"There are a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand people", a similar expression is "there are a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand viewers" or "a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand readers".
This British sentence is almost the benchmark recipe for Chinese audiences (readers) to intervene in Shakespeare's work. People are more familiar with it than they know about Hamlet. Hamlet's tragic fate is paved by his divided and pluralistic personality, and the richness of his character is perfectly connected with the differences in people's aesthetics. Everyone draws the bundle that belongs to him from the danish prince's character spectrum.
So, who exactly did this quote come from?
Chinese there are many opinions on the Internet, for example, some people say that people are from Shakespeare, and some people say that Engels quoted them in "To Ferdinand Lassalle"..., but each of these statements seems to be suspicious. In the Famous Quotes series, "a thousand Hamlets" naturally has a quality that people know but don't know why.
Of course, the online inquiry about the copyright of this famous saying has never stopped. Among them, there is an article worth paying attention to. On November 29, 2014, Science Network published an article by Chen Changchun, associate professor of Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, entitled "'There are a thousand Hamlets in the Eyes of a Thousand People' Eyes" suspected to be a copycat version of the proverb made by Chinese" (hereinafter referred to as the "cottage version of the proverb"). In this article, the author sorts out and analyzes many suspected sources of "a thousand Hamlets".
Hamlet
The article "Cottage Edition of English Proverbs" pointed out that Shakespeare's "Hamlet" has been performed for a long time, and it is not known when and where the so-called "there are a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand people", however, under a simple online search, it is rare to find that authentic English web pages have traces of this aspect, and Chinese web pages are everywhere. The English phrase "there are a thousand hamlets in a thousand people's eyes" on some English pages comes mostly from Chinese surnames.
In the view of the author Chen Changchun, "there are a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand people" is mostly a cottage goods cloaked in imported goods. According to his speculation, one of the sources that led to the widespread circulation of this pseudo-English proverb in China is probably the "Teaching Book for Teachers in the Fifth Grade of Chinese" (People's Education Publishing House, 2011 edition). In order to explain the British female writer Juan Aiken's essay "Walking Around the World for a Couple", the editor of the book quotes "a thousand readers have a thousand Hamlets", but the sentence itself does not appear in "Walking Around the World for a Couple" - "bundled sales", making this famous quote both overseas and all over the sea.
It should be said that there is a certain truth in the study of the "cottage version of the English proverb". First of all, Shakespeare did not say this. This sentence cannot be found in the Complete Works of Shakespeare, nor can it be found on the authoritative Shakespeare official website (https://www.shakespeare.org.uk/). Furthermore, in some mainstream English quotation websites, Shakespeare still can't find this sentence; secondly, Engels did not quote this sentence. Engels's "To Ferdinand Lassalle" (The Complete Works of Marx and Engels, vol. 29), written on May 18, 1859, is absent from the article and in engels's other writings.
At this point, the two main suspects about the provenance of the "one thousand Hamlets" have been excluded. The more certain inference is that this British sentence is not actually from the English-speaking world.
However, if this sentence is determined to be "pseudo" and "cottage", I am afraid it is slightly sloppy. In fact, the scope of the "cottage version of the English proverb" article is more or less the Internet after 2000. The problem is that "a thousand Hamlets" have been in print publications much longer than in the internet age. In the 1980s Chinese mainland published two literary and art theory books, which recorded this famous saying in black and white.
