uninterrupted commitment that leads into surges of personal development. Most important are the ways in which the structure is an expression of cumulative strength, and this is how the piece conveys its essential meaning. The pulsating movement evokes a life that is valued in itself in the process of working constructively at something that gives it a sense of purpose and meaning. This is particularly suggested by the rhythmic and melodic contrast between energetic movement indicating the perception of oneself and the theme – which alludes to our perception of the other person’s perception of him or herself, and therefore our perception of the world. The musical integration of these elements is a portrayal of serious endeavour, and while this is not specific there are many activities to which it might refer. For example, Bach’s own development as a musician and composer, the growth of an individual into a healthy adult, the nurturing of a child by a parent, or the committed involvement in a serious activity or career. In all of these pursuits we can see how it is possible for the realization of personal ambition to be a desirable expression of sensitivity to human interdependence.
The pulsating movement begins in bar 5 in the alto beneath the soprano answer to the subject, and this entry relates the counterpoint to the emphasis that is given to subliminal memory in this answer. Integration between these voices helps to make this quietly animated movement appear as spontaneous and unforced, as emerging almost unconsciously and without any particular effort of will. Following the ascending scale in bar 5, the leaping rhythms in bars 6 and 7 introduce, with characteristic syncopation, the structural element that will dominate the expression that defines personal action and perception of oneself. In this music, the sense of individuality as rooted in fidelity to a common life is powerfully expressed in the ways in which a feeling of integration is accompanied by self-assertion. The contrasting rhythmic patterns that dominate the piece are both deeply cohesive and allow for the voices to overlap and, along with syncopation, accentuate their independence. In this connection, there is a tendency for the inner voices to blend with each other while the soprano and bass stand out more clearly.
The identity of this piece approaches full expression after the exposition has been completed, in bars 17 to 22, where the characteristic features are more obvious. Here we can see, in the soprano, how the dominant ideas are combined not only contrapuntally but also melodically, as the minims ascending in thirds in bars 17 to 19 are like a continuation of the subject. This is supported by the tenor, in which the position of the minims and sequential crotchets and quavers is reversed, and this sense of solidity is set against the pulsating rhythm in the bass. These three lines ascend more or less in keeping with each other while the harmony moves between tonic, dominant and subdominant, resting briefly on the last in bar 20 at the completion of the ascent. In this gentle progression, we can feel the individual acquiring independence and strength while being fundamentally attached to interdependence with other people and the world as it is implied in the subject, which returns in the alto in bar 23. This further assertion of strength is conserved in bars 26 to 28, primarily in the leaping rhythms with syncopated crotchets tied to quavers. Thus, the first phase ends with a sense of momentum constantly being renewed as the music progresses.
This flows into the next statement of the theme at the beginning of phase two (bars 29 to 32), especially as the continuation of feeling in bars 26 to 28 helps the subject in the soprano to sound against the recent statement of it the alto (bars 23 t0 26). Also, we experience a progression from the tonic to the dominant, with, in this answer, an opening interval of a fifth. From these effects, the sense of subliminal memory in the music acquires a luminous clarity which conveys the sense of an increase of perception and self-awareness. It should be noted that to see the statement of the theme in this way depends on an appreciation of Bach’s skill as a musical dramatist, and that it is only through attention to the dramatic unfolding of the piece that these meanings can be sensed in the music.
Ascent in phase two is characterized by accompanying voices moving upwards in support of the soprano (bars 36 to 39). These bars have an intricate overlapping of voices, and this in combination with the shared motion creates the effect of the ascent carrying moral and psychological significance; the minims and their intervals linking the sense of achievement with the theme and therefore with a serious purpose and involvement in the life of a community. In this connection, the pattern of minim, quavers and crotchet with the minim tied over to the first quaver repeats in the alto and bass what has been the ascending pattern in the first phase (bars 17 to 20). This enhances the sense of continuity in a portrayal of personal development that is led here by the leaping rhythms in the soprano with its widening intervals between quavers and dotted crotchets. At the climax, there is a striking dissonance created by the augmented third of C sharp in an A minor chord which conveys an experience of affirmative self-awareness in the individual (bar 40). This generates an extended passage of effortless momentum that is carried in the syncopated leaping rhythms passing from the soprano to the alto. The A minor chord is also striking in being a full-bodied chord and thereby shifting our attention from counterpoint to harmony, and this shift in attention heightens the sense of change from absorption in some activity to a sense of being accomplished in it.
The sense of accomplishment lies behind a smooth transition into the third phase of this fugue, which begins in bar 49. Here the effortless momentum is expressed as a continuity between phases of development; the ascending minims in the alto (bar 48) leading into the subject in the soprano, which stabilizes itself, in bar 51, as the opening of the third phase. With this ascent, the piece reaches its highest register, and this development characterizes the final phase as a whole. In terms of structure, this is connected with a concentration of the wave-like development that we see in the overall form of the piece. Here we see a structural rhythm created by subsiding passages that act as a preparation for peaks of intensity, the first of which, in bars 56 to 58, leads into a longer suspension in the subdominant (bars 59 to 62). From this moment of recoil the music reaches a heightened pitch of self-realization through personal accomplishment which is affirmed as being in harmony with the idealized conception of community.
Thus, the conclusion is constructed mainly from the ways in which ambition and self-realization have been expressed throughout the piece. This is dominated by the syncopated leaping rhythms which now appear in the highest pitches in the soprano and alto voices and convey a sense of elated fulfilment in bars 63 and 64, and again, after a brief relaxation, in bars 67 to 70. A contrast is made with the parallel ascent in the second phase (bars 36 to 39) in which there is no syncopation, and this contrast is related to the structural rhythm of the fugue as a whole. For the second phase represents a steadying consolidation of personal progress, one in which a degree of control and self-awareness is achieved, as the preparation for the heightened accomplishment that is represented in the third and final phase. Such rhythm gives emphasis to the discipline that is demanded by personal development, and this is exemplified in how the phases parallel the wave-like development that I have just described. Moreover, evolution with respect to subliminal memory within experience is sustained by a consistent pattern of harmony along with variations in the basic melodic and rhythmic shapes that constitute the piece.
Thus, in the preliminary climax (bars 63 and 64) the music leaps from a descending C sharp by a sixth to A, and this gives the interval an unprecedented force. Meanwhile, in the alto, the pulsating quaver rhythm accompanies the soprano with a leap of a sixth, from A to F. With only a sustained A in the bass, the syncopated leaping rhythm in these bars suggests an unimpeded expression of natural inclination, as the high point of human aspiration. In the relaxation of this impulse, in bars 65 and 66, the other voices have returned, so that the full climax is significantly enriched by the counterpoint. So, in bars 67 to 69, we hear a complex integration of melodic and rhythmic shapes that have been prominent in this fugue. While the syncopated leaping rhythm is shared between the soprano and alto voices, the pattern associated with ascent in the first and second phase (bars 17 to 20 and 36 to 39) appears in inverted form in the tenor and bass. The inversion makes it possible for the top three voices to interweave closely together so that the bass in clearly heard as a rhythmic counterpoint. Altogether, the effect of these details is to give solidity and depth to the sense of aspiration and accomplishment conveyed by the music. This association of ambition with human interdependence and moral purpose is completed in the wave-like summary closing bars in which the theme returns in the tenor and the piece concludes in D major.
In the fugues that follow, meaning is conveyed primarily in a musical imagery that can be easily perceived when we know what we are looking for, and each piece is a response to its immediate predecessor and others. This indicates a clear compositional design insofar as the fugues explore essential relations behind our recognizable inner experience, relations with the character of our lives, their interdependence and moral significance. The relation between imagery and tone provides Bach with his means of expression, and musical form reflects the form of reflective life. Therefore, his use of figurative language in music is more than simply metaphorical; Bach employs the imagery of one kind of experience in order to represent another kind, and, as much by analogy as resemblance, achieves a true and vivid portrayal of reflective life in action.
Contrapunctus 5
Contrapunctus 5 responds to 2 by expanding upon the idea that freedom of thought is bound up with the discipline and detachment that are necessary to counter power and authority effectively. 2 employs the music of a military march as a satire on the mechanical efficiency of worldly domination, and in 5 Bach creates a complex image that is related to the freedom of individual action. To be precise, this image is not intended to be a sustained pictorially accurate sequence like a film, but takes certain visual elements from the object (a murmuration of starlings) and organizes them in accordance with musical form. Thus, the fugue evolves by allusion to spontaneous patterns that are created by birds in flight, as an expression of invention and exploration. The imagery is a means by which the music can reflect these ideas in its own form, and exemplify the intellectual mastery that gives purpose to imagination. In this respect, it represents the essence of the sequence as a whole. Moreover, the image is not simply one of creativity in a general sense, the music also evokes the inner experience of being inventive, of ideas emerging unexpectedly from a convolution of mental activity. An intricate mental activity is suggested by the manipulation of musical form itself, and this piece is a tour de force because it gives dynamic expression to the dynamism of reflective life.
This fugue begins in a similar way to the beginning of the Contrapunctus 1, with the difference that the theme is now in its inversion. A promise of growing animation and vitality is similarly offered by the quaver filled lines that accompany the theme. Contrapunctus 5 is not divided into parts, but is one continuous piece that is given its form by a structural rhythm that is suggested by the form of a murmuration. Hence there are musical patterns that bring the murmuration to mind and these patterns alternate definite shapes with moments of relaxation, akin to the ‘breathing’ motion that we see in a flock of starlings. Moments of suspended animation are followed by a revival of activity that condenses the flock into an unexpected shape, which itself develops into other unexpected shapes. Bach’s use of this structural device involves three phases that are separated by two moments of suspended animation, and in the former there is a progressive complexity between phases one and three (two being short and summary). This means that the piece grows in richness and intensity before suddenly dying away and thereby enlivening the impression of ingenuity and mastery. When it has ended, the music is suspended in the memory, like an after-image.
The fugue does not immediately evoke the image of birds in flight, but rather begins by measuring out a space in which there is an agitation that grows into the image. We can see this in the order for the entries of the theme; opening with the alto followed by the tenor, and then the soprano leading into the bass. In this sequence, the interval between the first two is expanded by the second, creating the feeling of a space opening up. At the same time, there is a complication of the accompanying quaver dominated voices as they increase in number. This is clear in a comparison of the simple line in the alto that accompanies the entry of the tenor with the dense interplay of the other voices when the theme is stated in the bass. In bars 13 and 14, the space separating soprano and bass is emphasized by a short ascent followed by its shadowing at a lower pitch, and this enables the composer to intensify a feeling of space within which there is a lively animation; the extremes of pitch open up the space while the other voices create the life that vibrates within it.
Allusion to the flight of starlings in a murmuration first appears in bars 19 to 22; the soprano voice uses crotchets and a dotted rhythm and minim to suggest movement of a flock as it arcs across the sky, this movement being subtly thickened by close contact with an alto line that diverges in rhythm to enhance the feeling of many birds in motion. Meanwhile, in the bass, the energetic succession of quavers evokes a contrary movement of the flock at a lower level. From bar 23 to 29 the theme, in an unearthly A minor, returns elaborated in the soprano supported in the alto voice, and now resembles the rhythmic dip and ascent of starlings in motion. The bass line is loosened by wider intervals to underline the rhythmic relaxation. Insofar as it is not a description but employs unconnected allusive phrases, the fugue translates a natural spectacle into a musical experience. What results from this is a continuous musical structure rather than the depiction of a continuous movement of birds in the sky. Thus, in bars 30 to 33 another formation is suggested which is a coherent musical development of this phase. The structural progression created by the transition from the dotted rhythm statement to the return of the theme is now extended so that we hear a more complex movement; an overlapping of voices expresses the central image in another way. This occurs at a point at which the soprano voice is withdrawn and leaves a passage of rhythmically varied lines that are close to one another in pitch. Already, in this music of great concentration, Bach has portrayed the murmuration in three quite distinct ways, and so that one flows convincingly into the next; musically, the dotted rhythm passage leads into the elaborated theme and then this subsides in a natural movement, in bars 28 and 29, into the imagery of overlapping flight amid the flock.
