Ivan Turgenev’s “Hamlet and Don Quixote”

How fascinating that Shakespeare and Cervantes—especially the characters of Hamlet and Don Quixote—loom large in Russian consciousness. I have read Dostoyevsky and Nabokov, I have known for some time that 19th century Russians spoke of the Hamlet type and the Don Quixote type, so reading Turgenev’s essay is inevitable. 

1/ Overall, Turgenev makes some errors (like saying that Hamlet and Part 1 of Don Quixote were published the same year, or Shakespeare and Cervantes died on the same day) and says some strange things, but it’s an interesting essay mainly because of the thesis: 

“In these two types, it two contrasting two poles of the human axis about which to basic tendencies, the they revolve. All men, to my mind, conform to one type or the other; one to that of Hamlet, another that of Don Quixote…” 

(translated by Moshe Spiegel) 

“What does Don Quixote typify? Faith, first of all, a belief in something eternal, indestructible—in a truth that is beyond the comprehension of the individual human being, which is to be achieved through the medium of self-abnegation and undeviating worship.” 

He acknowledges “his deranged imagination” and that “this constitutes the comic side of Don Quixote”, but “his ideal itself remains undefiled and intact.” 

I don’t agree with everything. Why, for example, does Turgenev say Don Quixote “does not probe or question”? Don Quixote becomes haunted by doubt and uncertainty near the end of Part 2. Why does Turgenev call him illiterate and unlearned? He has vast knowledge, and only seems soft in the brain regarding chivalry matters. Turgenev also says “Don Quixote loves Dulcinea ideally, chastely—so ideally that he does not discover that the object of his passion does not exist”. But we know this isn’t true: in Part 2 chapter 32, our knight says “God knows if there’s a Dulcinea in the world or not, or if she’s imagined or not” (translated by Tom Lathrop); and in the end, he can no longer pretend that Dulcinea exists. 

But generally, Turgenev is right about his faith, idealism, and lack of egotism. 

“Don Quixote is an enthusiast, radiant with his devotion to an idea.” 

Like the revolutionaries in Turgenev’s day? 

Then what does Hamlet represent? 

“Above all, analysis, scrutiny, egotism—and consequently disbelief. 

[…] Doubting everything, Hamlet pitilessly includes his own self in these doubts; he is too thoughtful, too fair-minded to be contented with what he finds within himself.” 

His self-consciousness, Turgenev says, is “the antithesis of Don Quixote’s enthusiasm.” 

“He distrusts himself and yet is deeply solicitous about himself; does not know what he is after, nor why he lives at all, and still firmly adheres to life.” 

Like the nihilists and the “superfluous men” in Turgenev’s day?  

Now that I’ve read Turgenev’s essay, I can see the idea of the Hamlets and Don Quixotes in 19th century Russia. Hamlet “vacillates, equivocates, consoles himself with self-reproach” and eventually only kills Claudius accidentally, whereas Don Quixote, “a poor man, without social connections, old and solitary, attempts single-handed to uproot all evil and to deliver the persecuted throughout the world, whoever they may be.” 

2/ Turgenev does see both sides of Don Quixote—he does see that Don Quixote is ridiculous—Nabokov focuses on only his nobility and says he “stands for everything that is gentle, forlorn, pure, unselfish, and gallant.” 

Turgenev says: 

“[Hamlet] would never crusade against windmills; and were they giants in actuality, he would likewise stay away from them. […] I presume even if truth incarnate were to arise before Hamlet, he would remain skeptical of its authenticity. Who knows but that he would challenge it, saying perhaps that there is no truth, just as there are no giants?” 

I like this point: 

“We laugh at Don Quixote, but, my dear sirs, who of us can positively affirm with certainty that he will always and under all circumstances know the difference between a brass wash basin and an enchanted golden helmet?” 

Good, that’s good.

3/ I don’t know why Turgenev talks about “the relation of the mob, of the so-called human race, to Hamlet and Don Quixote” and says that Polonius and Sancho Panza reflect this mass respectively.  

4/ Turgenev’s essay also has an interesting passage about love. Can Hamlet actually love? he asks. Turgenev says Hamlet’s feelings for Ophelia are either cynical or hyperbolic—I don’t think I would be so negative about Hamlet—there is a nobility in Hamlet that Turgenev seems not to notice, and the Russian writer doesn’t talk about the fact that Hamlet is so depressed, so cynical because he is grieving his father, angry at his mother, and disillusioned with humanity as a whole. 

This is a good point though: 

“Hamlet’s spirit of negation is skeptical of the good, but it is indubitably certain of the existence of evil, and militates against it constantly. […] Hamlet’s skepticism is unceasingly at war with falsehood and lying; thus, while disbelieving the possibility of truth’s realization now or ever, he becomes one of the chief vindicators of a truth which he himself does not fully accept.” 

5/ Turgenev says: 

“We esteem Hamlet a good deal more because of Horatio’s devotion to him.” 

But why? Is Sancho Panza not devoted to Don Quixote? 

6/ Turgenev doesn’t only compare Hamlet and Don Quixote—there’s also a section in which he compares Shakespeare and Cervantes. 

I will resist commenting—I have to think some more, and should probably read Exemplary Novels first. 

An interesting essay. Read it for yourself and tell me what you think.