Overall Context Flashcards
When was Hamlet written?
Early 17th Century around 1600 or 1601
When was it first performed
around 1602
what could the instability at court link to or have been inspired by?
- Gunpowder Plot
- Elizabethan era and the problem of an aging monarch and/ or her non married status
uncertainty within england - spies at court
Role of religon and Elizabeth’s rejection of catholicism - Revenge tradgedy play/Greek plays
written : Religon
It written at a time of religous UPHEAVAL, and beacuse of the English Reformation, the play is alternativly catholic (or piously medival) and protestant (or conciously modern).
R: The Ghost + Ophelia
He describes himself as being in a place of purgatory and as dying without last rites. Ophelias bruial are both uncharacteristically Catholic.
Where were Revenge Tradgedies predominatley based
Traditionally Catholic countries, such as Spain and Italy; and they present a contradiction, since according to Catholic doctrine the strongest duty is to God and family. Hamlet’s conundrum, then, is wether to avenge his father and kill claudis, or to leave the vengence to God, as his religon requires.
Why is there so much protestanism in Hamlet?
Deriven from its location in Denmark - both then and now a predominately Protestant country. Although unclear wether the fictional Denmark in the play is supposed to mirror this.
Philosophical: HAMLET
He expounds ideas that people would now consider to be relativist, existentialist, and sceptical.
When is Hamlet subjectivistic
He expresses a subjectivistic idea when he says to Rosencratz : “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” The idea that nothing is real except in the mind of the individual fins its roots on the Greek Sophists who argued that since nothing can be percieved except through the senses - and since all individuals sense, and therefore percieve things differently - there os no absolute truth, but rather only relative.
Hamlet and existentialism
The clearest alleged instance is in the “to be or not to be” speech, where Hamlet is though to by some to use “being” to allude to life and action, and “not being” to death and inaction.
What does Hamlet reflect?
He may reflect the contemporary scepticism promoted by the French Renaissance humanist Michel de Montaigne. Prior to Montaigne’s time, humanists such as Pico della Mirandola had argued that man was God’s greatest creation, made in God’s image and able to choose his own likeness, this was challenged in Montaigne’s Essais of 1580.
Hamlet’s “What a piece of work is a man” could supposedly echo many of Montaigne’s ideas. Many scholars have isagreed on wether Shakespeare drew directly from Montaigne or wether both men were simply acting similarily to the spirit of the times.
Psychoanalytic: What does Freud say about Hamlet?
Freud Begins from the premise that “ the play is built up on Hamlet’s histations over fulfiling the the task of revenge that is assigned to him: but its texts offer no reasons or mmotives for these hesitations”.
Freude concludes that hamlet has an “ Oedipal desire for his mother and the subsequent guilt is prevennting him from murdering the man who has done what he wants to do”
Hamlet is confronted with his repressed desires, Hamlet realises that “he himself is literally no better than the sinner whom he is to punish.”
Freude suggests Hamlet’s aparrent “ distaste for sexuality” articulated in his nunnery conversation with Ophelia - accords with this interpretation.
A performance with a Freudian approach to Hamlet
John Barrymore in 1922, directed by Thomas Hopkins : “ broke new ground in its Freudian approach to character”, in keeping with the post - world War 1 rebellion against everything victorian. He had a “blunter intention” than presenting the ganteel, sweet prince of 19th century tradition, imbuing his character with virtility and lust
what did Jones psychoanalytical approach inspire?
Several productions portrayed the “closet scene”, where Hamlet confronts his mother in her private quaters, in a sexual light.
In this reading, Hamlet is disgusted by his mother’s “incestuous” relationship with Claudius whilst simultaneously fearful of killing him, as this would clear Hamlet’s path to his mother’s bed.
What else can be seen through a freudian lense?
Ophelias maddness after her fathers death, could be read as a reaction to the death of her hoped - for lover, her father. She is overwhelmed by having her unfullfilled love for him so abruptly terminated and and drifts into the oblivion of insanity.
In 1937, Tyrone Guthrie directed Laurence Olivier in a Jones- inspired Hanlet at The Old Vic. Olivier later used some of these same ideas in his 1948 film version of the play
