The Shakespearean Mean: Three Dramaturgies (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798385080595)

Shakespeare's plays often leave our heads and hearts spinning and our judgement unsettled. This state of mind is a gift, and although it is difficult to relax upon, it might be well to sustain it. When Shakespeare points to something, say, by repeating it, it is reasonable to suppose that he has something in mind besides filling us with awe. He means us to think about it, which means that he has thought about it, too. He is saying, "Look!"

We respond as it is given to us to respond, every response a potential starting point, and no response final. If we seek better understanding, our next insight will not arrive as a new truth standing on the back of the true one already in hand. We should expect instead to move from error to error, from half-truth to half-truth. If things go well, our insights will not all lie in the same plane. They will trend towards or around or into something. It is a process that resembles maturation.

How far a process of this sort can be promoted is a difficult thing to know. It helps to become aware of depths. They exist such that being at one level is different from being at another. Think of the slippery slope of crime, where there have always been distinctions: the greater and the lesser, the monstrous and the unavoidable. Passing from one level to the next changes things. So in Shakespeare.