Another smooth transition occurs in bars 33 to 35, the first of these turning the expression from the overlapping to a moment of suspended animation in 34 and 35. With the same mastery, in bars 36 to 38, this moment grows into a swell that initiates the second phase. With respect to the structural rhythm of the fugue, this phase consists of an abridgement of the first in a form that is intensified by a convergence of the voices below the dotted rhythm motive and then the theme. A further moment of suspended animation (in bars 43 and 44) leads into the third phase.
In the fugue as a whole, the changing shapes are created by combinations of four musical ideas: the theme, the dotted rhythm motive, variants of the quaver passage for the moments of suspended animation and the ascending motive that first appears at the beginning of phase three. This phase is the strongest evocation of the experience of movement together with volume in a flock of starlings, and the ideas appear in a way that expresses a new physical shape. Here Bach produces the most sustained and fullest realization of the shifting forms and, at the same time he shows the greatest ingenuity and mastery. Therefore, the ideas of imagination and intellect are most forcefully reflected in a richly climactic conclusion.
This phase begins with the theme in the bass, which creates a rhythmic movement from deep within the flock, while the new quaver motive, suggesting waves of activity reaching upwards, is separated in pitch – in the soprano supported by the alto voice. At bars 55 to 57 the dotted rhythm motive in the alto fills the space between them and this develops into an interweaving of transparent veils of sound (bars 55 to 60), with the dotted rhythm in the soprano and rhythmically varied quaver movement now appearing in the alto, tenor and bass. Already the allusion to a murmuration is more skilfully realized than anything we have seen in the piece. In a wave-like ascent from bars 59 to 64, in which the vitality of the image is increased by tension between a rising scale of quavers in the alto and descending similar pattern in the bass (bar 62), the climax is heightened by interpolating the dotted rhythms immediately before the highest note (bars 63 and 64). This provides a playful interruption to the pattern of quavers and ripple of energy to the soaring movement of the birds. Simultaneously, Bach introduces the theme in the tenor voice, not so that it draws attention to itself as we might expect, but in a way that disguises itself and gives volume to the activity of the flock at the moment of its fullest realization as an image. The movement connected with the climax continues in bars 65 and 66, as the beginning of an anti-climax in which the flock subsides, and comes to rest in the closing bars. A sudden dying away of the image suggests a fragility in the moment of creative activity to which it alludes, as a virtue demanding a synthesis of the many powers that are required for this kind of resistance to authority.
Contrapunctus 4
This fugue presents us with another way in which we can resist the power of authority, one that is the opposite of individual responsibility for a life that is valued in itself. In place of the discipline in 2, number 4 shows us a more overtly social form of resistance, for which the primary goal is hedonistic. Thus, the form and structure of this piece are governed by the evocation of an image of figures in motion that closely resembles a dance. This resemblance does not involve the employment of any particular kind of dance, and its structure avoids the strict repetition that is characteristic of a minuet or a waltz. As in the previous fugues, Bach constructs an image that is intended to explore the inner life, and in this case, he exploits the ideas of social relations and pleasure to highlight a particular way in which life is given its form. The variety in his combination of dance-like elements is a means of sustaining both the pleasure of listening to this music and the intense pleasure that is experienced by participants in the imaginary dance. Our being entranced by the pleasure helps to convey the experience that is being represented; the beguiling experience flows through us as we listen. For this reason, we cannot easily assume an attitude of moral superiority and dismiss the life portrayed as frivolous and unworthy, since it is implicit that we ourselves are drawn to its attractions. A listener who took no pleasure from the sensuous nature of this music would be unable to understand what is being said.
The dance-like character of the piece is created primarily by a domination of motives beginning on an upbeat, along with a characteristic use of syncopation, and these motives are accompanied by or alternate with lines that begin on a downbeat. The motives are also combined in different ways and life is given to the music by a free and fluid movement between the different motives and ideas. Growing out of the fourth bar of the theme, in which the opening quaver is tied to the preceding minim, the motives and syncopated sequences are mainly sustained patterns of quavers closely related in pitch, giving an expression of continuous energetic motion to the dance. The seemingly spontaneous emergence of a dance out of the fourth bar of the theme is one way in which they are integrated. Hence the fugue is ordered by the appearances of the theme, either in all four voices or, in the closing parts, in two voices. So, notwithstanding the freedom in its movement from one moment to the next, there is an underlying structure to the fugue as a whole. and we can show how each return of the theme contributes to an unfolding dramatic purpose.
In its inversion, the theme easily lends itself to the dance-like rhythm that is suggested by the patterns that pervade the piece, but, at the same time, it retains its significance for all of the fugues of the sequence, its allusion to the idea of human interdependence. The drama in this case lies in a conflict between the moral demands of such interdependence and the hedonistic allure of the sensual life as expressed in the expression of freedom in the music. Thus, in the opening pages of the piece, the upper hand is assumed by the qualities of the dance as they increasingly assimilate the theme to their melodic and rhythmic character. In this connection, there are four rhythmic patterns: one already mentioned that is derived from the theme and uses a minim tied across the bar to a quaver and followed by quavers, variants of which can be seen in similar ties involving minims or crotchets and crotchets (A). Another motive uses a dotted minim followed by a crotchet (B), and in a further motive a crotchet rest is followed by a crotchet and a minim (C). The last is that of a quaver rest followed by three scalar descending quavers (D). The vitality of the image is sustained by means of varied transition and counterpoint between them and related rhythmic ideas.
The theme is introduced in an uncomplicated descending sequence from the commencement to bar 18, and different expressions of A (mainly but not exclusively) in different voices, increase the independent assertion of a dance rhythm – from the entry of the tenor voice which is opposed in bars 13 and 14, by a divergent leap of an octave in the soprano. Then, with the entry of the bass in bars 15 to 18, the A pattern is used in overlapping rhythms in all four voices (a characteristic of the piece as a whole) in order to absorb the theme into the dance-like patterns. With the completion of the introduction of the theme in all four voices, the dance-like music increases in vigour, from bar 19, with patterns A, B and D overlapping in counterpoint. At bar 27, the sequence involving the theme is repeated, as though to immediately confirm its assimilation to the dance and, in this instance, a dramatic ascent in the soprano, in counterpoint with entry in the tenor, is followed by the introduction of C as an element of variety to the dance-like rhythms.
Having absorbed the theme into itself, from bar 43 the music moves easily into its dance-like character in all four voices sharing the overlapping of A with other rhythms in the alto, tenor and bass, and a feeling of psychological freedom is conveyed by moving effortlessly (in bars 52 to 60) to an overlapping of C and D. This movement reaches a climax of sustained high pitch combined with descending scales in bars in 57 and 58, and 60 and 61 leading into a rhythmically forceful overlapping of A in the soprano and alto voices and (in bar 64) in alto and bass. The effect of the music in this section is to move from a sense of freedom of expression to an ecstatic affirmation in which its counterpoint vividly evokes an image of dancers moving together and making complementary movements and gestures. Simultaneously, a version of the theme reappears in the bass, in a form that is obscured by the other voices, especially the climactic soprano and alto. This is accentuated by the harmony, as the theme is now stated in the leading note and not in another key, giving it a muted quality – as though emerging from the depths of the music.
In this respect, the appearance of the theme denotes a change of direction, and a reversal of the order of its appearance between bars 61 and 80 is important to the meaning of the fugue as a whole. Changes of harmony in this order, from the bass to G minor in the tenor (bars 65 to 68), to the tonic in the alto (bars 72 to 76) and to A minor in the soprano (bars 76 to 80), combined with a virtual removal of overlapping rhythms in the accompanying voices, enable the theme to be sounded with increasing clarity and assertiveness. In this section, another rhythmic pattern appears (E) which is characterised by lines of quavers that have very little tying over from one to another, and, supplemented by arpeggios in the bass, this pattern is clearly intended to animate rather than interfere with the theme. Hence, at a moment of revelry in the dance, the theme returns to focus attention upon our unavoidable responsibility to the interdependence of human life.
A returns in the bars that follow (81 to 87) but a loss of confidence in the autonomy of the dance is suggested in the further pattern (F) of a semi-breve tied over to a minim – in bars 85 and 86, and again in bars 91 and 92. Meanwhile, B and D appear in different voices, until, with the help of more energetic phrasing in bars 93 to 96, the dance regains its dominance and equilibrium with counterpoint of A in soprano and tenor along with D in the alto. This is realized in a step-by-step ascent in all four voices between bars 96 and 102 and in the floating ease with which this leads to an exchange using D in the soprano, alto and tenor. The vigour of this recovery is then asserted against the theme, which returns in bar 107 (in the tenor) beneath a forceful statement of A in the soprano.
In this bar, there is a strong feeling that the dance might prevail over the theme. First, if the lines are synchronized and close to each other in sound, as for example between a sympathetic viola and cello, the harmonic and rhythmic intertwining of tenor and bass creates a sonority which blends the theme into the dance-like character of the music. Also, in bars 107 to 114 the theme in tenor and then alto is accompanied in the other voices by A in the overlapping rhythms that give emphasis to this dance-like character. Thus, the music creates a feeling of centrifugal force in which the dancers identify themselves with their common action and its emotional power; the theme is unprecedentedly absorbed into their sensuous experience and this has an obvious significance for the piece as a whole. In response to the assertion of responsibility to human interdependence in bars 61 to 80, the dancers assign human interdependence to the communal experience of the dance and, in doing so, obscure the world that lies beyond its pleasures. An expression of physical and emotional attachment to others and assurance of oneself in knowing their acceptance represents a powerful experience of seeing oneself in our perception of how we are seen by others.
This experience of euphoria is sustained in the dance rhythms that ensue, but is coloured, in bars 125 to 127, by a return of F in the soprano, in which a plaintive F (note) is echoed by an extended E (note). In this way, the conclusion turns adroitly against the dancers’ feeling of triumph, and as the dance reaches its conclusion and fades the theme returns, as impassive as a law, to take its position in the order of things. It is first heard in the tenor rising out of the bass, recalling its emergence in bars 61 to 80, and in G minor (bars 179 to 182), and then, more definitively, in the tonic of D minor, in the alto voice (bars 184 to 187). Thus, the completion of the piece is also the completion of a dramatic structure that gives this fugue its significance and place in the sequence of pieces that constitute the core of The Art of the Fugue.
Contrapunctus 7
This fugue is distinctive for its use of the theme and its inversion and in augmented and diminished versions of them, all of which also appear in various combinations. They are related to the earlier fugues, and in particular to Contrapunctus 5, with its dotted rhythm. At the beginning, this appears in its inversion, in counterpoint with a diminished version of the theme, to create a clear sense of self-expression. Almost immediately, however, this clarity of self-assertion is engulfed in a complex of voices and competing impulses, developing into a conspicuous contrast with the balanced opposition of voices in number 5. Thus, the preliminary sense of affirmation quickly falls away, as the spirit is expressed in different forms of the diminished theme in a sustained descent. Taking place in several phases, each with its own kind of organization and suggestive character, this descent as a whole is divided into halves, so that the mid-point represents a critical moment of resistance (in bars 28 to 31) from which the fall is completed. Bach’s portrayal in this fugue of a loss of mastery depends in particular upon his evocation of a visual image, that of a body drifting downwards as though into the depths of an ocean, and the counterpoint between different forms of the theme and the countersubject delineate the falling body, the movement of currents above, around and below it, and the dissolution of an individual spirit.
The strong feeling of a life over which the individual loses control again gives to Bach’s imagery an intimate sense of the experience; the disintegration of moral and psychological equilibrium is conveyed in the technical resourcefulness and precision that distinguishes this fugue and The Art of the Fugue in general. Thus, the medium for action is indicated by the countersubject, and a characteristic rhythm is established by quaver patterns of descending or ascending parts of the scale (or one and then the other) which evoke a current in ripples of energy generated by syncopation in the upbeat commencement of a scale. From bar 5 to 12 an augmented version of the theme in inversion appears in the bass, and this attracts different forms of the diminished theme. Interpolated into the medium created by the countersubject, the diminished theme is first heard (abbreviated) in the tenor (bar 6), and, in the following two bars, in the alto, both in the original form. This is a preparation for the appearance of the diminished version, now in its inversion, in the tenor voice in bars 9 and 10. These developments follow the rise and fall of the augmented version in the bass, and they are significantly affected by the way in which movement is intensified in the medium in these bars. Descent of the diminished theme drawn down by the underlying force of the augmented version is accompanied by crosscurrents defined by an overlapping of syncopated quaver patterns in the three top voices. This creates a complete image of the spirit falling bodily, being drawn by forces in the medium.
