Critics Flashcards
Sagar
‘The mouse trap proves nothing’
Mother ‘nymphomania’ - uncontrollable/excessive sexual desire of woman
Greenbalt
‘The play should be over by the end of the first act’ - Hamlet doesn’t act
‘Hamlet’
‘Hamnet’
Shakespeare son died when 12. No eulogy
Coleridge
‘Smack of hamlet in himself’
Outcast of society
Fell out of place w society
Saw intellectual man which made action impossible
Bradley
‘In hamlet though we have a villain, he is a small one
Wilson
‘Critics misunderstand [the nunnery episode] because in sympathy with Opehlia… forgotten that it is not Hamlet who ‘repelled’ her but she him’
Knight
‘Hamlet is an inhuman’
‘He is feared by those around him’
‘They are always trying to find what is wrong with him’
‘He is a creature of another world’
David tenant
Knows about spying
Surveillance cameras
Mel Gibson
Oedipus theory - pulling clothes off in closet scene
Oliver production
Cliff - what if it tempt you towards the cliff
Cut our 7th soliloquy - expendable
Feminist
Gertrude = powerful - chose her husband and widow - stays in royal court
BUT
Gertrude’s sexuality constantly referenced
Passion v reason
Late 1960- too passionate too angry. Hamlet wants blood
Romantics (Coleridge 1880s)
Smack of hamlet in himself
Bradley- 20th century - Hamlets delay was he was unable to cope with being in position he’s in
Lewis - mid 1990s - mystery of why he hesitates
Feminist changes
Collier - criticise Ophelia madness and writing her immodest was unessassry and diminishes her character (17th century)
Criticing double standards
Showalter (20 century) her madness is caused by inability to balance own desires with wishes of father brother and hamlet. Argued madness is used to give women a voice
Ophelia is merely a cipher- she’s there purely to give hamlet something to react against, rather than being developed as a character in his own right
Is Gertrude powerful or a strumpet - does it matter. Did she know about killing
Lewis
Tragedy is more important than love
Dudt
What makes a tragedy so tragic is not that noble individual falls into ruin, but that his fall causes so much suffering in others’
‘Get thee to a nunnery’
Is he mad
Yes - tragedy ruining relationship with 1 person he supposedly loved - letters he gave
No - cruel and insulting
Nunnery scene
Does he know he’s being watched
Yes - goes into prose after ‘are you honest’
No - mad or he’s taking mothers anger out on her
Ophelia
She appears in only 5 of the plays 20 scenes - showalter
Only concern is pleasing others - Smith
Gertrude
‘Negative and insignificant’
Polonius
A bad parent - Pennington
Claudius
A good and gentle king - knight
Slimy beast- knights
Hamlet
By Act 5 he has aged a decade - bloom
Not an individual but an Everyman- Lewis
