Here’s my thoughts, in pretty much the order they occurred:
“Boston…Boston…come on, Boston…..DAMNIT! Amherst.” <reads Garland Scott’s explanation> “Oh, ok, I guess that makes sense.”
“Portland, Maine, eh? Interesting, I’ve got a vacation weekend planned in Portland for April 10-11, I wonder if the timing will work out?” I don’t think so, I don’t think this is happening until later in the year. But I do plan to check!
“There’s 52 entries in this list, WHO GETS TWO? WHO THE F%^&*( GETS TWO? Oh…D.C. and Puerto Rico count. Fine, I guess.”
Seriously for a minute there I felt like the kid at the birthday party monitoring the cake slices to make sure nobody gets more than anybody else.
UPDATE : Looking back I see that this is a list for 2016, so (a) my Portland plans this April will definitely not be at the right time, and (b) I’ve got a whole year to plan a separate trip!
Then again I once got to do this (also thanks to Garland :)), so everything else is just gravy at this point.
The former artistic director of the Globe Theatre in London, who is starring in the BBC’s Wolf Hall, said: “I don’t think there’s pressure [to remove] the bawdy jokes. He’s bawdier a lot more times than people realise.
“The pressures I feel are more for times where he will say something very antisemitic,” he said.
Why?
Seriously, why do we single out antisemitism but leave in all the racism and sexism and every other -ism of which Shakespeare is guilty?
How about Claudio’s great head-smacking moment in Much Ado About Nothing? Forced into marrying a woman he’s never seen and asked if he’s ready to go through with it, he replies thusly:
LEONATO Good morrow, prince; good morrow, Claudio: We here attend you. Are you yet determined To-day to marry with my brother’s daughter?
CLAUDIO I’ll hold my mind, were she an Ethiope.
In case you missed it, Claudio basically gave “I won’t say anything, even if she’s black” as a worst-possible-case scenario.
Or should we talk about what Roderigo and Iago say about Othello? Calling him “thick lips” is about the least offensive thing I can think of as an example.
Maybe we should tackle sexism next? Pretty sure that would just kill the entire “courtship” between Petruchio and Kate. It could be a one woman show called Untamed Shrew.
The more I think of it the less I can get my head around what Rylance said. How do you even take the antisemitism out of Merchant of Venice? At least I’m assuming that’s the play to which he is referring. Isn’t it kind of the whole point? If you take out the antisemitic bits, the famous “If you prick us do we not bleed” speech is reduced to, “Actually, you know, people have been very nice to me. I’ve got no complaints.” If you remove the fundamentally antisemitic premise that Shylock is the bad guy *because* he is the jew, then why is he the bad guy?
You don’t solve a problem by saying “Let’s not talk about it. Let’s pretend it doesn’t exist.” It would seem like much better conversation can come from presenting it as Shakespeare wrote it and then discussing what it means.
Horatio at Hamlet’s death. Image via Wikipedia commons
He doesn’t. He’s what you sometimes hear referred to as the “exception that proves the rule.” Like how at the end of Hamlet, everybody dies. Except Horatio.
The official body count in the final scene (Act 5 Scene 2) of Hamlet is four: Gertrude, Laertes, Claudius, Hamlet. Enter Fortinbras, who says “What happened here?” and Horatio is left to tell the tale.
Kenneth Branagh’s 1996 film version may have also killed off Osric (the referee, for lack of a more description term), it’s difficult to tell. In Branagh’s version, Fortinbras is actively invading the castle while the final duel takes place between Hamlet and Laertes. Osric is seen being taken by surprise and stabbed. However, he then returns to the scene to deliver his line about Fortinbras’ “warlike volley.”
In some interpretations, such as Ingmar Bergman’s 1986 production, Horatio is killed at the end of the play. When Fortinbras orders, “Bid the soldiers shoot,” some directors have taken that as license to execute Horatio, presumably as the last remaining witness to all that had taken place. It’s important to note that there is nothing in the text to indicate this (just like Osric’s death above). However, there’s two ways to die in a play. Either the script says you die, or else you eventually just run out of lines. Once you’re no longer part of the action (such as Osric), you might fall victim to artistic license and find yourself dead at the end of Act 5 whether Shakespeare wanted it that way or not.
