The Problem of Hamlet

[peter]

One of the big problems with Hamlet is why he found himself unable to act on his promise to his father's ghost, that he would avenge his murder by his scheming and ambitious brother Claudius.

He seemingly continuously puts off the final stroke for no reasons that Shakespeare makes clear, and in ways that seem at odds with his character.

Was he unsure of the veracity of the tale the ghost was spinning? Was the ghost truly even his father? Could not it be 'the Devil in disguise' attempting to trick him?

Hamlet soliloquises about the choices of action versus inaction - the very value of continuing 'to be' in a world made abominable by the actions of man, of God's forbidding edict in respect of self slaughter, and marvellous writing though it is, nothing quite hangs together or is explicitly made clear as to what was the author's intention. You can't even say for absolute fact what Hamlet is talking about in these passages.

But was this just poor writing on Shakespeare's part - no, surely we cannot believe this. Shakespeare composed Hamlet at the peak of his power as a dramatist; evidence suggests he worked long and hard at it.

Goethe suggests that the problem is solved (re Hamlet's inaction) by seeing the Prince as a man of good intention, outraged by the horrible nature of his uncle's perfidy, and determined to right this wrong - but by virtue of simply not having the strength of will or character to see it through, finding instead himself spinning around like a pea in a whistle, unmanned by the sheer scale of the actions he must take, but is completely unable to shoulder.

Other critics don't get this. Hamlet is no softy, no jellyfish unable to spur himself to action. Look, they say, how he spears Polonius through the arras. Look how he dispatches Rosenkranz and Guildenstern to their deaths without a second thought. The problem remains.

Freud had it sorted though, in his Interpretation of Dreams, when in a couple of pages he psychanalyses Hamlet and - suprise, suprise - puts it all down to sex. What we have here is a clear case of Oedipus. Hamlet (like all boys) hates his father and wants to screw his mother. And what is it that Claudius has done? Killed his (Hamlet's) father and screwed his mother! For Freud this is the basis of Hamlet's blunted purpose. He suddenly sees in his uncle a reflection of himself, and is so taken aback that the steel of his promise is wrenched from him.

It's a good idea, but unsatisfactory for many, who simply see Freud blowing his own trumpet with the idea.

Or maybe (and this is what I'm thinking) Hamlet is just inconsistent because people are inconsistent. Shakespeare must have known this and why would he make his creation less of a man than a man - any man - truly is? Do I contradict myself? Then I contradict myself. I am vast and contain multitudes! Can not this be the simple explanation of the problem of Hamlet?

Tell me what you think?

[peter]

Or don't.

[Fist and Faith]

Sorry. It's been about 42 years.

[peter]

Ah, but once a bard, always a bard Fist.

(And I don't mean that like it could sound, honestly. )

[Damelon]

It’s been 20 years since I’ve seen Hamlet in the theater and to be honest, it’s not my favorite. But it does have these great lines.

Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.
Oh, that that earth which kept the world in awe
Should patch a wall t'expel the winter's flaw!

Hamlet to Horatio, Hamlet, Act V Scene I

[peter]

I think Hamlet is better read than seen.

I've seen it live on stage just the once, seen multiple film productions and read it what, a couple of times end to end. (I've dipped in and read sections on many occasions.)

I like to savour the language, which always causes a frisson of delight in me somewhere or other. For a while I could even do the "To be or not to be..." soliloquy start to finish from memory. To my mind it's only when reading it that you are pacing it at the rate which works for you. Without distraction or the need to see it visually (other than in the mind's eye), the richness of the text actually comes to the fore.

And to go back to the problem, just taking the 'To be...' soliloquy, we assume it to be on the merits of existence vs non existence, action vs non-action, but in another interpretation we can fold it back to the earlier lines in which Hamlet speaks to his mother on 'seeming'. He regards the tears and crys of the distressed as the trappings of woe, the seemings of it. The being of grief is within one. Thus the "...not to be" can be read as "To be or to seem to be, that is the question." And bizarrely, to act (be) becomes part of the trappings, the seemings of woe, where to not act (not to be), the actuality of it. (This is a poor summary of an explanation given in the fine novel The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld, which I confess to having read recently, and which caused me to once again begin thinking about Hamlet.) And get the play on the word 'act' here. To act is to seem: to not act is to be. And this is of course a play, an act.

But I really like the multiple interpretations we can make of Shakespeare's words, their slippery quality. Professor Harold Bloom, who's regard for Shakespeare was almost at the level of deification, believed that the onion-skin layers of meaning in his text could never be plumbed to their full depth. He felt that no matter how far you delved, Shakespeare would always be ahead of you, placing yet another undiscovered layer beyond your grasp.

Again, this level of immersion cannot be achieved in a theatre or cinema. Yes the works are plays, intended for playing - but they are written to be read, and cannot be fully appreciated but bt this means.

[peter]

Reflection: not sure that hangs together (though it 'seemed' to while I was writing it. )

[Holsety]

Well I think Damelon offered a good hint, though I won't necessarily elaborate regarding why. Maybe it's about class? Maybe Hamlet is more willing to kill those he did kill because they're of a lower class than him. While his uncle is a member of the royal family.