Transcript Hamlet
Hamlet Background Notes Shakespeare and His Time When William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) was born in Stratford-on- Avon, England, Queen Elizabeth I was the ruling monarch. It was a time of national strength and wealth, and the prevailing attitude was that life was exciting. It was an age of exploration, not only of the world, but also of man’s nature and the English language. Shakespeare’s time was also considered the English Renaissance of 1500 – 1650. Some ideas that characterized this period that are important to this play are: Humans had potential for development. The idea of medieval Christianity, that this world is a preparation for eternal life, was questioned. Instead, people began to see everyday life as meaningful and an opportunity for noble activity. This was a time for heroes. The ideal Elizabethan man was a talented courtier, adventurer, fencer, poet, and conversationalist. He was a witty and eloquent gentleman who examined his own nature and the causes of his actions. Marriages were arranged, usually for wealth. Women had a lower social status than men. People were concerned over the order of things. They felt there was “a great chain of being.” This concept originated with Plato and expressed the idea that there is a proper order within all things, and among all things, based on complexity, from the tiniest grains of sand to heaven and God. When everything was in its proper position, there was harmony. When the order was broken, everything was upset and everyone suffered. People felt that their rulers were God’s agents. To kill a King was a heinous crime; the heavens would show ominous signs when such evil was present. Features of Shakespeare’s Character and Theme Development Formal versus Informal Forms of Address: Modern English has lost this division, but in the Renaissance, there were two forms of second person address—the formal and the informal. As is the case in German and several Romance languages, the formal form of address was used when an inferior was talking to a superior, when two business colleagues who were not close friends were speaking, or when the speaker wanted to maintain a distance. The informal was more intimate, to be used among friends, family members, and persons to whom the speaker wanted to imply closeness. You was the formal form of address, and thou was the familiar. Motifs Notice how Shakespeare returns to certain themes for emphasis and development: The Garden of Eden (especially the Serpent) Hamlet’s desire for, and concept of, death Images of Disease and Decay Metafiction/Metadrama Metafiction is a kind of fiction that comments on the very devices of fiction it employs. It usually involves irony and is self-reflective. Metadrama is similar—drama that calls attention to itself as a play or has occasion to comment on its own actions and devices. Themes: Moral corruption, and the consequent dysfunction of family and state. Revenge, and the complexity of taking revengeful action. Appearance and reality, and the difficulty of discovering and exposing the truth in a corrupt society. Mortality, and the mystery of death. Dramatic Conventions and Author’s Techniques: Dramatic Devices A soliloquy is a monologue. The character is alone onstage. It is a device the playwright uses to give the audience insight into the character’s thoughts and emotions. Shakespeare uses soliloquies to allow the reader to learn the true cause of Hamlet’s melancholy and to witness Hamlet’s understanding of death and his desire to die. The aside is another device used by the playwright to give the audience insight into the character. Here the character is speaking either to himself or directly to the audience. There are other characters onstage who, by convention, do not hear the aside. An allusion is an indirect reference to another event, person’s or work with which the writer assumes the reader is familiar. Shakespeare uses allusions as techniques for establishing character, building theme, and setting mood. In Hamlet, there are allusions to Greek and Roman mythology, Roman history, and the Bible. Use of the supernatural is another device. Madness, either real or pretended, was another popular device in Elizabethan drama. There can be no drama at all without conflict. In Hamlet, the primary conflict is internal between Hamlet’s sense of duty to avenge his father’s murder and his inability to take action. Since fiction was a relatively new concept (as opposed to legends and mythological stories that were believed to be, on some level, true), Elizabethans enjoyed metafiction; the characters in the play somehow calling attention to the fact that they are indeed fictional characters. One also cannot discuss Elizabethan tragedy without a discussion of the tragic hero. The tragic hero, according to Aristotle, was a man (god, demi-god, hero, high-ranking official) who rose to a high position and then fell from that high position—usually to utter desolation and death. Two forces seem equally powerful in classical tragedy—the tragic hero’s tragic flaw (or hamartia), and fate. Some tragic heroes clearly bring about their own downfall, other tragic heroes seem to be more a pawn of fate. By the Renaissance, however, people generally felt themselves to be less pawns of fate and more in control of their own destinies. The Elizabethan tragic hero, therefore, is much more often responsible for his own downfall. This “waste of human potential,” as it were, seems to be much more tragic to the Elizabethans than the vagaries of fate. Shakespeare’s Sources: Derived from the Chronicles of the Danish Realm or History of Denmark written by an early thirteenth-century historian, Saxo Grammaticus. Tells the story of a pre-Viking Prince called Amleth whose uncle murdered his father. “Amleth” means “dim-witted”—this is a reference to the Prince’s feigned madness, which he assumes to protect himself from his uncle (according to Viking lore, if one were to kill a madman, his soul would then fly into your own). After avenging his father’s death, Amleth went on to become a hero. He died in Jutland and his grave still stands on a heath known as Ammelhede. Saxo’s story was adapted by Francois de Belleforest in his book Histories Tragiques (1570). This version puts some of the blame for the murder on Hamlet’s mother. An early version of Hamlet called Ur-Hamlet is mentioned in some sources but no text survives (1589). This text was possibly written by Shakespeare, but most likely by Thomas Kyd. Shakespeare was thought to have completed Hamlet by 1601. It is believed that Shakespeare played the part of the ghost of Hamlet’s father. Hamlet’s tragic flaw, indecision, seems to be unique to Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Hamlet: The Character The play is based upon Hamlet’s hesitation in accomplishing the task of revenge assigned to him Different interpretations of Hamlet’s character: Romantics: Sensitive poet filled with thoughts of death Victorians: Brooded too much; needed a good tonic Age of Freud: Neurotic; obsessed with his mother’s sexuality Mid 20th Century: Existential hero clad in jeans and a black turtleneck who saw the fundamental absurdity of existence and concluded that all action was meaningless Emphasizes isolation of the individual experience in a hostile universe; Human experience is unexplainable How old is Hamlet? In the beginning of the play he seems to be 18 He interrupted his studies at the University of Wittenberg Later on he seems somewhat older Act V, Scene i: we learn that Yorrick died 23 years ago—Hamlet knew Yorrick Gravedigger comments that he came to the job 30 years ago “that very day that young Hamlet was born.”