Something significant is added to the second section (bars 13 to 31), as the focus shifts from the body falling and the currents to the value of the spirit and a predominance of the theme in different and interrelated versions. Specifically, the falling body shines brightly as the activity of the medium is attenuated by a lighter allusion to the movement around the descending figure. Thus, between bars 13 and 21, a descent of the diminished version, that is mainly in the original form of the theme, enjoys a conspicuous domination of the music, with its movement from soprano and alto to tenor and bass being countered by a strong emphasis upon the character of the theme. This is enriched at the beginning of the movement by a modified reiteration of the theme in its original inversion in the alto voice, which takes over from the diminished version in the soprano, and echoes what we have heard in bars 2 to 5. Allusion to the expression of individual spirit as presented in Contrapunctus 5 has the effect of giving backbone to the falling figure, and suggests an inner resistance to its confusion and loss of control. An element of stability created here is continued in the soprano in bars 19 to 21, and then, less obviously, in the augmented version that arises in the tenor (bars 23 to 30).
In this section, there is a continuous affirmation of the spirit of the individual, and it grows in conviction as the music evolves. We feel it especially in the surge of feeling in bars 20 to 26, in which the diminished version is integrated with the movement of the currents and is combined with a rising pitch and intensity in the voices. Hence the theme appears in the tenor and bass in bars 20 and 21, in the alto in bars 23 and 34 and in the soprano in bars 25 and 26; and it is, in all but one, in the morally positive original form of the theme and continuous with the flow of the medium as it is determined by the countersubject. This development gives us a sense that the spirit is strong enough to withstand the challenge that assails it. The climax of the second section arrives in the mid-point of the fugue with an unimpeded statement of the diminished theme in its original form in bars 28 to 31. Appearing firmly in the bass and repeated in stretto in the alto, it makes a strong affirmation of the spirit, and the meaning of this affirmation reflects the value of a form of life as it is affirmed in Contrapunctus 1.
Consequently, Contrapunctus 7 can be considered to be tragic in tone, since the second half corresponds to the first but conveys disintegration. Initially, the third section corresponds to the first, and describes a precipitate downward spiral that is highly dramatic in the light of section two and its expression of resistance. This change is evident in the turbulence created by a more complex employment of the rhythmic shapes and syncopation that are characteristic of the countersubject. Thus, in each of bars 31 to 34 there are three different places in which notes (mainly quavers) are tied over to semi-quavers so that the accent falls on an upbeat, and this represents currents of water surrounding the falling body. The action of pulling it downwards is suggested in two specific ways: one involves the use of chromatic touches to convey an impression of spiralling downwards and the other a shift from the higher to lower voices in order to evoke a sudden descent. These devices are perfectly co-ordinated with the turbulence of the countersubject in this section and with each other; the first touch of chromaticism occurs in bar 32, in which the quavers of the second half in the tenor are B flat, B natural, C and C sharp. In bar 34, a more energetic torque is given to the falling figure by a more intricate chromaticism, in which quavers of C sharp and C in the soprano are in unison with quavers of E and E flat in the tenor. With respect to the shift from higher to lower voices, in bars 34 and 35 syncopation is more prevalent in the tenor and bass, making them predominant, and movement in them carries the body down quite explicitly in the descending scale that follows immediately in bar 36.
At bar 35, the augmented version returns in its inversion in the alto voice, and this line is key to an image of the figure drifting slowly downwards. The abrupt change is accompanied by a change in our point of view, as now the body is imagined from below, and the image is strongly influenced by a re-orientation of the current, as the descending scale in the bass is continued in a sequence of quavers without syncopation. This accentuates the feeling of depth by removing the turbulent activity from the current – thereby suggesting a silent world in which the powerless spirit is weakened as it sinks into an unbounded space, and while the one diminishes the other expands endlessly. In order to create this effect voicings of the original theme in tenor and soprano surround the augmented version and, by shadowy harmony and counterpoint, give resonance to its spatial significance.
The fourth section is a contrasting parallel to section two – whereas two portrays the individual resisting decline, four describes a dramatic loss of strength and ultimate demise. This begins immediately in a statement of the diminished version in the home key (in the soprano and alto) and then its repetition in G minor (in the alto and tenor), so that a sense of instability coincides with an impression of the spirit losing resilience. Psychologically, the latter key is less forceful, and it continues to play a part in the whole of the fourth section, as the unfocused individual is tossed around by the increasing currents. Thus, a growing disorder is conveyed in the rush of ascending and descending scales in different voices, the abrupt movement in certain wide intervals, and sudden shifts of direction in mood and phrasing. In bars 47 to 50 the movement becomes decidedly wayward, as the weakened expression of impulse in the alto and tenor statements of the theme is overlaid by a rising and falling scale (bar 47) that peters out in the following bar, and is succeeded by another impulse (bar 49) which descends into a broken sequence of short phrases in the tenor, alto and bass, before an octave in the alto lifts the will back into action. This faltering of spirit continues in the next bar with a muted extract of the theme, the fragility of which is supported by a rising scale in the tenor and then followed by an immediate loss of momentum in bar 54. The rapid changes of mood in these bars are given a psychological definition by an elegiac return of the theme in its diminished form in alto and tenor in bars 55 and 56. In the course of these developments, the augmented version of the theme unfolds in the soprano from bar 50, and, contrary to its role in the other three sections, its presence is fragmentary – in keeping with the character of the fourth section. Thus, it is most prominent in its closing crotchets and their dissonant collision with the other voices.
From bar 52 patterns of semi-quavers in the lower voices create a rhythmical motion beneath the attenuated spirit, and the ascending scale in the tenor just mentioned (in bar 52) is immediately followed by a descending scale in the bass in the next bar. The counteraction is part of an unpredictable flow of energy that continues to the end of bar 55, and then violently condenses the spirit and the medium from bar 57 to the conclusion. In this, the spirit loses its character, while agitation in the bass in bars 57 and 58 is transferred to the soprano. At this point, the other voices fall away and allow an unimpeded attention to the death throes of the spirit and the displacement of the current. For, now the body is on the ocean floor and the subsequent descending quaver patterns and a conclusive final bar hold it down as it dies.
In The Art of the Fugue, Bach shows how different ways of seeing the form of reflective life in a person can be powerfully represented in terms of inner experience, and do so without engaging in a narrative and relating our thoughts and feelings to detailed characterization. For example, a sense of disorientation is often suffered by us and is sometimes an unavoidable expression of the form of human life, and it is accompanied by certain feelings and emotions. The piece engages with many aspects of reflective life as it is experienced by a person; hence the pleasure that we take in the music is created by its sense of inner life in relation to the form of human experience. Even when the experience is tragic we can be deeply drawn to a representation of life that reveals the nature of things. To a reflective being this kind of knowledge is a natural concern, and the deep exploration of it can be both exhilarating and compelling. In Contrapunctus 7, the body drifts downwards in an unbounded and empty space, and in this image the listener’s experience of the music suggests the experience of the individual as he or she loses mastery of himself and a sense of the world to which he belongs; the music is more than simply a way of signifying an idea of how life can be deprived of purpose, or simply a consoling expression of feelings and emotions. The intense experience of our feelings and emotions in relation to the form of human life is a significant kind of self-knowledge.
Contrapunctus 8
A contrasting way of conceiving the form of reflective life for a person is presented in Contrapunctus 8. Whereas in the previous fugue the individual is portrayed in its isolation from others, here the emphasis is turned towards the significance of inner life in others to our own inner life. In this respect, we return to the central idea of human interdependence from another angle, and once again the piece is presented in halves; the first is in two parts which elaborate upon a playful gesture and then combine this with an expression of self-affirmation. The second half incorporates these ideas into the music associated with the third subject of the fugue, and this expresses the idea of interdependence in our shared inner experience, as fundamental to the experience of a reflective being. Hence the first half can be seen as portraying the elements of play and inner affirmation in the development of a child while the second represents the mature psychological interaction that is the goal of this nurturing play.
In keeping with what we have seen about the purpose of the work as a whole, this fugue is not so much a description of any particular experience as a portrayal of the vitality that comes from the intimate experience of each other. So, we can see the opening subject as a playful gesture without a particular meaning, apart from its being the kind of behaviour that awakens the psychological contact between ourselves and others and therefore stimulates inner awareness between individuals. It is an interesting example of Bach’s wit that he introduces us to this dimension of our inner life with the kind of experience by which it is typically initiated in our development.
The lilting downward movement of the first subject and the whimsically abrupt nature of its ending express the playful gesture in the alto voice, At bar 6, the soprano takes up the subject while a countersubject in the alto becomes an emotional complement to the gesture. This part of the first half of the fugue is characterized by a free interaction in which the response of other voices, and mainly in the form of the countersubject, express an encouraging confirmation of the subject, an impulse that is strongly suggested by the shape of crotchet followed by quavers in a particular orientation. In connection with the latter, the interval of a third enhances the mood of openness and warmth. Also, the whole of this section (to bar 38) is distinguished by an open texture that enables the music to breathe freely, so that expression of the subject and countersubject are clearly articulated as aspects of an effortless and spontaneous communication between parent and child. Even when the subject and countersubject are in counterpoint (for example, in bars 21 to 24) the expressive intention of both is easily heard.
Furthermore, the countersubject as an expression of encouragement belongs to a structure that is governed by alternation between playful action and receptiveness. This applies in particular to the inversion and its sense of withdrawal from action, as we see early in the piece (in bars 15 t0 19), before bar 20 leads into the next main entry of the subject. The alternation provides a rhythm for the fugue as a whole, and in the first half attachment of the countersubject to the subject expresses action while attachment of the inversion to intervening passages expresses receptivity. This conception is underlined by a gently bouncing rhythm in the alto and tenor which concludes the opening section in bars 35 to 38.
At bar 39, the first subject in the soprano is in counterpoint with the second subject in the alto, and the psychological significance of this development is conveyed in a rhythmic transformation of the music. To start with, the second subject and its descending pattern of quavers – involving triple repetitions separated by descent of a third and ascent of a tone – adds a contrasting drum beat of self-affirmation to the playful opening subject. In this respect, counterpoint between the subjects, both in this section and the remaining parts of Contrapunctus 8, is concerned with an imperative that lies behind our involvement in the inner experience of others. And because the drum beat of self-affirmation expresses a psychological necessity, the rhythmic structure of the music changes in another way. Whereas the playful indulgence of the first section is generally free and relaxed – counterpoint with the subject being largely affected by notes tied over the bar, quaver rests and syncopation – now the rhythms of the first and second subjects are strictly lined up so that the free expression of feeling is replaced by the sense of an experience without which the individual will cease to develop and flourish. Otherwise, this relation between the subjects in counterpoint remains in a dialectical contrast with moments of receptiveness in which greater rhythmic freedom is qualified by a substitution of seconds for thirds in the countersubject, suggesting constraint.
These observations clearly suggest a new perspective, as the counterpoint of one subject with another diverges from the simple expression of a playful gesture. Rather than developing the description of a particular experience the music takes the original idea as a prompt for its definition of the form of inner experience itself. Hence the playful perception of another person’s inner experience represents one element of the form and the self-affirmation that accompanies it represents another. Such a transformation is confirmed by the structure of the second section. In this, we can see that its organization in four parts makes use of the soprano and alto counterpoint of subjects one and two, with some variation of pitch, harmony and completeness, in bars 39 to 43, 51 to 54 and 81 to 84. So, the alignment of these elements provides a basis for the unfolding of this section of the piece, and in the first and second parts this alignment leads into a stronger statement, in the soprano, of the second subject (bars 44 to 46 and 67 to 70). Meanwhile, the intervening music is akin to the counterpoint in the first section with some prominence given to the countersubject and its inversion (especially in bars 45 to 58), and to the first and second subject. This combination is enriched by a variety of ways in which the flow of inner experience develops in mood and feeling, and creates a kind of imagery for the definition of such life as the expression of forms that are usually subliminal. In short, a positive experience is portrayed as a means of highlighting the forms by a structure in which they emerge naturally in the course of the section. The third part, beginning from bars 81 to 84, through an ascending climax in pairs of quavers to a triumphant reiteration of the second subject (bars 88 to 90), is followed by a rhetorical flourish in the tenor and then soprano, as a bridge into the third section.