"Talking to Young People about Beauty and Revised Edition" (Geological Publishing House, June 1987 edition, edited by Li Yanjie), "There are a thousand audiences, there are a thousand Hamlets - Talking to Young Friends about the Beauty of Appreciation" wrote that
When Ibsen's social drama "The Doll's House" came out, there was an uproar over whether Nala should run away. This strong social impact was not even anticipated by the author, so when Ibsen was asked about these questions, his answer was, "I am just writing poetry." Western aestheticians say, "For a thousand viewers, there are a thousand Hamlets." It can be seen that the social influence of literary and artistic works sometimes goes far beyond the subjective intentions of the author. (Talking to Youth about Beauty, Revised Edition, p. 109)
"100 Topics of Introduction to Literature" (Shanxi People's Publishing House, June 1986, eds., edited by Min Kaide, Huang Shuxiong, etc.) "What is the Difference and Consistency of Literary Appreciation?" How to understand "a thousand readers have a thousand Hamlets"? There are two references to —
Literary appreciation, in addition to national, epochal, and class differences, is also manifested as individual differences. This difference can be expressed both in the understanding of the nature of the content of the work and in the depth and breadth of the understanding of the work. The reason for this difference lies in the subjective aspect of the viewer. Due to the different subjective conditions of people, the feeling and understanding of the artistic image can be correct or distorted to the point of being wrong; it can be profound or superficial; it can focus on appreciating this aspect of the image, or it can focus on appreciating the other aspect of the image; it can cause the admirer to communicate emotionally in this part or another part. In the case of basically liking a certain work, whether they can appreciate all its beauty is also different. The so-called "a thousand readers have a thousand Hamlets" refers to this situation. (Introduction to Literature, p. 187)
The artistic image is not only a special form reflected in real life, but also the product of the processing of the writer's mind, therefore, any artistic image is a subjective and objective unity; and when the artistic image is produced, it is a specific objective existence, which has a definite objective meaning, and its objective meaning does not shift with the subjective feelings of the viewer. As an objective object of appreciation, the basic aspects of the artistic image are definite, clear, and generally define the direction, scope and nature of the viewer's feelings and cognition. Thus, although in the appreciation "a thousand readers have a thousand Hamlets", it is always Hamlet, and it is not felt as Don Quixote or any other character. (Introduction to Literature, p. 187)
The "One Thousand Hamlets" that appear in the two books "Talking to Young People about Beauty and Revised Edition" and "Introduction to Literature" are likely to provide solute for the spread of this sentence on the Chinese Internet after 2000. At the same time, the two books state the background of this sentence in vague language - "Western aestheticians say" and "so-called", which may also be the reason why "a thousand Hamlets" "indiscriminately recognize relatives" in ancient and modern China and abroad.
There is also a theory that the spread of "a thousand Hamlets" in China is related to the introduction of acceptance aesthetics. "Aesthetics of Acceptance" is a european and American literary and artistic trend, which was proposed in 1967 by H. R. Yaosi, a professor of literature and art at the University of Konzstein in Germany. He believes that even if a work is printed, if the reader has not yet read it, it is only a text. The transformation from text to work depends on the perception, regulation and creation of aesthetic subjects, that is, the realization of the function and value of literary and artistic works depends on the acceptance of readers (audiences).
As far as the views of the relevant chapters of "Talking to Young People about Beauty and Revised Edition" and "Introduction to Literature" are concerned, they do have something in common with the aesthetics of acceptance. The 1980s were the era when Western literary and artistic trends, including aesthetics, were introduced into China in large numbers. Everything is tightly sewn together, and the search for the provenance of the "a thousand Hamlets" seems to be directed to the work of Yaos and others. But one scholar's article overturns this assumption. He is the famous aesthetician Zhu Guangqian, whose article is "On Beauty is the Unity of Objective and Subjective". This article was originally published in the fourth issue of Philosophical Studies in 1957, and later included in the fifth volume of The Complete Works of Zhu Guangqian (Anhui Education Publishing House, January 1989). The writing and publication of "On Beauty as the Unity of Objective and Subjective" predates the production of aesthetics in time.
Zhu Guangqian wrote "On Beauty as the Unity of Objectivity and Subjectivity", the main purpose of which is to debate the aesthetic view of mechanical materialism held by Cai Yi, Li Zehou and others. On the basis of zhu Guangliang's reflection on his original subjective idealistic aesthetic view, he put forward the proposition that "beauty is the unity of objectivity and subjectivity". In the third part of this article, "Explanation of My Current Aesthetic Point of View", Zhu Guangqian's discussion of aesthetic differences has a surprising discovery, as follows:
The differences in aesthetic taste can be seen at different stages of historical development, different ways of life and cultural traditions, different classes, and different culturally cultivated classes. On this point, Plekhanov, in his Art and Social Life, has given many vivid examples and incisive analyses that we do not need to repeat here. Even in the same era, the same people, the same people, and the same class cannot have completely the same views on the same literary and artistic works. "For a thousand readers, there are a thousand Hamlets", the saying is not unfounded. (The Complete Works of Zhu Guangqian, Vol. V, p. 90)
The "One Thousand Hamlets" in "On Beauty is the Unity of Objective and Subjective" is the only appearance in the 20 volumes of the Complete Works of Zhu Guangqian, and it is also the earliest presentation in the Chinese literature currently available. However, judging from the expression in Zhu Guang's potential article, this sentence is in quotation marks. In other words, "a thousand Hamlets" is a quote from Zhu Guangqian, not an original.
