Ah. The cusp of winter and one’s thoughts inevitably turn to Hamlet. I’ve got Branagh’s Hamlet next on my Netflix list and I’m looking forward to geeking out on it next week sometime.
Hamlet, without a doubt, is my favorite of Bill’s plays. It’s just about perfect in every way. One debate I’ve had with people, though, is whether ol’ Hamlet was really crazy or just playing crazy.
In so many versions, he frets and whines his way through the movies I’ve seen (and at least one stage version).
The Alabama Shakespeare Festival’s version, though, did something I thought was fantastic. Hamlet put on his “antic disposition” when he was around people and took it off when he wasn’t. He was truly mad north-northwest, when the wind was southerly he knew his hawks and handsaws.
It was fabulous. Hamlet turned from a whiny teenager into a man who was manipulating the people around him. He had a sinister edge - a man in control - who was controlling, in turn, those around him.
This, says I, is the way to play Hamlet. No longer a emo teen with a Oedipal thing for his mom. T(hat scene became one of chastisement and anger, not creepy passion.)
A sane Hamlet is a man in control, scheming, a bit dark, and manipulative. Much more interesting.
I have to say, the clearest examination of Hamlet I’ve read is Isaac Asimov’s, in his Guide to Shakespeare. It think the Oedipal thing got way too much play in the lsat century, and Asimov really brought it back to what is probably more sensible - the loss of Hamlet’s chance to be King. Yes, he’s upset that his mom married downward (in his opinion) so quickly, but that’s only a small portion. Asimov says (paraphrasing), “How do we know that Hamlet is faking? Because he tells us, repeatedly, that’s he’s faking it.” It’s so simple, and yet, it’s ignored by the actors who think Hamlet = scenery chewing.
And there ain’t nothing more messed up than Glenn Close making out with Mel Gibson in the 1990 movie. WTF?
He starts by faking it and ends up a tool of his own conspiracy; after killing Polonius and the subsequent death of Ophelia, there was no going back. His plans–throwing on a play of his own to fake out Cladius, and then the fencing match–are clearly not the actions of a stable, decisive leader and are about as likely to come to successful fruition as the typical gizmo in an episode of “MacGyver”.
An alternate interpretation–albeit one that is clearly outside of the mainstream–is that Hamlet was bug-nuttery to begin with, already emotionally unstable and instigated by the supposed (but false) apparition of the Ghost to Horatio, Barnardo, and the other guards (probably just swamp gas), has hallucinations of his father commanding Hamlet to avenge his death that are so vivid that he convinces the others of the conspiracy rather than accept his own inadequacy, and focuses on the totally innocent King Claudius. Then after pointlessly (if accidentially) killing Polonius, he delves into paranoid fantasy rather than accept his moral responsibility in the death of his father’s key advisor and father of his fiancee, and resulting in Ophelia’s madness and suicide. Following that that, ordering the deaths of Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, and setting up Laertes for a fight. He also imagines Cladius to have poisoned the wine, and injects the toxin himself while first taking a drink from it. Goodnight sweet prince, indeed.
Now, let me tell you my theory about “My Three Sons”…
That is, perhaps he’s manipulating the people around him because he is a pretty manipulative guy. That whole “Get thee to a nunnery” scene screams of it, to me.
But at the same time, considering all that’s going on around him, he is, in spite of himself, heading down the path of madness. Jumping into Ophelia’s grave–okay, that could be interpreted as manipulation…but maybe by this point he’s actually gone that mad.
I’ve never thought it was strictly one or the other. A man who is completely crazy or completely in control is less interesting than one who is somewhere in between, and isn’t sure where the line is. He wants to fake being crazy, but he’s just seen the ghost of his father say ‘I was murdered by your uncle.’ Wouldn’t that make you a little crazy? Or mean you’re already a little crazy? He spends an act or two just trying to figure out if it’s really his father speaking to him from the great beyond, or if Satan is trying to damn him. These are not conditions that make it easy to keep your sanity. And as a result, Hamlet makes mistakes. He certainly treats Ophelia cruelly because he feels betrayed by her. His meanness to her is unnecessary, I think, and it hurts him that his scheme ends up killing someone he cared about.
I’ve never liked the Oedipal anxiety angle. It’s creepy in the wrong way and reeks of modern over-analysis. But the thought of Hamlet as just somebody who wants to be King is a little boring. Richard III wants to be king, he does it, and he’s no Hamlet. Hamlet’s got other motivations and other things on his mind that go beyond temporal power. If you make Hamlet totally in control, I think he’s pretty much Iago with more intellectual curiosity - but that still might be an interesting take on the character compared to the emo version.
Like everyone, I have seen it played both ways. In my mind, one of the most interesting was Mel Gibson’s version. The way I saw it, he played the prince of Denmark as more constipated than anything else.
What was the actor’s name? Might be worth keeping your eye on if he was that impressive (the Director may choose the direction to go, but it’s up to the actor to make it happen.)
I think he was close to the edge when he decided to act crazy but it was still just an act. At first. Then he sank into the role so well that it overtook him.
Going away for awhile does him a lot of good and he comes back changed.
He had to think about other things for awhile to get himself together. This is shown by how when he returns he talks with the gravedigger and remembers happier times with Yorick instead of thinking about his unhappy present.
When he sees Ophelia’s body he realizes the consequences of his actions, but instead of despairing over them he takes responsibility.
To add to my last post, I do understand why that version of Hamlet is annoying. I had the same kind of feeling when I saw the RSC Macbeth with Ian McKellen. The other Macbeths I’ve seen are pretty much wimpy, straight-and-narrow types who turn to regicide because the Mrs. has their balls in a vice. But McKellen got it right, so his character, Lady Macbeth’s character, and much of the rest of the play made more sense.