Introduction of the third subject is accompanied not by the other subjects but by the flow of receptive experience and its characteristic use of the countersubject, in its original form and inversion (from bar 93). This creates an opening for the expression of self-awareness in relation to the inner development of the piece. In this connection, we have seen that the evocation of a particular experience in the opening section is transformed by the second subject into a portrayal of the form of inner experience, and this is extended in the third section. Hence, the new subject, which enters in the alto, in bar 94, outlines the form of the original theme of The Art of the Fugue, the significance of which is to express the idea of human interdependence. Specifically, this recollection makes the interdependence a fundamental element of inner experience, and it is reasonable to see this in our involvement in the inner experience of others. The self-awareness is ingeniously constructed by introducing the third subject covertly behind lively activity in the soprano (bars 94 to 97), and then projecting it in the tenor through spare activity in soprano and alto (bars 99 to 102). A corresponding moment of self-recognition is conveyed in bars 103 and 104, where a chromatic variant of the countersubject appears dramatically high in the soprano voice, and this reaction is confirmed in a luminous statement of the third subject, also in the soprano (bars 105 to 108).
Having established the identity of the third subject as an element of the form of inner experience, the music then reverts to the earlier material in bars 110 to 113. This action is figured in a striking combination of overlapping rhythms, chromaticism and syncopation in bars 111 and 112, and the resulting suspension enhances the forceful return of the second subject in the soprano, shadowed by the first in the alto (bars 113 to 118). The re-statement of the main themes following the introduction of the third subject leads straight into the ever-changing flow of inner experience which itself moves quickly to an emotional peak in bar 124 and immediately subsides. Thus, in the following bar a fourth section begins with an emphatic statement of the second subject in the soprano which is shadowed by the first in the alto (bars 125 to 129).
From bars 129 to 144, the main themes are adumbrated within the flow of inner experience in a way that suggests their being temporarily elusive and no longer a focus of attention. For example, some affinity to the third subject is already present in bars 129 to 131; the second subject in the alto is accompanied by the first in the tenor in bars 131 to 134, while the latter is also allusively present in the soprano in bars 139 to 140 and 143 to 145. The purpose of this somewhat indecisive interlude becomes clear when a mood of anticipation, created by the countersubject in the alto (bars 145 to 147), is resolved by the first of three versions of all three subjects stated together. Now we can see that the structure of the fourth section is characterized by a long passage of unfolding experience in order to find a place for the culminating union of the three subjects in an essential realization of the form of inner experience.
Therefore, in this fugue, the imagery that we have seen to define a type of experience is turned into a more precise representation of a person’s inner experience. Thus, there is a progression from a particular kind of experience (a parent’s playful engagement with a child) to its integration with self-affirmation and human interdependence, which are usually unnoticed. Expression of this development in the piece is crystallized in a multiple counterpoint of the three subjects between bars 147 and 162. The first subject ties this to experience of something specific and thereby gives it an object, while the second and third subjects define more completely the underlying form of inner experience. Rotation of the subjects, so that each is voiced in the soprano, alto and tenor, and the close relations of pitch and rhythm contribute to a delicate synthesis. Such intricate control makes it possible for Bach to create imagery for the subliminal elements in our awareness of another person’s inner experience, as piercingly sensuous and psychologically satisfying.
This climactic phase of Contrapunctus 8 is defined by its own structure; the first of the versions, between bars 147 and 151, gives space for the voices to move, and together with their placement makes them audible and equal in importance. To this lucid statement of the elements, the second version (bars 153 to 156) offers a response, in which the third subject moves from the tenor to the soprano while the others move down a step, and this brings together, in soprano and alto, the similarly structured third and first subjects. The complication alludes to conflict in the relations governing the form of inner experience, as in different experiences the elements can be opposed and even hostile. In the third version (bars 159 to 162) this instability is accentuated in a mock resolution in which (following the pattern of moving the tenor to soprano and the others down a step) the second subject is now separate in the soprano, and the first and third subjects are tightly interwoven in alto and tenor. The blending of subjects one and three enables us to hear a single line which animates the interweaving of playful engagement and a sense of human interdependence.
Bach’s subtle employment of dramatic form is continued in the closing phase of this fugue, in keeping with the meaning and significance of the music. Thus, from bar 164 to the final bar, a wave-like structure confirms the optimistic mood of the piece as a whole, making use of the overlapping tied over crotchets and quavers and their syncopation, characteristic of passages during which the subjects are either muted or absent. In the first place, we see an ascent of this kind reaching a peak in bar 169 with a statement of the second subject in the soprano, followed immediately by another return of all three subjects in bars 170 to 174. Here the third and first subjects are separated again by being in the soprano and tenor respectively and also because the first is two beats ahead of the other subjects. This contributes to the forceful descent of the second subject from soprano to alto and so to the impression of self-affirmation taking the initiative away from any threat of instability. In keeping with this spirit, the second wave reaches its peak in a triumphant flourish of semi-quavers akin to those that separate the halves of this composition, only more emphatic in tone. It subsides in a conclusive and balanced return to the three subjects in their original order, with the first in the soprano, second in the alto and third in the tenor.
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This argument concerning The Art of the Fugue sees the individual pieces in relation to a conception of musical meaning as it may be applied, in the Contrapuncti 3, 4 and 7, to the exploration of experience by imagery, and, in Contrapunctus 8, to the creation of a concrete surrogate for the form of inner experience. A development of the conception of inner experience in this discussion can begin with a reference to the origins of Bach’s approach to musical meaning in the work, and specifically to his interest in Germen philosophers who were known to him
Christoph Woolf has referred to these philosophers in linking Bach’s approach to composition to the scientific discoveries of Newton (Woolf 2001).
There is no question that Bach was influenced, notably in Leipzig (at that time home of Germany’s largest and most distinguished university), by the academic climate of intellectual inquiry and search for truth propounded by the philosophers Gottfried Leibnitz and Christian Woolf. Both defined philosophy as ‘Weltweisheit” (wisdom of the world) and – according to Bach’s student Lorenz Mizler – as ‘a science of all things that teaches us how and why they are or can be’. Bach was exposed to much abstract theoretical discourse, especially in Leipzig, but he had no interest in contributing to it himself. He focused instead on a genuinely empirical approach that made him explore ‘the most hidden secrets of harmony with the most skilled artistry’, that is, push and expand the known limits of musical composition. (page 98)
My interpretation of The Art of the Fugue suggests that though Bach was not interested in writing philosophy, philosophical thought of the kind that was practised by Leibnitz and Woolf was much more than inspiration for an interest in the science of music, and played a critical role in the meaning of this composition. Its development from the portrayal of experience by means of imagery to a portrayal of the form of inner experience is only possible by means of a philosophically sensitive understanding of the basis of reflective life. This psychological insight enables Bach to create music that engages us with inner life in action, and thereby generates an experience of the form of such life.
The Tears of Saint Peter
Before looking into the music, we should examine the ideas that are most important to the poems, in order to see as clearly as possible what is implied in the opening madrigals, particularly what is being conveyed in Madrigal 4. Thus, in the lines that Lassus chose to set, the drama of Saint Peter’s story is centred by the connection of his moral failure to an immediate experience of what he reads into his master’s eyes. This moment is specifically introduced in Madrigal 2 as a metaphor of arrows that penetrate his soul, and between this and Madrigal 8 the cycle develops our understanding of what is seen by Peter in the glance itself. Thereafter, we are given, from various points of view, a dramatization of the moral and psychological significance of the event in its effect upon Peter.
In this discussion, I am interested in the opening eight madrigals since it is here that the music reveals the form of our sensory perception of the other person. Therefore, it is necessary to show how the central ideas of the cycle affect the meaning of individual pieces that are relevant to my purpose. So, in Madrigal 4 the idea of Peter’s denial of Christ comes together with the power of a person’s physical appearance, and it is vital to the meaning of Lagrime that the denial is more than simply a form of cowardly self-preservation. In the light of his master being surrounded by enemies and deserted by friends Peter sees ‘O disloyal friend, cruel disciple’ as a reproof for his betrayal. At the point of sacrifice all of the followers of Christ lose trust and therefore abandon their faith in him. This view is supported by the formal strength of ‘disloyal’ (‘Amico disleal’), for which the failing of cowardice on its own would be inappropriately weak.
Peter sees himself in Christ’s glance and the music conveys a sense of moral vertigo in this moment of self-awareness. Of course, the poet could have referred to moral vertigo, but could not achieve the same directness and power. The music gives us an acquaintance with the inner life of the subject that we can only acquire physically, and we may see this as a distinctive form of knowledge. To respond in this way, we need not have had exactly the same experience as Peter – from analogous experience, and without reference to any particular event, we can perceive his moral vertigo in the sounds, and so make good sense of the musical narrative.
Therefore, the music should not be seen merely as an emotional counterpart to the dramatic events that are presented in the poetry, rather our understanding of Peter’s psychology and inner experience is comprehensively extended by the musical setting. In this connection, there is a play of perception, self-awareness, feeling, mood and emotion which we can hear in the sounds themselves. Hence the union of perception and feeling in the music is cognitively as significant as the meaning of the words, and intensifies an enthralment that is now felt by the disciple with unprecedented force. The expansive contact with inwardness, moreover, means that we should not confine our interest in the music to short passages alluding to moments of perception and feeling, but also trace the arcs of musical development that help to portray the wider transformations of Peter’s inner experience and self-knowledge. Such compositional skill, moreover, depends upon an extraordinary expressive suppleness and precision.
There is a possible example of this wider transformation in a sensory intuition that is not fully recognized in the form of conscious thought. It may be conveyed in the music that the disciple ‘sees’ the anger and love of his master as essential to both of them, and that there is something more to Peter’s disloyalty than simply a betrayal of friendship. For the idea of disloyalty implies more than just cowardice, and it points to the possibility that he doubts the claims of his master. Peter might suspect that subliminally this uncertainty has given him a justification for denying Christ (here the word deny is given the further meaning of doubting that he is the messiah). To expand upon this, though Peter’s fear of death makes him disloyal, cowardice in itself can only be regarded as a weak form of disloyalty when compared with apostasy, and in the poem disloyalty is expressed in a strong form which is powerfully accentuated by the music. He sees in the eyes of his master something that has been barely conscious to him at the time of his action and then completely obscured until now.
Thus, there is an ambiguity in the intuition since the grace that is restored to the disciple in response to his genuine suffering respects both its psychological truth and a love from his master that is necessary – the interdependence between them is a condition of the value of life for both men, and this is why Christ is not simply angry or disillusioned. With such a conception in mind, it is not disloyalty but love that is pre-eminent and must prevail. Moreover, the transformative emphasis that is indicated in these ideas is contrary to a view of the tone of the cycle as simply one of pathos. The underlying tone of Lagrime is one of solemnity and it is not intended to elicit our sympathy and compassion for the subject. It is solemn in the sense of being dignified and uncompromisingly serious.
Thus, in Madrigal 1, the story of Saint Peter is presented as ancient and everlasting. The sense of its being steeped in time is immediately conveyed by the harmonic language of the piece, and remains through the agile changes of expression that are generated by the narrative. Often the changes are dramatic, and each verse has its own character while staying within the natural development of the music, both in a given madrigal and in the cycle as a whole. At the heart of this story is the interaction of physical modes that is associated with music as a physical art form, and this is focused in the idea of our surrender to the power of physical appearance. In this respect, Peter’s relationship to Christ highlights the influence of sensory experience upon our perception of the other person. Physical imagery, such as metaphor combined with dramatic contrast, is a way of alluding to modal interaction in the sensory experience at the heart of Peter’s psychology.
In Madrigal 1, the interaction of space, time and movement is intrinsic to the experience of looking into the eyes of his master at a moment of acute inner drama for Peter, creating a powerful sensory emotion which heightens the feeling of descent into anguished disillusionment. The image of repeated blows that are hypothetical in an earlier verse of this madrigal are now darkly and insistently real. Here we can see that within the sequential turn of attention towards Christ a synchronous interaction of sound, space, time and movement, using archery as a physical metaphor, musically defines the inner life of the main character. While space interacts with stillness in the steady purposefulness of Christ’s gaze and Peter’s response to it, time interacts with movement in the insistent reality of the blows. Thus, a cross-rhythm of modal interactions gives life and meaning to the portrayal of sensory perception and the psychology behind it.
