Religion in Hamlet Flashcards
introductory forewarning in ‘The History Of Hamblet’- histoires tragiques, by Francois de Belleforest
you must understand that a long time before the kingdom of Denmark received the faith of Jesus Christ and embraced the doctrine of the Christians, that the common people in those days were barbarous and uncivil, and their princes cruel, without faith or loyalty seeking nothing but murder and deposing, or, at least, offending each other, either in honours, goods, or loves; not caring to ransom such as they took prisoners but rather sacrificing them to cruel vengeance naturally imprinted in their hearts
Williams- why we cant believe Hamlets reason for sparing Claudius life
‘Claudius’s soul, stained as it was with murder and adultery could never have found admittance to heaven, whatever the cirumstances in which it was [killed]’
Why should hamlet have no doubts about hell/ the afterlife according to Williams
Old Hamlet makes it perfectly clear that hell, damnation, purgatory and burning fires are not figments of an ecclesiastical imagination but the realities if the afterlife’
which literary figure who was also trained at wittenberg has doubts about the after life
Dr Faustus who says ‘i think hell’s a fable’
Williams on why the conditions of a body before death does not determine where they go in the after life
'’if old Hamlet, dying in no more sinful circumstances than during an afternoon snooze… is doomed to ‘fast in fires/ till the foul crimes done in my days of nature./ are burnt and purged away’ there can be no doubt whateverin Hamlets’s ,mind as to the inevitable fate of his uncle’s soul if he were to kill him there and then’
Williams on Shakespeare’s intention regarding Hamlets decision not to kill Claudius in 3,3
‘it is impossible that Shakespeare does not intend us to realise, beyond any shadow of doubt, that Hamlet is engaging in self-deception because he simply cannot bring himself to kill in cold blood’
