and an irrelevance. Moreover (to say nothing of the fact that the Ghost
was doubtless a popular figure in the old play, and demanded by the
public) it was highly desirable that Hamlet's knowledge of the usurper's
crime should come to him from a supernatural witness, who could not be
cross-questioned or called upon to give material proof. This was the
readiest as well as the most picturesque method of begetting in him that
condition of doubt, real or affected, which was necessary to account for
his behaviour. But to have shown us in action the matter of the Ghost's
revelation would have been hopelessly to ruin its effect. A repetition
in narrative of matters already seen in action is the grossest of
technical blunders.[6] Hamlet senior, in other words, being
indispensable in the spirit, was superfluous in the flesh. But there was
another and equally cogent reason for beginning the play after the
commission of the initial crime or crimes. To have done otherwise would
have been to discount, not only the Ghost, but the play-scene. By a
piece of consummate ingenuity, which may, of course, have been conceived
by the earlier playwright, the initial incidents of the story are in
fact presented to us, in the guise of a play within the play, and as a
means to the achievement of one of the greatest dramatic effects in all
literature. The moment the idea of the play-scene presented itself to
the author's mind, it became absolutely unthinkable that he should, to
put it vulgarly, "queer the pitch" for the Players by showing us the
real facts of which their performance was to be the counterfeit
presentment. The dramatic effect of the incidents was incalculably
heightened when they were presented, as in a looking-glass, before the
guilty pair, with the eye of the avenger boring into their souls. And
have we not here, perhaps, a clue to one of the most frequent and
essential meanings of the word "dramatic"? May we not say that the
dramatic quality of an incident is proportionate to the variety[7] and
intensity of the emotions involved in it?