As a physical medium, music is able to give direct expression to the modal interaction in experience. The composer’s mastery of sound, rhythm, melody, and harmony enable him to manipulate modal interactions musically so as to evoke the same kind of activity in the character’s inner life. This employment of a physical medium involves more than sequential causation and is also more than mimesis, or resemblance. For we can only recognize the truth of Peter’s experience of Christ from the self-awareness that is latent in sensory perception. Here, our associated sense of ourselves and other people – an immediate intuition which does not create a resemblance – tells us how a person in Peter’s situation would be likely to react. Knowing of his moral failure we see the truth of his reaction without the need for mediation of any kind. In this case, modal interactions in the disciple’s experience are revealed by musical thought, and they represent significant relations between the physical and psychological that are normally hidden.
Use of the physical metaphor for sensory emotion is continued into Madrigal 2. Now the image from archery is used in order to present a deeper and more precise definition of Peter’s experience of looking into the eyes of his master. In this madrigal, the dominance of a sensory emotion is announced in the opening verses, as it is the visual experience that affects him most powerfully. Thus, in the first half of the cycle focus changes from the guilt-ridden self-awareness that is introduced here to the many-sided reproof that Peter reads into the gaze of Christ.
It is obvious that the verses of this madrigal alternate between the narration of events and a portrayal of Peter’s inner experience. However, the mood of the poem blends them together to evoke the sensory emotion of stricken self-awareness by means of a dramatic contrast between the two elements. This blending is also served by an overlapping of the verses so that the development from an outline of the circumstances to Peter’s act of visual perception gives a particular intensity and intimacy to the music.
The opening verses culminate in a sense of vertigo as the eyes of Peter and his master meet. In this moment, the significant modal interaction is one of movement, time and balance. Hence the music slows down in order to evoke the capture of Peter’s attention, which evolves into a feeling of spellbound disorientation, and is strongly conveyed in the word miraro. Meaning aimed, this word is repeated in a high register and so becomes weightless and insubstantial, evoking the disciple’s loss of psychological equilibrium before the steady purposefulness in his master’s gaze. In the madrigal as a whole, Lassus is able to portray inner experience with great concentration and intensity by means of his manipulation of the modal interaction; in this respect, we can see precisely how musical form is organized in order to give direct expression to the form of inner experience.
A sense of narrative distance is restored in verses 4 and 5, and they establish a transition (‘not content with piercing Peter’s heart alone’) to the descent that conveys his spiritual disruption. Dramatic contrast is created by an interruption of the flow that generates a high ethereal phrase followed by a sudden leap downwards which is accompanied by a piercing harmonic progression. Thus, in verses 5 to 7 the interaction between movement, time and balance is given a further orientation, but one that represents a coherent development from the sense of vertigo to a loss of self-possession. Such an underlying connection in the musical expression is characteristic of the ways in which Lassus achieves a unique form in each of the pieces in this cycle.
The arrow that pierces Peter’s soul represents the moment of crisis for his sense of himself in this encounter, and it is in relation to this aspect of the experience that verses 5 to 7 create a culminating sense of instability. So, return to the narration in verse 8 is a prelude to the resolution, in which the tears of Saint Peter are predicted to recur without ending in his melancholy recollection of this moment. Close repetition of the phrase ‘Ungerle ‘ conveys in a concentrated form the anointing of his wounds in a motion that suggests the action of bathing them, and as this reiteration unfolds it is subjected to a contrast in pitch, so that the high ‘…licor’ in the soprano, as opposed to the other voices, resembles an opening wound. From this compounded musical allusion to the perpetuation of Peter’s grief and his tears, the voices come together to dramatize the process of bathing which he will observe thereafter.
This immediate resolution of the event is not final, for as we can see there is no prospect that Peter will ever be freed from it psychologically, even though grace is restored to him later in the cycle. However, the subtle and complex order of Madrigal 2 is resolved in terms of the deeper structure that we have already discussed; the closing verses round off interaction between the physical modes of time, movement and balance. The bathing of his wounds by anointing them with tears is a movement in time that has been indefinitely extended, and so the balance that is restored after his crisis is only temporary. As a whole, the madrigal is a beautifully poised realization of deep inner conflict in which modal interaction is consonant with a central aspect of the story.
All of this is possible only because physical modes like space, time, movement, balance, light, sound, matter, surface, shape, temperature and size are also media of sensory perception, and therefore belong to the psychology of a sentient being. One reason why I see a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee is that the modes which define my realization of the object are necessarily media of my sensory perception. Otherwise, I would not see a vessel of any kind because I would not see things as spatial, temporal, in motion or at rest, and so on. Because the physical object is realized by means of an act of sensory perception the physical modes in terms of which it is realized are media of sensory perception. Correspondingly, when the artist uses a physical medium such as music or painting the manipulation of modal interaction portrays a person’s inner experience by presenting the modes in a way that reflects their action upon his or her perception, thought and feelings. In this connection, the modal interaction that determines the character of the object and how it is felt by the perceiver can simultaneously affect a wide range of psychological responses, including not only sensation, mood and emotion but also the sense that we have of ourselves and others.
Thus, in Madrigal 2 the interaction between movement, time and balance is not metaphorical but explicitly unites the physical with the psychological. For example, the musical ideas which show Peter’s loss of composure depend upon an interaction of physical modes that are integral to his psychology as a person. The physical balance of a person is extended by his or her experience of life into balance of a psychological order – we see a continuity between them in the physical instability of somebody who is mentally disturbed. So, the physical event of Peter’s looking into the eyes of Christ includes the modes of movement, time and balance which interact as media of sensory perception, showing that much of our inner life is revealed by the ways in which the physical object is composed by our immediate experience of it. The precise setting in these terms of a psychologically penetrating text illuminates the form of inner life for a reflective being.
Madrigal 3 provides an outline of the events that are especially relevant to the other central aspect of the story, namely, what the moment of seeing into the eyes of his master tells Peter about his betrayal. Therefore, in Madrigal 4 the key moment is presented as a highly dramatic portrayal of our sensory perception of the other person, and for this musical setting the core of the drama lies not in his feelings of guilt or despair but in his sensory experience of that moment and the perceptions contained in it. From a gospel resembling narration of what is beyond reach when Peter looks into the eyes of Christ, this madrigal takes us close to the essence of the event. So, the structure of the piece is determined by a psychological description, reinforced by details of the master’s situation, which leads into a powerful evocation of what is seen and felt by the disciple.
Thus, the climactic final verses are marked by a development involving harmonies that illuminate the inner experience of the subject and elaborate the text with striking clarity and insight. In his violent estrangement, Peter is subjected to the prophecy Christ has made of the denial, and then to the judgement of his action, accusing him of disloyalty and inhumanity. With respect to the latter, ‘fiero’ has been translated as ‘proud’ in accordance with its present meaning and as ‘cruel’ (by Sylvia Dimiziani). At the time of Tansillo and Lassus, the word fiero was used to mean wild, uncivilized, and savage, and this could justify the translation as ‘cruel’ rather than ‘proud’. But the repetition of ‘discepol fiero’ is equally relevant, as it suggests a wildness and loss of self-mastery created by fear, and the music also reflects the engulfment of his will by shame and guilt.
Therefore, the same music expresses both his memory of the earlier action (its wildness) and his present experience of humiliation and paralysis (his engulfment). In the final verse there is a telling acceleration from a slowing down in ‘Amico disleal’ to the rapid succession of multiple voices in ‘discepol fiero’, creating a complex interaction of time and movement, the brevity of which reflects Peter’s instantaneous perception of his master’s reproof. Once again inner life is portrayed by modal interaction in which the physical modes act as media of sensory perception. Furthermore, this interaction encompasses a knowledge, alluded to in verses 5 and 6, that the captured Christ has been deserted by all of his disciples. Hence, while it is impossible to reach into all of the recesses of Peter’s inner experience, important features of it are vividly represented as directly felt by him, and what he sees in the eyes of his master will be developed dramatically in the pieces that follow.
The purpose of interaction between time and movement in the portrayal of this psychological event is to evoke the concentration of a range of perception and feeling in a single moment. Here the relationship between poetry and music can be defined in terms of the particular virtues of both forms of representation. In Tansillo’s words, the moment evoked can be seen as a supernatural expansion of the form that is taken by our sensory perception of the other person; looking into the eyes of Christ tells Peter far more than he might expect from such an encounter. However, even ordinary sensory perception is subliminally affected by an ocean of past experience, and in significant interpersonal contact a many-sided sense of oneself and the other person is possible, not to say likely.
In another aspect of his experience, Peter’s self-awareness when he looks into the eyes of Christ is a visual perception that can only be understood if we experience the moment as an interaction of space, time, light and stillness. The power of a figure that is illumined and motionless acquires its intensity from an interaction of space and time, and, simultaneously, light is concentrated by stillness.
Of course, in Lagrime, Peter’s experience is portrayed in music, and so visual phenomena are expressed by a medium for which there is interaction between sound, time and movement. The vertiginous dilation of a momentary visual experience is conveyed physically by an immobilization of rhythmic propulsion in musical sound. This immobilization and its psychological significance are created not simply by slowing the music down but by doing so with a rich harmonic development of sound. Thus, an aural conception of the modal interaction within Peter’s response to his master takes us close to the core of what is primarily a visual experience.
The foregoing phenomenological – rather than scientific – conception of physical modes is necessary to a true grasp of the structure of inner life, and thereby the influence of what is felt upon Peter’s psychology and his attitudes and actions. In this connection, we can see that the experience of looking into his master’s eyes is not merely a parallel to observable behaviour, it plays a substantial part in his response to a critical moment in his life. Hence it is in the music that essential features of his inner experience are most clearly expressed.
In Madrigal 2, the composer’s realization of sensory perception and related thought and feeling expresses the vertigo that accompanies the soul being pierced, while in Madrigal 4 the same kind of realization expresses a recognition of personal disorder and how this is transformed by the encounter into an experience of engulfment. We know the truth of such musical expression from direct intuition of our own lives, and this intuition depends upon the complex interaction of physical modes that enable a physical art form to illuminate inner experience.
The sensations that affect Peter’s perception can be seen to play a significant part in his self-awareness as he reads the origins of his own actions in the eyes of Christ. For the experience of vertigo and engulfment reveals his confusion about motivation and intentions when he denies his association with his master. We have seen that in Madrigal 4 ‘fiero’ means wild and uncivilized and refers to actions that are clearly driven by fear. In Madrigal 7 the same word unmistakably means ‘cruel’, ‘Pui fieri (parea dir) son gli occhi tuoi / De l’empie man, che / mi porrano in croce’ (‘More cruel’, He seemed to say, ‘are your eyes than the godless hands that will put Me on the cross’). In the same moment, a word is used in conflicting senses; in a loss of self-possession and overcome by feelings of moral entrapment the disciple sees cruelty in actions that are merely fearful.
Madrigal 8 expands on this distortion, in words given entirely to Christ by Peter’s perception of him. Comparing his most beloved with the other disciples, the Lord is seen to be ‘saying’, ‘Perfido e ingrate sovra / ogri’altro sei;’ (treacherous and unkind above all the others), and then, even more improbably, ‘Ti stai a pascer del mio / danno gli occhi,’ (you feast your eyes on my adversity’). Vertigo and the sense of engulfment draw Peter into seeing a degree of censure that is extreme and also contradicted by his tears. Madgrigal 9 expresses through the image of a snowflake hidden in winter and melted by the sun in spring the fear that has possessed him and is transformed by the encounter into shame and sorrow. Consequently, Peter’s transparent contrition is an obvious reason for grace being restored to him (Madrigal 11).
Significance in the form of inner experience in Lagrime can also be seen in the effect of Peter’s holy encounter upon his remaining life. In this connection, the despair that overcomes him in the later pieces is not simply created by an emotional disposition which follows from shame and guilt over his denial. Madrigal 11 closes with, ‘never a night passed that he did not awake on hearing the rooster sing of his iniquity, and weep new tears over the old guilt.’ In these words, ‘tears’ can be seen as a metonym for the key moment in the cycle. Thus, each time he remembers his great moral failure he re-lives through his weeping the experience that has determined its meaning for him, and this is not a generalized fact about himself but a vivid encounter with the other person. In Tansillo’s poetry, and especially in the music of Lassus, we feel the power of a sensory experience that changes the disciple’s understanding of himself.