I agree that he started off putting on an act. He tells us so repeatedly, as ArizonaTeach points out. But as the play wears on, a combination of factors really does seem to drive him over the edge a bit:
[ul]
[li]His need to act crazy, so as to give himself “crazy-room” in which to carry out his plan;[/li][li]The pervasive, desperate paranoia of the atmosphere in Elsinore (more scenes seem to have someone secretly watching the action than don’t); and[/li][li]Finally, his real grief over his father’s apparent murder while Hamlet was away, coupled with his revulsion at his mother’s too-quick marriage to his uncle.[/li][/ul]
Really, who wouldn’t be a bit unbalanced after all the dude’s been through?
Moreover, Christmas is approaching. Hamlet’s not only dealing with all this, but he’s about to go through his first fatherless Christmas. This, all by itself, would be enough to make him a bit nuts; everything else just piles on top of it. He’s getting kicked while he’s down.
My suspicion is that he’s genuinely deranged toward the end, but, if things had turned out differently and he’d survived, he would have been fine once the stressors were removed.
So: Is he insane? Yes, but not in a “lock him in the nuthouse permanently” kind of way. He’s exercising bad judgment and not making decisions as clearly as he probably would otherwise, but this appears to be a temporary response to major stresses in his life, and not a permanent handicap.
I think Hamlet’s well predisposed to madness from the beginning – afterall, without having heard from his father’s ghost yet, merely on the strength of his mother’s marriage to his uncle (I don’t want to overinterpret his not becoming king, which he doesn’t seem so grieved about), he wants to commit suicide. His acted madness, and I agree that his outward madness is definitely acted, because he tells us so, isn’t even the main reason for everybody’s concern – both Polonius and Claudius worry about his grief and whether there’s more to it than just the death of his father, the whole reason for Rosencrantz & Guildenstern’s being called for.
But I don’t think Hamlet’s a sort of Richard III in Denmark, plotting and planning and scheming. He doesn’t actually have any sort of plan, until R&G brought the players to Elsinore, and at that point, I think, he rather loses it inwardly – though I doubt his madness is really noticed by the other characters, or accepted. Claudius says “nor what he spoke – though it lacked form a little – was not like madness”; and Ophelia, Claudius and Hamlet converse quite nicely before the play. Claudius realizes that Hamlet’s not alright, but not mad – though possibly dangerous. That’s true, too. He is not mad as such, as in “without reason”, he just has settled on killing Claudius and subordinates everything to that desire, be it is mother’s trust, Polonius’s or Ophelia’s lives, or Rosencrantz & Guildenstern. His madness is in his single-minded (and still often derailed) desire to avenge his father, not so much in his utterances.
Yeah, “fake it 'till you make it”, I think. He’s certainly a bit off, but he also hams it up to throw people off guard. I’ve seen this a lot with bipolar folks and those with schizophrenia (not that I’m trying to diagnose Hamlet, just to be clear): there are these moments of self-awareness, a nod and a wink, just before they launch into crazyland to mess with someone - only then they can’t get out. They’re both bonkers *and *faking it, and I think Hamlet’s the same way.
But I also agree with jakelope, that Hamlet wasn’t *irretrievably *insane. He was just very, very stressed out.
I think you’ll like Branagh’s Hamlet, then - he plays Hamlet as, well, not stone cold sane, but definitely more of the pretty manipulative, in control, faker Hamlet. He sees behind Ophelia’s act and knows that Polonius is behind it, thus he treats her cruelly but it’s pretty clear that he does love her. There’s also a few scenes the reveal his father in life and show how close he was to Dad, which I think help strengthen the story. He’s also more aware of his position - he knows he should be king and isn’t.
It’s a really well crafted film; I think it’s one of the best Hamlets I’ve ever seen.
Punchy title for something that has caused endless speculation, and lots of ink spilled. There was an article on this is American Scientist, which seemed an unlikely place for literary speculation. I did a quick search, and all I could finfd was this:
Title:
Hamlet on the Couch
Authors:
Bynum, W. F.; Neve, Michael
Publication:
American Scientist, Volume 74, Issue 4, p.390-396
Publication Date:
07/1986
Origin:
WEB
Bibliographic Code:
1986AmSci…74…390B
I could’ve sworn the article was more recent that that, but I might be misremembering.
This hits it pretty close to the mark IMO. Hamlet is overwhelmed by his inner turmoil and an inability to lay aside his gloom–something I think is closer to the “tragic flaw” of classical drama–but he’s not insane.
Something that makes Hamlet great as literature is its ambiguity, so that the reader or watcher can project various views on it – even the oedipal complex stuff which is completely unjustified by the text.
I think it’s interesting to read Hamlet as a political drama: about how Claudius manipulates the situation, and how Hamlet is limited in his possible responses. To do that, you need to take into consideration contemporary views on the divine right of kings: regardless of how flawed Claudius’s path to the throne is, it’s a major sin to kill an anointed king. And you might want to look at the contemporary political situation in London in the early 1600s: in my view, Fortinbras, from Norway to the north of Denmark, is in part a model of King James VI of Scotland, who was very shortly to take the throne of England when Elizabeth died without an heir.
And in this reading, Hamlet’s “madness” is in part policy and in part a genuine reaction to the difficulties of his situation. As policy, it partly deflects attention from Hamlet being viwed as “ambitious”, i.e., wanting to get rid of Claudius, and partly political manipulation of those around him, from Ophelia to Rosencrantz & Guildenstern. But Hamlet does also remind us from time to time of the reasons for his grief, and of hisd frustration in not being able to do anything about it.