Who exactly did Zhu Guangqian quote? Is the person a Chinese or a foreigner? Is this statement written or verbal? Judging solely in terms of the context of "On Beauty is the Unity of Objectivity and Subjectivity", it is difficult to draw conclusions. In the study of the development of aesthetic literary and artistic theory at the beginning of the founding of the People's Republic of China, some clues may be found.
Before the introduction of a large number of European and American literary and artistic trends in the 1980s, there was also a wave of Western learning and eastern learning, that is, the translation of Russian and Soviet literature in the Yan'an period in the 1950s and even earlier. Among them, Belinsky, Chernyshevsky, and Dubrov, three Russian literary critics of the nineteenth century, can be called benchmark figures. In the theoretical circles of Chinese literature and art at the beginning of the founding of the People's Republic of China, there was a great tendency to say that "Bei, Che, Du".
Among the three people of "Bei, Che, and Du", Belinsky is also a pioneering figure. For Belinsky, Zhu Guangqian's famous book "History of Western Aesthetics" (volumes VI and VII of the Complete Works of Zhu Guangqian) has a special chapter to introduce it, saying that "Belinsky and Chernyshevsky laid the aesthetic foundation for Russian realist literature."
The Belinsky Anthology
It is worth mentioning that in 1952, the first and second volumes of Mantao's Translation of Belinsky's Selected Works were published by the Times Publishing House. Coincidentally, there is an article in the first volume of the Belinsky Anthology: "Shakespeare's Play< Hamlet >: The Role of Hamlet played by Mochalov (originally translated as Hamlet, hereinafter referred to as "Shakespeare's Play< Hamlet >"). It was published in three consecutive issues in 1838 in the Moscow Observer.
In the study of Shakespeare and his most controversial figure, Hamlet, Shakespeare's Play < Hamlet > has an extremely important and even unique status, and "Hamlet is the most glorious diamond on the splendid crown of the king of the dramatic poets" is derived from this article. Belinsky also creatively argues in the text that Hamlet's character is divided and his will is weak, but this is not caused by his nature, but "a weak will after knowing responsibility." Belinsky's definition and exposition of Hamlet gives people a wealth of enlightenment -
hamlet! Do you understand the meaning of this word? It is great and profound: this is life, this is man, this is you, this is me, this is each of us, more or less, in that lofty or ridiculous, but always compassionate and pathetic sense ... (Shanghai Translation Publishing House, May 1979 edition of The Anthology of Belinsky, vol. 1, p. 442)
Two equally great, talented actors play the role of Shakespeare: in each of them's acting, you can see Hamlet, Shakespeare's Hamlet; but at the same time, it will be two different Hamlets, that is, each of them, though faithful to the same concept, will have its own unique appearance... (p. 514)
If it comes to enlightenment, the most important thing is that Belinsky explains the differences in Hamlet's aesthetic to the extreme: Hamlet is each of us, and each person's interpretation of Hamlet has its own unique appearance.
Admittedly, Belinsky did not explicitly say "a thousand Hamlets" in Shakespeare's Play < Hamlet >. But his statement is like a detailed and complete formula for a mathematical problem that a slightly more professional person can fill in accordingly. The answer is presented in Zhu Guangqian's "On Beauty is the Unity of Objectivity and Subjectivity.".
Belinsky's "Hamlet", if not the source of "a thousand Hamlets", can at least be counted as the source of this famous saying.