Conclusion
Hamlet
The dramatist’s enquiry into our perception of others in Hamlet represents the form of inner experience; this is how inner experience can be revealed by dramatic form. For example, in Hamlet’s memories of his mother and their relation to his inclination to see her as lustful. We can infer something significant about inner life from his preoccupations and the dramatic shape that is taken by his judgements. Thus, in Hamlet’s characterization there is an inner portrayal that arises from his analysis of her in the light of his sense of having been betrayed. In this respect, sensory perception, and related perceptions from memory and imagination, are entangled with reflection and calculation – with his efforts to think about what has happened. Hamlet’s situation is defined by the urgent need to think constructively combined with extreme pressure upon his capacity to think clearly, and in this inner conflict, sensory perception, memory and imagination have a precarious role to play.
We have seen how the play shows us with great subtlety the evasive ways in which Hamlet establishes a view of Gertrude, and how this, along with his attempt to unsettle the King, shapes his behaviour towards Ophelia. In the various kinds of expression that are given to these trends we can see the structure of inner experience as a subtle reflection of Hamlet’s circumstances in relation to many aspects of his character. Hence the vivid memories of his mother that intensify the anger and disillusionment of his opening soliloquy emerge from a filial relationship that is all the more deeply violated by her because she abandons him to the will of his rival and enemy.
Hence, in Hamlet, the form of inner experience is revealed by the responses and actions of characters to each other, and this is the primary means for doing so in drama. It is extended by the ways in which dramatic form can be used to clarify the circumstances that determine a character’s understanding of his or her situation, and therefore the true nature of his thinking. We have seen this in the exposition of Ophelia’s rejection of her father and brother and the allegiance to Hamlet that underpins the action of the play. It is only in the light of such related action that we can understand how he responds to and acts in relation to her, and thus how his inner experience is revealed. In this connection, there are many trends that can shed light on the form of inner experience, and in Hamlet the relationships between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia are particularly alive with them.
Shakespeare’s mastery of dramatic form enables him to reveal the form of inner experience in Hamlet with an extraordinary richness and coherence. In direct connection with the present discussion we can see that this has been achieved in a complex pattern of psychological development throughout the action of the play. The inwardness of Hamlet’s experience of his mother in the first act deeply affects both his ability to act decisively against Claudius (Nelson 2017) and his amnesia and inattention to the circumstances of his accomplice Ophelia. The former leads to his evasive dependence upon the performance of The Murder of Gonzago and this helps to create a vertiginous loss of self-mastery, failure to protect Ophelia and a turmoil of confusion in which he murders Polonius and becomes increasingly irrational towards his mother. Behind this pattern of responses and actions the form of inner experience is also suggested in a subtle association of the unconscious evasions that stem from his conception of Gertrude with the disintegration of will following the hapless verbal assault upon her at the end of Act 3. This leads to the void he must face in having lost Ophelia, together with knowing his own part in her death. In the literary form of drama sensory experience and associated memory and imagination are intertwined with thought and reason, and with impulse and intention. Form is determined by language and not by the isolation of physical elements (as in a physical medium like music or painting).
Within this action as I have described it there is a salient feature of inner experience in our interaction with others which is pervasive in the play. The disparity between what we know of our own inner experience and what we know of the thoughts, feelings and attitudes of the other person is a strong dramatic element in all of the scenes in Hamlet. We see it from the beginning, in how, in spite of his readiness to obey the Ghost, Hamlet is unsettled by an understandable uncertainty about whether he is being deceived. The searing imagination of his returning father is at once compelling and deeply disturbing, as Hamlet is now helplessly dependent upon a ghost’s authority. In this connection, the opening of the play is defined by a feeling for our uncertainty about the inner experience and motivation of the other person; it is at the heart of the turbulence that gives the initial action its mood and character.
Another powerfully dramatic expression of the salient feature appears in Act 1, scene iii. In this scene, we can see that Ophelia exploits the ignorance of her brother and father in order to repel and mislead them. Moreover, her having firmly established her position as Hamlet’s accomplice leaves her free to mock them by means of psychological intelligence and skills that also enable her to avoid giving herself away. As an introduction to how the salient feature grows into an underlying element of the action of the play as a whole, this scene ignites a relationship between the theme of dissembling and the form of inner experience as it is centred in the opposition of Hamlet and Ophelia to the trio of the King, Queen and their spymaster Polonius.
Thus, in Act 2 the tension between knowing oneself and knowing the thoughts and feelings of others lies behind Ophelia’s deception in seeming to help Claudius and the Queen to discover Hamlet’s intentions and state of mind, and this tension reaches a high point in Act 3, scene i. Here, a fully realized expression of his desire to confuse and torment his adversaries shows us Hamlet’s actual intentions and state of mind. In this respect, the disparity between self-knowledge and our knowledge of the inner experience of others becomes more sharply focused.
The disparity is also evident in Hamlet’ subliminal inclination to undo his mother’s betrayal and therefore to spare Claudius in order to make it possible. In the relevant scene in Act 3, Hamlet’s imperfect knowledge of the King’s inner life is interwoven with an imperfect knowledge of his own mind. This is implied when, now that his designs appear to have been successfully realized and Claudius seems to be on the point of confessing the murder, Hamlet is taken by the sudden impulse to enact his revenge but finds reasons to suppress and postpone it. Even after the storm of mental effort to confuse and torment he secretly hopes that in private Claudius will reverse his decision to confess and continue in his place.
A mental confusion is obvious, since the ostensible purpose of catching the King’s conscience is to trap him into making a public confession and relinquish his crown. This intention is overridden by the impulse to kill him then and there; thus, the postponement exposes the double-thinking that is caused by Hamlet’s obscure desire to undo Gertrude’s betrayal. In this case, the imperfect knowledge of one’s own mind is a direct consequence of our imperfect knowledge of the mind of another person, for the precarious judgement of his mother’s sexual appetite is a cause of Hamlet’s loss of contact with his own motivation. As we have seen, the casualty of this labyrinthine psychological action is the person about whom Hamlet cares most, and that is Ophelia.
In scene iv, we are plunged more deeply into the entanglement of our self-knowledge with our imperfect knowledge of the other person, as Hamlet descends further into the vertiginous state that plays a significant part in defining the action of Act3. He kills Polonius in a moment of wildness and becomes increasingly disconnected from himself and the world as he is more and more exposed to the semblance of purposeful action by which he has dominated affairs. The expression of his will in this connection reaches a fitting conclusion in the meeting with Gertrude; this completes the cycle of dramatic events by confirming that his conception of her is a misconception. The tormented demonstration of his father’s superiority to Claudius and what follows it lead ultimately to her allusive denial of the invention that her marriage has been inspired by lust, and Hamlet’s persistence with this theme in lines 144 to 146, betrays his enthrallment to one idea and its power over him. And because there is no content in the key to his undoing of her betrayal he has fails in both public and private spheres, to put things right. Hence, at the close of this scene, he gestures towards an illusion of moral affirmation by proclaiming himself to be the agent of a mission to cleanse the world of its ills (lines 173 to 175).
In all of this we can appreciate how Shakespeare employs a predominantly literary art form to portray a powerfully recognizable human world in minute social and psychological detail. His expansive knowledge of this world is completed by a sustained and coherent knowledge of our inner experience, taking us well beyond the idea of drama as mimesis. The way in which, moreover, the psychology of a reflective being is seen in the disparity between our knowledge of ourselves and our knowledge of the other person is characteristic of literary art as a portrayal of the form of inner experience.
In order to complete these observations on the play we should consider more definitely an aspect of Shakespeare’s use of dramatic form that has already been intimated. For the subtlety of Hamlet’s characterization also depends upon the sensitivity of this form to the subliminal nature of self-awareness in our ordinary experience and behaviour. Self-awareness is present in many different ways that generally go unnoticed when we are immersed in our normal activities like playing a game or enjoying a piece of art. Such examples can be extended to include almost all of our thought and actions, including our engagement with and reflection upon others. The foregoing discussion of the play suggests that sensitivity to the subliminal nature of self-awareness is implicit in the psychological movement between impulses that obscure from Hamlet the reasons for seeing his mother as libidinous and moments of clear-sightedness in which he recognizes this motivation. Hence, by being able to portray degrees of self-awareness in our responses to others dramatic form is open to a more complex view of character. It is one thing to accuse Hamlet of self-deception and another to reveal the fluctuations of his inner awareness and what they imply. So, while we do not need drama to tell us that most of our self-awareness is subliminal, the portrayal of reflective life in action is able to show in detail how the fluctuations can affect our perception, and it can also give us insight into the consequences of this instability.
The Art of the Fugue
A comparison of Shakespeare’s use of dramatic form and Bach’s use of musical form in The Art of the Fugue must centre on the difference between the media of different art forms. In order to do this, we must concentrate on the implications for our understanding of the interdependence of sensory perception and the physical object in a physical as opposed to a literary form. Therefore, the well-defined integration of inner life with the detailed conception of a society and culture that characterizes Hamlet will not be found in a purely musical work; Bach’s composition exemplifies a physical form by realizing the interdependence in physical terms. Specifically, the identity and character of a physical object is realized in terms of interaction between physical modes such as sound, movement, time and space. This is how, in a physical art form, the physical object portrayed is given its identity and character by sensory perception, and, as we have already seen, it is possible because the physical modes are also media of sensory perception.
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In the music, there is a much livelier realization of the impressions, feelings and emotions of the subject. In this connection, Bach does not use dramatic form to portray the experience of a particular subject – he uses it to portray what a particular kind of experience is for the subject, whoever he or she happens to be. Hence, The Art of the Fugue does not have the great social and psychological range of Hamlet. However, as a physical art form it does achieve an intense realization of what inner experience is for the subject, and this is the key to its value as form of knowledge. Such realization is based on the evocation of imagery that has a physical affinity to our impressions, feelings and emotions and by means of this affinity refers to their personal significance. The relevant imagery should not be confused with literary images like metaphor and simile; rather it represents a physical equivalent of inner experience, and though inner experience is implicitly both physical and psychological, does not always take a definite physical form. Thus, the main theme of the cycle does not stand for, or symbolize, human interdependence; the hymn-like music of this theme is characteristically a direct expression of our sense of community, and the idea of human interdependence lies in our experience of the music as a physical equivalent of our inner life.
In Contrapunctus 3, the physical modes of sound, space, movement, time, shape and texture are dominant. The interaction between these modes, which are also media of sensory perception, evoke the murmuration of starlings in what is a perfect image for the experience of constructive thinking. Thus, the music does not represent the arrival at some decision or conclusion, rather it portrays the delicate and fleeting experience of turning ideas over in reflection with the aim of reaching some kind of resolution. In this connection, the use of physical imagery ties allusion to the inner experience of sensory perception to the physical aspect of a psychological phenomenon. Just as the physical object is given its identity and character by sensory perception, our experience of thought itself is intrinsically tied to physical origins, and so the intricate flow of a murmuration can suggest, through physical transformation, the unfolding development of ideas in our thinking. For example, musical ideas themselves are physical both in their being organized sound, movement and time, and in their allusion to a world of human experience that is essentially both physical and psychological. So, an inner state can be suggested by the musical manipulation of a physical image, and Bach’s apt employment of physical imagery is ideally sensitive to the portrayal of creative activity in a reflective being.
Thus, the image of a murmuration in the physical medium of music realizes the inwardness of a reflective being in an action that is typical of 0ur experience of constructive thinking. Clearly, this experience is not merely a matter of calculation and computation, for we have seen that media of sensory perception necessarily interact in the interaction of physical modes. Therefore, the purposeful thought of logic and reason is present in the structure of this composition as an expression of the movement of shape and texture in an imaginary space and through precise intervals of time, and this physical interaction entails the arousal of sensory intuition, memory and imagination. It also achieves a vivid impression of creative thought as a form of reflection that is both ordered and unpredictable. In this respect, the experience of inner freedom that is fundamental to constructive thinking is brought to life in a way that represents the non-mechanical essence of mind.
