TS Eliot’s explanation of why Hamlet is an artistic failure provides a language to interpret works of literature in general. He says “The only way of expressing emotion in the form of art is by finding an "objective correlative"; in other words, a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that particular emotion; such that when the external facts, which must terminate in sensory experience, are given, the emotion is immediately evoked.” In other words, the “objective correlative” in Coleridge’s “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” for the emotion of guilt and remorse is the shooting of the albatross and the supernatural occurrences that follow, as well as the “eye” of the mariner as he tells his story. Eliot argued that Hamlet lacked an “objective correlative” for Hamlet’s angst, that it was, so to speak, “over the top.” “Objective correlative” is more than motivation, however, it is more of a metaphor (perhaps extended) that embodies the emotion the literature in question seeks to convey.
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