Critical Interpretations Flashcards
TS Eliot - The Play
“The Mona Lisa of literature.”
Kermode - The Play
“It is a play obsessed with doubles.”
Voltaire - The Play
“A vulgar and barbarous tragedy.”
Kermode - The Play
“It is not only Hamlet but his play that delays.”
Richard Wilson - The Play
“Although the last two and a half acts are not “devoid of incident”, Hamlet’s delay is their predominant interest.”
Linda Charnes - Characterisation
“No-one in this play knows or understands anyone else.”
Coleridge - Hamlet
“In Hamlet Shakespeare seems to have wished to exemplify […] an equilibrium between the real and imaginary worlds” and it is in “this balance” that Hamlet “is disturbed.”
Bloom - Hamlet
“The hero-villain.”
Dr Johnson on Hamlet not killing Claudius when he could have
“Too horrible to be read or uttered.”
Schuking - Hamlet
“Hamlet cannot be comprehended except as a study of emotion.”
LC Knights - Hamlet
“Sterile concentration on death and evil.”
Goethe - Hamlet
“Pure, noble and most moral nature.”
Jan Kott - Hamlet
“A young rebel who has something of the charm of James Dean.”
Oliver film - Hamlet
“The man who couldn’t make up his mind.”
Bloom - Hamlet
” By Act 5 he has ‘aged a decade.’ “
Coleridge - Hamlet
“Psychological study of a man who could not bring about a balance between his inward thoughts and the external world.”
CS Lewis - Hamlet
“Not an individual but everyman.”
Coleridge - Hamlet
“Full of meditative excess.”
AC Bradley - Hamlet
“Tragedy of reflection.”
Erlich - Hamlet
“Hamlet wishes his father strong enough to punish Claudius”, refers to “God, the universal father figure.”
Coleridge - Hamlet
“Hamlet is brave and careless of death; but he vacillates from sensibility, and procrastinates from thought, and loses the power of action in the energy of resolve.”
Kinnear - Hamlet
“Hamlet is simply the man that was put in an impossible situation.”
Richard D Altick - Claudius
“The cunning and lecherousness of Claudius’ evil has corrupted the whole kingdom of Denmark.”
Carla Stockton - Claudius
“Clearly the antagonist.”
LC Knights - Claudius
“A slimy beast with unctuous verse rhythms.”
G Wilson Knight - Claudius
“Good and gentle king.”
Michael Pennington - Polonius
“A bad parent.”
Michael Pennington - Polonius
“Made palatable by the fact that he is funny.”
A C Bradley - Gertrude
“The queen was not a bad-hearted woman.”
Nardo - Hamlet
“Hamlet’s feigned madness is how he escapes true madness.”
Wilson Knight - Claudius
“Claudius shows every sign of being an excellent diplomatist and King.”
Kirsch - Hamlet
“Hamlet’s grief is intensified by the functional loss of his mother and the inability to mourn his father.”
Neely - Ophelia
“Ophelia’s madness differs from Hamlet’s because of gender differences.”
Paster - Hamlet
“Hamlet swings between melancholic lethargy and ineffectual rage.”
Showalter - Ophelia
“A powerful figure who rebels against the family and social order.”
TS Elliot - Hamlet
“Hamlet is dominated by an emotion which is inexpressible.”
Knight - Hamlet
“Hamlet is inhuman.”
Knight - Hamlet
“Hamlet is feared by those around him.”
Knight - Hamlet
“They are always trying to find what is wrong with him.”
A C Bradley - Hamlet
“In Hamlet though we have a villain, he is a small one.”
Greenbalt - Hamlet
“The play should be over by the end of the first act.” - Hamlet doesn’t act. He simply just procrastinates throughout the whole play and could have avenged much quicker than he ever does.
Sagar - The Mousetrap
“The mousetrap proves nothing.”