Contrapunctus 4 presents a conflict between the interdependence of our lives and a hedonistic attitude to human experience. We hear this conflict in the ways in which the main theme of The Art of the Fugue is related to the manipulation of a number of motives that together evoke a sense of involvement in a dance-like activity with a high degree of sensuous appeal. Opposition between the relatively simple and austere music of a chorale and the vigorous and sensually enveloping music of a dance is given a narrative structure in this piece, and I have presented an account of its outline.
The imaginative response of the listener to powerful inclinations vying for mastery creates an insight into the form of inner experience as it is for the subject, and this psychological drama is mediated through the interaction of physical modes. As in other contrapuncti, this interaction is a vehicle for the psychology to which it is tied in experience; here the significant interaction being one that involves the modes of sound, movement, time and balance. In this connection, we have seen that in different parts of Contrapunctus 4 the main theme and the dance-like music are related to each other in different ways. Order in the opening section in which the opposing lines are given equal strength is countered in the unfolding of the music as the main theme is gradually absorbed into the wayward and increasingly off-centre excitement of its counterpart. The rhythmically mixed and syncopated music of this richly contrapuntal alternative conveys the intense and pleasurable inclinations of a hedonistic subject, and culminates in the suggestion that human interdependence is truly represented by a shared indulgence of sensual enjoyment. For the subject, an unseen development takes place as the music of pleasure becomes sufficient to satisfy the interaction between physical modes so that movement, time and balance are in orderly relation to each other. This gives the dance-like element the power to absorb the main theme as an enrichment of its own character; for the subject this unseen effect creates the impression that his or her way of life complies with the demands of human interdependence. In this respect, the interaction changes in accordance with the emphasis placed upon different moments in the psychological drama by the precise unfolding of the experience.
Thus, an illusion that human interdependence is adequately represented by hedonism is created by the fusion of inclination and the interaction, and cannot defy reason for long. Hence, in the concluding section of this fugue, the interaction returns to the general orientation of the music as a whole, with the main theme as an expression of human interdependence that resists its counterpart. In keeping with this spirit, the committed return of the main theme brings the piece to harmonious completion.
Another characteristic action of a very different kind can be seen in Contrapunctus 7, in which the imagery of bodily descent is a metaphor for mental decline and loss of mastery. This piece is antithetical to Conrapunctus 3, in that where 3 portrays a subtle balance in which control is held in suspension in order to promote understanding, in 7 control is exerted in order to resist disintegration but with an increasing loss of power. Moreover, whereas 3 depicts a particular sensory experience 7 could be seen as the portrayal of inner decline over a period of time, a process of change which can also be associated with a different emphasis in its exploration of the form of inner experience. In this respect, there is a similar basis for seeing into this form, for in both pieces meaning is determined primarily by the modal interaction that is characteristic of physical media. However, 3 concentrates upon purposeful reflection and achieves an exhilarating insight into the feeling of a powerful but elusive and transitory experience. In 7, the falling object evokes the interaction of space, time, mass, volume, balance and movement in the form of drifting disorientation, and this interaction introduces into exploration of the form of inner experience a strong sense of mood and emotion. In a natural extension of sensory perception and its cognates memory and imagination, Bach creates this development by means of his use of a minor key combined with melodic shape, rich counterpoint, harmony and repetition that is subtly modified through the course of the music.
In Contrapuntus 8 and its parallel 11, the emphasis shifts from the individual to experience of our engagement in the lives of others. This makes it akin to dramatic form but in a manner that is appropriate to the art of a physical medium. Accordingly, there is a further development in these pieces of the ways in which impressions, feelings and emotions are extended in the portrayal of inner experience. For now, it is possible to organize the music so that the evocation of immediate awareness of oneself and the world can encompass elements of inner experience that are often sensed in passing, like self-affirmation, or normally subliminal and obscure, like the sense of human interdependence. Together with this development, the interaction of physical modes is enriched by the interaction of these modes with modes that are psychological in nature, in particular the mode that resides in a contrast between acquaintance with our own inner experience and acquaintance with the inner experience of another person.
The normally subliminal sense of human interdependence is conveyed in 8 by a degree of concealment. Thus, there is a clear distinction between the open announcement of interdependence in Contrapunctus 1, in which the main theme is introduced, and how it appears in 8. Inversion and fragmentary allusion to the theme deliberately subdue the hymn-like expressiveness of 1 to reflect the subliminal feeling of human interdependence in our actual experience of the other person. At the same time, allusion to this psychological dimension greatly deepens and enriches the music; a discreet echo of the theme strengthens the relevant portrayal of inner experience, and it does so, as we have seen, by creating tension between the theme and the music of self-affirmation. Thus, the structure of this fugue is not that of a narrative, rather it is built up in phases so that we experience with increasing clarity and intensity a coherent idea of what engagement with the other person is for the subject. The inner form of this kind of sensory perception is illuminated by our listening perceptively to the music.
What inner experience is for the subject, as a definition of the form of inner experience, does not refer exclusively to what is clear and obvious to the subject. It also refers to influences that are obscure but essential to the full experience. An example of how such influence plays its part in the form of inner experience can be seen in the reference to the unseen power of the interaction of physical modes in Contrapuncti 4 and 8. Thus, art can generate a significant development of self-awareness: the sensitive and penetrating portrayal of the form of inner experience can reveal much that we ourselves do not see in our subjective experience, and therefore can tell us things that cannot be inferred from a person’s report on his or her private life, feelings and emotions.
The Tears of Saint Peter
As a musical setting of dramatic action Lagrime combines, in its portrayal of the form of inner experience, the dominant features of Hamlet and The Art of the Fugue. The former is evident in a dramatic event between two individuals and a psychological realism that depends upon a precisely defined social and cultural situation. This event is predominantly realized by music that conveys inner experience by means of a profoundly expressive interaction of physical modes, achieving a comprehensive development of the serious text that is set. Thus, in its subtle and penetrating disclosure of inner life we see what such life is for the subject with a clarity and vivacity that is beyond our ordinary perception of ourselves and others.
Both Bach and Lassus create music that powerfully conveys a sense of what inner experience is for the subject, and do so by means that are appropriate to a physical art form. But an important difference between The Art of the Fugue and Lagrimecan be seen in the distinction between portrayal of a general kind in the former and the dramatization of a personal encounter in the latter. Hence, in Lagrime we can highlight a fundamental aspect of the form of inner experience. For in our experience of another person there is an inescapable departure in how we know and understand the other person’s inner experience from how we know and understand our own. From this distinction, we know that our knowledge of the other person is fragmentary and uncertain, and this uncertainty affects our sensory perception.
In Lagrime, the music is animated by a sense of how this disparity gives power to the physical presence of others; Peter’s experience of looking into the eyes of Christ is dominated by the reproof that Peter’s reaction puts into the thoughts of his master, and this reflects inner doubt and a sense of exposure. But the very nature of this knowledge also entails an unseen dimension of Peter’s sensory perception: our relatively partial knowledge of the other person’s thought and feelings makes our understanding dependent upon our past history. What Peter senses of Christ’s thinking about him is shaped by his enthralment to an overwhelmingly powerful spirit from whom nothing is concealed. Far from being an expression of pathos and pity, the relevant verses in Madrigals 2 and 4 can be heard as an incomparably lucid engagement with the subject’s inner life as it is outlined by the poetry, and this includes the influence of personal history that is unseen by Peter when he reads meaning into his master’s gaze.
There is no question that the portrayal of what inner experience is for the subject, as exemplified in Lagrime, is a distinctive and powerful form of knowledge. We have seen how, in its representation of the form of inner experience, Peter’s sense of himself and feelings are shaped by past experience in a personal relationship that is culturally and psychologically defined. Thus, the precise nature of his responses is integral to a wider conception of character and contributes an essential part of how his character can be understood, and this is continuous with how the inner experience itself affects his understanding of the encounter with his master.
Accordingly, we can infer a close connection between our giving the physical object its identity and character in an act of sensory perception and the significance of inner experience to what we perceive. Peter’s experience of looking into the eyes of his master is so diverse and powerful because it is charged with the sense of failing a profound and enduring moral commitment. In this respect, inner experience provides an essential component to the phenomenon, for without his subliminal sense of the history of their relationship Peter would not see such complex thought and feeling in Christ’s expression. Hence, by showing that past history determines what is perceived, I oppose the view that sensory perception is merely a transfer of information from the world to the mind, and argue that it is primarily in the form of inner experience, rather than in calculation or computation, that we gain essential insight into others and into ourselves. While Peter’s perception of his master’s thought is fallible, and inescapably subjective, it is fittingly secure in a way that would be impossible without the sense that it is given by the cognitive depth of his sensory experience.
Lagrime is holistic in the sense that Hamlet is holistic. Complex inner experience is conceived in relation to a complex conception of the character of an individual living in a well-defined society, and this relation is deeply understood in terms of personal relationships. The society, in turn, belongs to a culture with diverse forms and values to which the dramatic or musical artist is highly receptive. This integrated portrayal of reflective life in action, in which interacting parts of the whole are profoundly realized is not often to be found.
A consequence of this holism is that the aesthetic qualities of great art are necessary to the portrayal. Depth and scope of insight require technical skill, and mastery of detail and relations that govern the form and structure of the work. This is impossible without the felicity of execution that we associate with eloquence, proportion, rhythm, harmony and unity of effect. Therefore, experience of a work of art like Hamlet or Lagrime combines the aesthetic power of its realization with an exhilarating experience of unprecedented vision. Correspondingly, this fundamental relation of aesthetic excitement to knowledge enables us to appreciate why great art, though aesthetically powerful, is often disturbing and far from beautiful, since genuine revelation threatens the comforting perception of ourselves and the world to which we are naturally inclined.
It emerges that showing how art articulates the form of inner experience reveals something essential about the conditions for our knowledge of ourselves and the world. In this connection, we have seen that literary and physical forms differ in the emphasis that they place on aspects of inner experience that we might consider to be polar opposites. While it is essential to both forms that they integrate the inner life with a particular community and its values, it is clear that Hamlet is distinguished by a formidably precise conception of a social and cultural world in which the characters’ moral and psychological attributes are subtly drawn. Whereas, in the music of Bach and Lassus, we experience more acutely what inner experience is for the subject, even though this is only possible by means of a sensitive portrayal of a world by which inner experience is shaped. Immediately above, I have made the point that what inner experience is for Peter is at the heart of a complex order of events that transform him, and that therefore his moods, sensations. feelings emotions and thinking on a single occasion have a central part to play in determining his character and history. Hence, in the absence of literary and physical art forms, the interrelations between inner experience and the world cannot be deeply explored, and the significance of what inner experience is to the subject is most likely to remain obscure.
Within the foregoing argument lies an important distinction concerning the nature of our perception in general, and this can be elucidated in terms of an observation about how an object changes in our experience of it over time. In listening to an obscure piece of music we can begin in a state of incomprehension in which the sounds have no meaning at all, and progress through successive hearings to a clear musical idea of what is being expressed. Such a progression, in what is primarily a sensory experience of the music, may be intermittent in that a phrase might make sense after several hearings while the rest of the piece remains obscure. Further on in this project other phrases might be clarified and this development continued until the piece as a whole acquires a musical sense and eventually a definite meaning that could be expressed in words.
In this account of sensory perception there is no synthesis involved in the procedure that produces a development from incomprehension to understanding, and the purely sensory progression to a conceptual resolution does not require any representation or reproduction in the imagination. Most significant is that throughout the whole experience until the resolution, at least some part of the music will remain to be clarified purely by means of further listening. And in this we can see that a concept or clear understanding of the object can be achieved simply by repeatedly hearing the piece. This is because all sensory perception in a healthy person is given depth of meaning by contact with that person’s past experience of the object and related experiences. Hence the object is given its identity and character by an act of sensory perception.
This argument has two main implications in relation to knowledge of the physical object. In the first place, our sensory perception of an object can change in our growing acquaintance with it, even though we do not see how the changes are taking place (in the middle of the project parts of the music will remain incomprehensible even though an indiscernible development towards comprehension must be taking place – without gradual change in this respect there could be no resolution of the project). This implies that there can be developments in comprehension that do not depend upon having a concept of the object. Second, it is possible, and undoubtedly common experience, that conceptual understanding is not only the result of deliberative thinking but arises naturally out of our patterns of sensory experience. This is related to how subliminal self-awareness affects our sensory experience in general, and does so in a way that is continuous with sentient life itself and does not require special acts of inner representation. Awareness of earlier experiences of the music must be seamlessly and subliminally woven into the present experience of it, and in a way that increases comprehension.
