‘O, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion into tatters.’
‘With two provincial roses on my ragged shoes,
My sea-gown scarfed about me.’
Having read this, I think it will be seen that there is no such great difficulty in costuming any play, except perhaps this last. There have been many attempts to put ‘Hamlet’ into the clothes of the date of his story, but even when the rest of the characters are dressed in skins and cross-gartered trousers, when the Viking element is strongly insisted upon, still there remains the absolutely Elizabethan figure in inky black, with his very Elizabethan thoughts, the central figure, almost the great symbol of his age.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] ‘Lockram’ is coarse linen.
[B] Thin stuff for women’s veils.
[C] ‘Cheveril’ is kid leather.
[D] Shoes with very high soles.