Tolstoy on Shakespeare

“Mr. Crosby’s article on Shakespeare’s a attitude toward the working classes suggested to me the idea of also exp­ressing my own long-established opinion about the works of Shakespeare, in direct opposition, as it is, to that es­tablished in all the whole European world. Calling to mind all the struggle of doubt and self-deceit, efforts to attune myself to Shakespeare which I went through owing to my complete disagreement with this universal adulation, and, presuming that many have experienced and are experiencing the same, I think that it may not be unprofitable to express definitely and frankly this view of mine, opposed to that of the majority, and the more so as the conclusions to which I came, when examining the causes of my disagreement with the universally established opinion, are, it seems to me, not without interest