I found myself on Answers.com today, poking around the Shakespeare questions. The answers make you want to punch somebody. Let’s look at the question, “How did Rosencrantz and Guildenstern die?” Here’s the answer that 3 people marked as useful:
Claudius sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to go back to England with Hamlet. Before the three of them leave Claudius sends a letter to England telling them to kill Hamlet once he steps on to their soil. The letter is to be delivered by Rosencratnz and Guildenstern, the both of them do not know what the letter says and are merely following the king’s orders. It’s important to note that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern are Hamlet’s good friends and would not have delivered the letter if they had known it was in fact Hamlet’s death sentence. Hamlet finds this letter and is convinced that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern were on Claudius’ side and wanted him dead as well. In an act of madness Hamlet destroys the letter and rewrites a new one demanding that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern be killed when they step foot in England-no questions asked. He then seals the letter with a seal his father left him.
Important things to look it and question would be : why is has the seal on him at all times and the sudden burst of irrational revenge towards two of his best friends.
Oy vey iz mir, where to begin? They get the first part right, about the letter to England. Then it takes a left turn:
It’s important to note that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern are Hamlet’s good friends and would not have delivered the letter if they had known it was in fact Hamlet’s death sentence.
Absolutely incorrect. R&G may have at one point been friends of Hamlet, but are now in the employ of the king. Hamlet knows this. He even at one point calls them, “my two schoolfellows, whom I will trust as I will adders fang’d.”
It is a valid question to ask how they would have felt about Hamlet’s upcoming execution if they knew the contents of the letter, but it is pure conjecture to state that they would not have delivered it. There’s nothing in R&G’s actions or words to suggest that they would go against Claudius’ orders.
Hamlet finds this letter and is convinced that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern were on Claudius’ side and wanted him dead as well.
Nope again. After opening the letter he never even mentions R&G. In fact it is Horatio who brings them up.
In an act of madness Hamlet destroys the letter and rewrites a new one demanding that Rosencratnz and Guildenstern be killed when they step foot in England-no questions asked.
Unless you consider the entire play one big fit of madness, I don’t know where they get this stuff. In secret he forged a royal document, maintaining the original mission for the voyage. Remember that when he’s doing this he doesn’t realize he’s going to have a chance to escape, he thinks he’s going to be standing right next to them when the king of England opens the letter.
Important things to look it and question would be : why is has the seal on him at all times and the sudden burst of irrational revenge towards two of his best friends.
That he has the royal seal is just a plot contrivance of Shakespeare’s, and not even a particularly unusual one. What’s more interesting as an “important thing to question” is the sudden burst of irrational revenge toward two of his best friends. I’m not sure how many words in that sentence I can find to disagree with. Best friends? Nope, we’ve covered that. Sudden burst? Again, not hardly. They were on a sea voyage. He had plenty of time to think about it. Irrational? Changing the purpose of the mission and then planning to go through with the mission, that’s irrational? Irrational would be stabbing them in their sleep. Revenge? It’s not revenge, it’s self preservation. The entire purpose of this transaction is not Hamlet saying “Aha, at last I found a chance to kill Rosencrantz and Guildenstern!” It’s anything but. When Horatio awkwardly asks, “So, you just sent them off to their deaths, then, right?” Hamlet’s only reaction is, “They are not near my conscience.”
It’s stuff like this that reminds me why I started Shakespeare Answers and Not By Shakespeare.
There’s a short and easy answer to the question of why Hamlet killed Polonius. It was an accident. A case of mistaken identify, if you will. What he did next, however, certainly was no accident.
The story so far: Hamlet has sprung his mouse trap, playing out Claudius’ crime in front of him with the help of the actors. Claudius reaction has, as Hamlet anticipated, “caught the conscience of the king.” Gertrude, upset with her son for angering her husband, has requested Hamlet come to her bedchamber so she might speak with him. Polonius offers to spy on Hamlet by reaching the queen first and hiding in the arras (curtains).
