“That he was an individual I have no doubt, but he exists for me wholly in the work he did, and I often fail to recognize him in pictures painted of his time. He had too much poetry, and too much sense, to be the slave of fashions in human being. He is typical of any world that can be understood, and he is the kind of storyteller who can be judged by the most general standards we have. The "Poetics" of Aristotle will explain him more readıly than the unique literature of his age will explain him. It is difficult enough for such literature to explain itself; nor does Shakespeare seem to call for explanations beyond those which a whole heart and a free mind abundantly supply.”

Mark Van Doren