" Yet he thought he did better in "Macbeth" than in
"Hamlet"!
Was he right after all?
His _view_ of "Macbeth," though attacked and derided and put to shame in
many quarters, is as clear to me as the sunlight itself. To me it seems
as stupid to quarrel with the conception as to deny the nose on one's
face. But the carrying out of the conception was unequal. Henry's
imagination was sometimes his worst enemy.
When I think of his "Macbeth," I remember him most distinctly in the
last act after the battle when he looked like a great famished wolf,
weak with the weakness of a giant exhausted, spent as one whose
exertions have been ten times as great as those of commoner men of
rougher fiber and coarser strength.
"Of all men else I have avoided thee."
Once more he suggested, as he only could suggest, the power of Fate.
Destiny seemed to hang over him, and he knew that there was no hope, no
mercy.
The rehearsals for "Macbeth" were very exhausting, but they were
splendid to watch. In this play Henry brought his manipulation of crowds
to perfection. My acting edition of the play is riddled with rough
sketches by him of different groups. Artists to whom I have shown them
have been astonished by the spirited impressionism of these sketches.
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