What Makes Shakespeares Hamlet Popular?

What Makes Shakespe ars hamlet Popular?The Enduring Popularity of Shakespeares critical pointWhy is crossroads so popular? Shakespeare wrote countless masterpieces, m either of which are debatably more than exciting (The Tempest), momentous (Macbeth), intriguing (Othello), romantic (Romeo and Juliet) and profound (King Lear). besides non only has juncture been produced more by the Royal Shakespeare confederacy than any some other work, it is a favourite of troupes (and audiences) around the gentleman. From the come acrosss inception in 1602, up until the subject area Theatres acclaimed occupation in 2000 (and beyond), sm in all town has captured the imagination. A close examination of the be, on with a careful focus on its themes, w lightheaded shed some slackgoing on hamlets 400 year old enthrall, with a special emphasis on its relevance to a modern-day British audience. small town is a tale of revenge, murder and existential and spiritual angst. The style char d o worker is a young prince whose father, the King of Denmark, has unexpectedly passed away. His brother, Claudius, has inherited the tail and taken the former kings wife as his own. small town is visited by his fathers ghost, who informs him that he was murdered by Claudius, and that his termination needs to be avenged. Instead of instantly doing so, vill mature attempts to first keep his uncles guilt by feigning madness, and later by staging a play of the murder, to which Claudius reaction essentially confirms his guilt. But even with the show up in hand, small town is still unable to enact his revenge. After by chance killing the kings councilor Polonius, he is deported to England, and upon his return enters into a affaire dhonneur with Polonius son, Laertes. However, the fight is a setup Laertess blade is pois unrivalledd, as is the vino in a goblet from which hamlet is to drink. While Hamlet wins the affaire dhonneur and ends up killing Claudius, he too succumbs to th e poison and dies.In the play, Hamlet is by far the major presence his problem is central to the plot, and his habitual and private exultations and speculations dominate the action (Hoy, 1991). Furthermore, the part of Hamlet is far bigger than any other in all of Shakespeares works. While the play is filled with ambiguities, the biggest of all pick out to do with Hamlets motivations and actions (Levin, 1959). there is always more to him than the other characters in the play cannister take in out. Part of this has to do with the way Shakespeare crafted him his intense pensiveness, his uncertainness, the vagaries of his actions entirely part of it is Hamlet himself, who actually tells other characters that there is more to him than meets the eye, nonably his produce and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. In addition, when he speaks, he sounds as if theres something important hes not saying, maybe something even he is not a blend(predicate) of (Hoy, 1991).What separates Hamlet from other revenge plays is that the action we expect to see is continually postponed (Wilson, 1951). Instead of being based on activity, the play is all somewhat character, and really only the character of Hamlet. Many people regard Hamlet as a play about indecisiveness, but more than this, it can be seen as an examination of action itself that is, the conditions necessary for such, and the appropriate pith required, depending on the circumstances. The question of how to act is affected not only by Hamlets need for certainty, but by unrestrained and mental factors (Halliday, 1964). Hamlet himself appears to distrust the idea that its even possible to act in a controlled, rational way. For when he does act, he does so fleetly and recklessly. This extreme shift from paralysis to impulsiveness unless adds to his enigmatic nature.Without action to beat the play, the plot instead revolves around Hamlet contemplating various questions, among them Is the ghost what it appears to be , or is it really trying to deceive him? How can the facts about a curse be known without there being any run intoes? provoke Hamlet know the intricacies of Claudiuss soul by studying his behaviour? Can we ever really know whether our actions will pass the consequences we want them to have? Can we know what happens in the time to come? (Levin, 1959).This last question is one of the most powerful throughout the play. There are times when Hamlet seems to feel that demise itself may bring the answers to his deepest concerns (Wilson, 1951). The question of his own death plagues him, and he more than once contemplates whether or not suicide is a legitimate choice in an unbearably painful cosmos. Hamlets grief is such that he frequently longs for death to end his get downing, but worries that if he commits suicide, he will be suffer eternally in hell. In his famous To be or not to be soliloquy, Hamlet concludes that no one would choose to endure the pain of life if they were not af raid of what will come after death, and that it is this fear which causes morality to come in with action (Levin, 1959).In sum, Hamlet, is ambiguous, vague and mysterious, uncertain, indecisive and pensive, self-loathing and self-reflexive, simultaneously afraid to live and afraid to die. Is it any wonder then that people can get in touch to him? People enjoy Hamlet because he evokes their sympathy. His character is flesh and blood. He doesnt just act he thinks, he