Characters of Shakespear's Plays Merry Wives of Windsor". The bulk of Hazlitt's commentary on the two history plays is devoted to Falstaff, whom he considers to be "perhaps the most substantial comic character ever invented". Falstaff had been of interest to Shakespearean commentators for years. Forty years earlier, a full-length book had appeared, "An Essay on the Dramatic Character of Sir John Falstaff" (1777), by Maurice Morgann, often taken as the beginning of that school of Shakespearean criticism which considers the characters of Shakespeare's plays as though they were real people. Hazlitt, who seems to have had little acquaintance with Morgann's work, is careful
Giuseppe Verdi whether he preferred "Aida" or "Don Carlos", Verdi replied that "Aida" had "more bite and (if you'll forgive the word), more "theatricality"." During the rehearsals for the Naples production of "Aida" Verdi amused himself by writing his only string quartet, a sprightly work which shows in its last movement that he had not lost the skill for fugue-writing that he had learned with Lavigna. Verdi's three last major works continued to show new development in conveying drama and emotion. The first to appear, in 1874 was his Requiem, scored for operatic forces but by no means an "opera in ecclesiastical