Hamlet, in exultation at having proven Claudius’ guilt, comes to his mother’s bedchamber and intends to tell her off:
Hamlet. Now, mother, what’s the matter?
Gertrude. Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
Hamlet. Mother, you have my father much offended.
Gertrude. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
Hamlet. Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
Gertrude. Why, how now, Hamlet?
Hamlet. What’s the matter now?
Gertrude. Have you forgot me?
Hamlet. No, by the rood, not so!
You are the Queen, your husband’s brother’s wife,
And (would it were not so!) you are my mother.
Hamlet’s mood at this point is pretty obvious. He’s been unhappy with his mother and is letting it all out. You have my father much offended. You question with a wicked tongue. You are your husband’s brother’s wife.
If Hamlet had stormed off at this moment, having made his point, the play would have gone differently. Instead, Gertrude stands up and says, “I don’t have to take this!” and Hamlet shoves his mother back down, because he’s not done with her yet:
Gertrude. Nay, then I’ll set those to you that can speak.
Hamlet. Come, come, and sit you down. You shall not budge;
You go not till I set you up a glass
Where you may see the inmost part of you.
Gertrude is not prepared for Hamlet to put his hands on her. Remember that the whole castle believes Hamlet to have lost his mind. So it’s hardly unexpected when she yells to Polonius for help:
Gertrude. What wilt thou do? Thou wilt not murther me?
Help, help, ho!
Polonius. [behind] What, ho! help, help, help!
Hamlet didn’t know someone else was in the room. He stabs blindly through the arras:
Hamlet. [draws] How now? a rat? Dead for a ducat, dead!
[Makes a pass through the arras and] kills Polonius.
Polonius. [behind] O, I am slain!
Gertrude. O me, what hast thou done?
Right now the audience is thinking the same thing that Gertrude is. What just happened? Hamlet’s a thinker and a talker, not a doer. Up to this point in the play he hasn’t really done anything. Until now. Heard a noise? Kill it!
Hamlet. Nay, I know not. Is it the King?
Gertrude. O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!
Hamlet. A bloody deed- almost as bad, good mother,
As kill a king, and marry with his brother.
Gertrude. As kill a king?
Hamlet thought Claudius was hiding behind the arras! During this exchange, in fact, he still believes he has killed Claudius, which perhaps explains why he so blatantly accuses his mother of the crime, thinking that he has now avenged his father.
Hamlet discovers Polonius. Image via Wikipedia commons
The timing here is subject to some debate. In the previous scene, on his way to his mother’s bedchamber, Hamlet had already passed Claudius at prayer. He has an opportunity there to kill him, but chooses not to take it. So, then, does Hamlet think that Claudius somehow beat him to the same destination? It’s possible that Hamlet took his time getting to his mother’s room eventually. Or that castles do tend to have secret passages and if there was a shortcut to Gertrude’s room, Claudius knew it. It’s also likely that in the heat of the moment Hamlet simply never thought of this.
So, Polonius’ death was an accident. What happens next is not. Hamlet hides Polonius body, refusing to let him have a proper burial. Act 4 scenes 2 and 3 are actually devoted entirely to the search for Polonius’ body:
Rosencrantz. What have you done, my lord, with the dead body?
Hamlet. Compounded it with dust, whereto ’tis kin.
Rosencrantz. Tell us where ’tis, that we may take it thence
And bear it to the chapel.
And then, when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern can get no answers out on him, Hamlet is taken before Claudius:
Claudius. Where is Polonius?
Hamlet. In heaven. Send thither to see. If your messenger find him not
there, seek him i’ th’ other place yourself. But indeed, if you
find him not within this month, you shall nose him as you go up
the stair, into the lobby.
So Hamlet uses the dead body of his girlfriend’s father as a prop so he can tell Claudius to go to hell. Is this part of his crazy act? Or at this point does he truly care so little about such things that he doesn’t think twice about defiling a corpse?
