(See note to p. [217].)
ON MR KEAN’S IAGO
Mr. Examiner,—I was not at all aware that in the remarks which I offered on Mr. Kean’s Iago my opinions would clash with those already expressed by the respectable writer of the Theatrical Examiner: for I did not mean to object to ‘the gay and careless air which Mr. Kean threw over his representation of that arch villain,’ but to its being nothing but carelessness and gaiety; and I thought it perfectly consistent with a high degree of admiration of this extraordinary actor, to suppose that he might have carried an ingenious and original idea of the character to a paradoxical extreme. In some respects, your Correspondent seems to have mistaken what I have said; for he observes that I have entered into an analysis to shew, ‘that Iago is a malignant being, who hates his fellow-creatures, and doats on mischief and crime as the best means of annoying the objects of his hate.’ Now this is the very reverse of what I intended to shew; for so far from thinking that Iago is ‘a ruffian or a savage, who pursues wickedness for its own sake,’ I am ready to allow that he is a pleasant amusing sort of gentleman, but with an over-activity of mind that is dangerous to himself and others; that so far from hating his fellow-creatures, he is perfectly regardless of them, except as they may afford him food for the exercise of his spleen, and that ‘he doats on mischief and crime,’ not ‘as the best means of annoying the objects of his hate,’ but as necessary to keep himself in that strong state of excitement which his natural constitution requires, or, to express it proverbially, in perpetual hot water. Iago is a man who will not suffer himself or any one else to be at rest; he has an insatiable craving after action, and action of the most violent kind. His conduct and motives require some explanation; but they cannot be accounted for from his interest or his passions,—his love of himself, or hatred of those who are the objects of his persecution: these are both of them only the occasional pretext for his cruelty, and are in fact both of them subservient to his love of power and mischievous irritability. I repeat, that I consider this sort of unprincipled self-will as a very different thing from common malignity; but I conceive it also just as remote from indifference or levity. In one word, the malice of Iago is not personal, but intellectual. Mr. Kean very properly got rid of the brutal ferocity which had been considered as the principle of the character, and then left it without any principle at all. He has mistaken the want of moral feeling, which is inseparable from the part, for constitutional ease and general indifference, which are just as incompatible with it. Mr. Kean’s idea seems to have been, that the most perfect callousness ought to accompany the utmost degree of inhumanity; and so far as relates to callousness to moral considerations, this is true; but that is not the question. If our Ancient had no other object, or principle of action but his indifference to the feelings of others, he gives himself a great deal of trouble to no purpose. If he has nothing else to set him in motion, he had much better remain quiet than be broken on the rack. Mere carelessness and gaiety, then, do not account for the character. But Mr. Kean acted it with nearly the same easy air with which Mr. Braham sings a song in an opera, or with which a comic actor delivers a side-speech in an after-piece.
But the character of Iago, says your Correspondent, has nothing to do with the manner of acting it. We are to look to the business of the play. Is this then so very pleasant, or is the part which Iago undertakes and executes the perfection of easy comedy? I should conceive quite the contrary. The rest of what your Correspondent says on this subject is ‘ingenious, but not convincing.’ It amounts to this, that Iago is a hypocrite, and that a hypocrite should always be gay. This must depend upon circumstances. Tartuffe was a hypocrite, yet he was not gay: Joseph Surface was a hypocrite, but grave and plausible: Blifil was a hypocrite, but cold, formal and reserved. The hypocrite is naturally grave, that is, thoughtful, and dissatisfied with things as they are, plotting doubtful schemes for his own advancement and the ruin of others, studying far-fetched evasions, double-minded and double-faced.—Now all this is an effort, and one that is often attended with disagreeable consequences; and it seems more in character that a man whose invention is thus kept on the rack, and his feelings under painful restraint, should rather strive to hide the wrinkle rising on his brow, and the malice at his heart, under an honest concern for his friend, or the serene and regulated smile of steady virtue, than that he should wear the light-hearted look and easy gaiety of thoughtless constitutional good humour. The presumption therefore is not in favour of the lively, laughing, comic mien of hypocrisy. Gravity is its most obvious resource, and, with submission, it is quite as effectual a one. But it seems, that if Iago had worn this tremendous mask, ‘the gay and idle world would have had nothing to do with him.’ Why, indeed, if he had only intended to figure at a carnival or a ridotto, to dance with the women or drink with the men, this objection might be very true. But Iago has a different scene to act in, and has other thoughts in his contemplation. One would suppose that Othello contained no other adventures than those which are to be met with in Anstey’s Bath Guide,[[92]] or in one of Miss Burney’s novels. The smooth smiling surface of the world of fashion is not the element he delights to move in: he is the busy meddling fiend ‘who rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm,’[[93]] triumphing over the scattered wrecks, and listening to the shrieks of death. I cannot help thinking that Mr. Kean’s Iago must be wrong, for it seems to have abstracted your Correspondent entirely from the subject of the play. Indeed it is one great proof of Mr. Kean’s powers, but which at the same time blinds the audience to his defects, that they think of little else in any play but of the part he acts. ‘What! a gallant Venetian turned into a musty philosopher! Go away, and beg the reversion of Diogenes’ tub! Go away, the coxcomb Roderigo will think you mighty dull, and will answer your requests for money with a yawn; the cheerful spirited Cassio will choose some pleasanter companion to sing with him over his cups; the fiery Othello will fear lest his philosophic Ancient will be less valorously incautious in the day of battle, and that he will not storm a fort with the usual uncalculating intrepidity.’ Now, the coxcomb Roderigo would probably have answered his demands for money with a yawn, though he had been ever so facetious a companion, if he had not thought him useful to his affairs. He employs him as a man of business, as a dextrous, cunning, plotting rogue, who is to betray his master and debauch his wife, an occupation for which his good humour or apparent want of thought would not particularly qualify him. An accomplice in knavery ought always to be a solemn rogue, and withal a casuist, for he thus becomes our better conscience, and gives a sanction to the roguery. Cassio does not invite Iago to drink with him, but is prevailed upon against his will to join him; and Othello himself owes his misfortunes, in the first instance, to his having repulsed the applications of Iago to be made his lieutenant. He himself affects to be blunt and unmannerly in his conversation with Desdemona. There is no appearance of any cordiality towards him in Othello, nor of his having been a general favourite (for such persons are not usually liked), nor of his having ever been employed but for his understanding and discretion. He every where owes his success to his intellectual superiority, and not to the pleasantness of his manners. At no time does Othello put implicit confidence in Iago’s personal character, but demands his proofs; or when he founds his faith on his integrity, it is from the gravity of his manner: ‘Therefore these stops of thine fright me the more,’ etc.[[94]]
Your Correspondent appeals to the manners of women of the town, to prove that ‘there is a fascination in an open manner.’ I do not see what this has to do with Iago. Those who promise to give only pleasure, do not of course put on a melancholy face, or ape the tragic muse. The Sirens would not lull their victims by the prophetic menaces of the Furies. Iago did not profess to be the harbinger of welcome news. The reference to Milton’s Satan and Lovelace is equally misplaced. If Iago had himself endeavoured to seduce Desdemona, the cases would have been parallel. Lovelace had to seduce a virtuous woman to pleasure, by presenting images of pleasure, by fascinating her senses, and by keeping out of sight every appearance of danger or disaster. Iago, on the contrary, shews to Othello that he has ‘a monster in his thought’;[[95]] and it is his object to make him believe this by dumb show, by the knitting of his brows, by stops and starts, etc. before he is willing to commit himself by words. Milton’s devil also could only succeed by raising up the most voluptuous and delightful expectations in the mind of Eve, and by himself presenting an example of the divine effects produced by eating of the tree of knowledge. Gloom and gravity were here out of the question. Yet how does Milton describe the behaviour of this arch-hypocrite, when he is about to complete his purpose?
‘She scarce had said, though brief, when now more bold
The Tempter, but with shew of zeal and love
To man and indignation at his wrong,
New part puts on, and as to passion moved,
Fluctuates disturb’d yet comely and in act