A third implication can be derived from these two: the imperceptible changes combined with the acquisition of understanding by purely sensory means implies a continuous interaction between knowledge, or conceptual clarity, and sensory experience, and we can therefore infer that what we learn about an object will have a significant influence on our sensory experience of it. So, when a child realizes that a cup is a vessel for drinking tea or coffee, this knowledge will change his or her perception of the object and he will come to see it as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee. His seeing the object according to its purpose will be in his visual response – as opposed to there being a sensory experience followed by a conceptual reproduction that gives the object its identity.
It is an important strength of art as a form of knowledge to resist the strict individuation of faculties, in particular those of reason and feeling. The foregoing argument shows us how the interaction of sensory perception and constructive thought is necessary to an elucidation of the form of inner experience as it is revealed in works of art. In this connection, the discussion of Hamlet, The Art of the Fugue and The Tears of Saint Peter has shown in numerous ways how the physical object or person is given its identity and character by an act of sensory perception. A clear reflection of the interaction of sensibility and constructive thinking, as a continuous feature of inner experience, is deeply established in the delineation of character in all of these works and with many coherently related meanings. We see it with a special intensity and psychological significance in the portrayal of a moment of sensory experience in the drama of Saint Peter. The interfusion of immediate perception with the understanding that he has of Christ gives a power to sensibility that changes Peter’s conception of himself and the world.
Thus, compared with propositional logic, in pieces of great depth like Hamlet and The Tears of Saint Peter the logic of dramatic form, and by implication of art forms in general, is more finely discriminating and responsive to contrasting points of view in its judgement of human life and its value. And this means that the interpretation of individual works should not be a reduction of artistic insight to the form of propositions about such life and experience but, rather, an elucidation of what the work is saying in terms of its own logic. Hence, in Hamlet the intricate and complex definition of relations between Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia at the heart of a highly charged and dramatic action resist the language of unequivocal judgements about the nature of human life and experience. Similarly, Saint Peter is drawn into a vortex of personal betrayal, guilt and disturbing sensory experience that confuse our attempts to evaluate the judgement to which he subjects himself, and it is the intense moral and psychological disorder portrayed by the poet, and even more powerfully by the composer, that represents the aesthetic meaning and substance. In both works, the logic of artistic portrayal is richer and deeper than we could reasonably expect from a string of seemingly definitive propositions.
The purpose of the foregoing enquiry into Hamlet, The Art of the Fugue and The Tears of Saint Peter has been to show in detail how, in certain powerful works of art, the logic of dramatic and musical form can be developed in ways that give depth to the portrayal of reflective life in action, and in particular to interconnections between the form of inner experience and the social and cultural conditions of life in a clearly defined civilization. More narrowly, and in relation to physical art forms, emphasis is given to the interaction of physical modes in our sensory perception.
The essential ideas behind this approach to knowledge of ourselves and the world rest upon an absolute ontological distinction between materiality and inner experience. This can be expressed in different ways, including, as we have seen, the rejection of theories that attempt to merge them. Nor can we substantially represent the world as we experience and understand it by describing physical activity in the brain. Moreover, a direct and specific example of the distinction can be seen in the form that is taken in our sensory perception by the interaction between materiality and inner experience. In our seeing a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee, the physical object is given its identity and character by the act of perceiving it, so while our perception does not make stone hard it makes us sensitive to the hardness of stone in architecture, certain tools and in sculpture. This implies an interaction between something material that can be transformed into a physical object like a cup, a house or a mountain, and the inner experience of a sentient being that makes the transformation. Thus, each element in the interaction is intrinsically distinct; the material thing cannot be wholly or partly experiential and the inner experience cannot be wholly or partly material. This means that the composition of anything as a physical object entails an absolute ontological distinction between interacting elements, and that we cannot understand phenomena in terms of a metaphysical theory that merges these elements.
We can see an analogy in a canvas that has been stained with blue paint: what stains the canvas must be paint-like and not canvas-like. The canvas is a physical requirement for a blue canvas but the paint gives it colour. Similarly, what gives the physical object its identity and character must be experiential and not material. The material and its physics provide what is necessary to the realization of a physical object but the act of perception, memory or imagination gives it identity and character.
It follows that the world and our place in it can only be properly understood when we conceive of them in a way that makes use of a language and logic appropriate to the distinction concerned, and how it is realized in our perception of things. Translation of the language of inner experience into mechanical physical interactions in the brain must violate the ontological distinction and, in doing so, fail to illuminate the true nature of ourselves and the world to which we belong.
By observing this distinction, the foregoing discussion avoids a common theoretical confusion and thereby opens up the underlying features of that world. Hence the language of dramatic form and those of other kinds of art can take us beyond the simplification involved in propositional logic, which disregards the opposition and its essential interaction. We see this in how the intricacies of moral phenomena are ignored in the description of character in terms of ‘material’ facts. To cite just one example, implicitly I have shown how accusing Hamlet of self-deception can be conceptually akin to accounting for the function of a physical object like a spanner or screwdriver. The use of propositional logic in our moral judgements is often necessary and effective, but it does not promote a deep insight into human experience and behaviour. Observing the distinction between materiality and inner experience is necessary to the true portrayal of reflective life in action and what we can learn from it.
To go a little further into the implications of the distinction, we should recognize the sense in which the logic of dramatic form counteracts the language of ordinary judgements and its attachment to propositional logic. Hence judgements about ourselves and other people are characteristically governed by psychological inclination; we are familiar with how personal wishes determine such judgement, and with the hold that conventional thought and received ideas have on our understanding of things. In contrast, we can appreciate how Shakespeare’s mastery of dramatic form creates a vastly greater canvas for insight into the moral reality of Hamlet’s inner life. This does not emerge from an otherworldly transcendence of will and desire, but rather from the subordination of other inclinations to the intention to portray life as fully as possible according to how it can be seen and understood. In Hamlet, the refined integration of inner experience with the social and cultural intricacies of a civilization creates an objectivity that takes precedence over other tendencies that may be necessary to the execution of the work and alters their intentionality.
Thus, we can trace an underlying connection between the ontological distinction and the logic of dramatic form as the source of profound insight into human life and experience. The distinction requires the realization of the physical object by an act of sensory perception, which in turn has implications for our perception of character in ourselves and others. Just as an object is given its character by our immediate apprehension, so other people are known by our sensory experience of them. This, of course, does not fully account for how we see their character but it is essential to our having any conception of them as individuals, even if it is done only in imagination. We cannot, for example, have a conception of Julius Caesar that does not include a physical impression, and the same must be true for the characterization of any other person. This physical basis for the perception of others links the ontological distinction with dramatic form, since genuine insight into the means by which our senses give character to ourselves and others is achieved by modes of thinking that are sensitive to the form of inner experience. My analysis shows how this insight is integral to form in the art of Shakespeare, Bach and Lassus.
We can extend this outline of the ontological distinction inwards, by adding a close examination of the activity of self-awareness within sensory perception. Concerning the distinction between materiality and inner experience, we have seen that the physical object is given its identity and character by the past, but it is equally significant that the self-awareness in such perception must be given its character by the object and the manner in which it is perceived.
An analogy can be observed in mental arithmetic, which does not involve a direct form of self-awareness – rather, the mathematical object is ‘on my mind’ as I concentrate on the figures and work out the answer. In this process, I might need to gather my thoughts and remind myself of the exact figures, and therefore be momentarily self-aware, and in this there is an epistemological distinction between perceiving the object and self-awareness. Furthermore, there is a significant difference between seeing the object and seeing how the solution is arrived at, which is sometimes opaque (if I see the solution to 13 + 37 instantly, I cannot see directly how I have arrived at the answer. In the same sense, I cannot see how an object is given its identity and character by inner experience of the past). The event as a whole depends upon an interdependence between contrasting forms of awareness; that in the impression of the object itself, and that of its being on my mind in the act of perceiving the object. The self-awareness implied by something being on my mind is given its character by the thing that is on my mind (e. g, my perception of a cup). To take a simpler and more direct example, the taste of an orange is the perception of an object. In the same event or action, the tasting of the orange is a sensation, which is a form of self-awareness.
Consequently, there is one action (0r reaction) in which the object is given its identity and character by inner experience of it, while this realization of the object is necessarily a form of self-awareness that is given its character by the object and the manner in which it is perceived. Normally, both forms of awareness in this action are largely subliminal, but without them there could not be any foundation for my recognition of any physical object in the future and therefore no sensory perception. Correspondingly, there could be no memory or imagination or inner experience of any kind.
Both forms are largely subliminal because in the former we see just the object and not the history of experience that lies within (say) my seeing a cup as a vessel for drinking tea or coffee, while in the latter attention is focused on the object and not on my self-awareness. However, there are many instances that confirm this argument and they can help to illuminate its relevance to the psychology behind Shakespeare’s invention of dramatic action and characterization. For example, when the manner of sensory experience is powerfully influenced by fear or desire it is likely that our attention will be dominated by the object, as somebody might find when threatened by a ferocious dog or spellbound by an extremely attractive person. Thus, in the moment, self-awareness will be present in a merely subliminal way. However, when reporting the experience, our retrospective account of the event will undoubtedly include our self-awareness as an essential element in what has occurred. In this connection, a later perception might unearth certain details in our self-awareness that were subliminal, such as having the sense that one’s life is in danger (‘I thought I was going to die’), or the sense that one might say something foolish (‘She has the kind of beauty that turns you into an idiot’).
There are also experiences in which self-awareness is not subliminal, but on the same footing as the sensory perception. In sensual pleasure a heightened perception of the other person can coalesce with a heightened self-awareness, so that it is unclear exactly where one’s attention lies. And at the other end of the emotional spectrum, when one is humiliated in public the perpetrator can be seen as inseparable from the isolated sense of oneself that he or she is creating. In all of these examples, whether subliminal or not, self-awareness is present in sensory perception by the former being given its character by the object perceived. Ultimately, this is because the physical object is given its identity and character by my act of sensory perception; I am self-aware because I cannot but see myself in the identity and character that I am giving the object, even when the self-awareness and the giving are only subliminal.
Hence, we can see that sensory perception is not simply the acquisition of data about ourselves and the world, but contains an ocean of self-awareness which, though not obvious to us, might profoundly influence our understanding of things. This ocean could be seen as a realm of suggestive experience that can be drawn upon (particularly in indirect ways such as drama and music) to enrich our thinking in respects that are especially relevant to knowing ourselves and the world to which we belong. For example, if I can discover that within my perception of an object, or experience dependent upon such perception, I am covertly protecting myself in some way then this can be a means of understanding human experience in general. The recognition of something like this by the author appears to be widely prevalent in Hamlet’s characterization and evident in that of other characters – including Ophelia, Gertrude and Claudius. So, as a candidate for the forces that lie behind Shakespeare’s employment of dramatic form as a means of insight, the structure of sensory perception is far superior to the familiar combination of factual knowledge with certain kinds of sentiment, like sympathy, empathy and compassion.
Related Texts and Music
Bach, J. S. The Art of the Fugue & A Musical Offering [score].
New York: Dover Publications, 1992
Bach, J. S. The Art of Fugue; CD by Rachel Podger / Brecon Baroque.
Channel Classics, 2016
Lassus. Lagrime di San Pietro; CD by Philippe Herreweghe / Ensemble Vocal Européen.
harmonia mundi, 2002
Luoma, Robert C. Music, Mode and Words in Orlando di Lasso’s Last Works. New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1989
Nelson, B. R. Forms of Enlightenment in Art.
Cambridge: Open Angle Books, 2010
Nelson, B. R. Sensory Knowledge and Art.
Cambridge: Open Angle Books, 2017
Nelson, B. R. The Inner Necessity of Moral Virtue, 2020 [online] Available at www.brnelson.co.uk
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet; edited by Peter Alexander.
In The Complete Works of Shakespeare, volume 3, Tragedies
London: Collins, 1958 (1964 printing)
Still, Jonathan. Research on Marching Music and Dotted Rhythms. 2018. [Online] available at: www.jonathanstill.com
Woolf, Christolph. Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician. Oxford: O. U. P, 2001
B R Nelson 
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