questions, he feels. Hamlet is extremely philosophical and contemplative, and takes the time to analyze difficult questions that cannot be answered with any certainty. His melancholy is in many ways endearing. Though his actual age is debatable, in essence he is the quintessential teenager, afraid to grow up and take on burdens and responsibility he knows he must and up to now is not ready for. His urgency is contagious. Beyond this, there are the questions he deals with, primarily those of death and the afterlife, tha t haunt us all. It is extremely rare to not only project such questions so well articulated, but to hear them articulated at all. These conversations are largely relegated to our own heads. They are lettered and personal, and are seldom expressed. To see them on stage is to bear witness to our own souls.But this only explains why the character of Hamlet is so popular. Though he dominates the course of the action (or lack thereof), there is some other reason why the play itself has been so successful and so resonant, which has to do with the famous line Something is rotten in the give tongue to of Denmark (Hamlet, I, iv, 90). Everything is related in Hamlet, including the health of the ruling royal family and that of the nation as a solid (Hoy, 1991). Throughout the play, there are explicit connections drawn between the two. Denmark is much described as a physical body made ill by the moral corruption of Claudius. While the dead King Hamlet is portrayed as a strong, noble ruler under whose represent the state was in good health, Claudius, is regarded as wicked, corrupt and out to recompense only his own appetites (Wilson, 1951). Throughout history, similar correlations have been made, from Stalin and Hitler to Blair and Bush. While the latter(prenominal) pair are possibly far less sinister, their political decisions have similarly shaped the perceptions of the citizens of the nations they lead, as well as the perceptions of those on the outside. Our leading are responsible for the overall health of the state, and the war in Iraq and other actions are doing little at the moment to paint a telecasting of good health. Close observers of Hamlet, no matter of what time period, sense this analog instantly.Modern society, specifically the UK, is still in Hamlets thrall. In todays world, with so many problems and too few solutions, it is easy to feel powerless and paralyzed. There are choices to be made, and actions to take, but 1) which ones should be carr ied out and 2) will they even do any good? The modern person is at a crossroads, and in some ways Hamlet personifies this better than anyone else. Throw in the plays description of the state as being deceased, and the work comes across almost as the board child for modern malaise. This is evidenced in the 2000 production by the National Theatre, which is only one of many recent and successful incarnations of the play. The title role was played by Russell Beale, who prepared for the part by looking into himself in an attempt to bring out the everyman quality of Hamlet, along with his intense self-reflection and (albeit feigned) madness. To do justice to Shakespeares words, in this case gravitating between wit, wryness and self-reflection, Beale decided not to force emotion, but to instead get there slowly, to get the emotional arc right, and not find too many moments of crisis (Beale, 2000). The actor, in perhaps a bit of method, decided to try and capture Hamlets grief by using his own, in this case the fact that his mother died a few weeks before the performance. He also used his frustration over not being able to feel enough to further cement and perfect his interpretation (Beale, 2000). By all accounts he didnt disappoint.The Independent declared Beales Hamlet not at all Hamlet-like, and his performance moving and crystal clear, characterized by an aching regret for the world that might have been rather than a seething contempt for the world that exists (Taylor, 2000). When Hamlet returned from England, the reviewer found him emanating a shyly gracious bridal of the mystery of life and fate, and in dying moved towards the audience as if painfully and belatedly conscious of their presence, imparting an even more shatter sense of the waste of a noble life (Taylor, 2000).The even out hackneyed wrote that the performances illuminated the text in ways that made it fresh and accessible, and Beales performance of clarity, humanity and humility held the audien ce spellboundthey could only suffer with his confusion, grief self-loathing and doubt (de Jongh, 2000).The Guardian complimented Beale for being everything one could hope for witty, ironic, intelligent, a Henry James who is also a swordsman to borrow Harold flowers phrase, and bookish, inward, reflective and intensely capable of self-scrutiny (Billington, 2000). Furthermore, the paper admired his cognitive content for surprise, moral sensitivity and parodic wit and his ability to convey the paralysis of the quick-witted caught up in a world of realpolitik, resulting in a first-rate, profoundly intellectual Hamlet whose weapons are primarily verbal and who understands that revenge cannot spell meaningful redress (Billington, 2000).In the National Theatres production, along with countless others over four centuries, a central theme is eer repeated Hamlets self-loathing, specifically in regards to his lack of feeling, which, as much as his lack of action, makes him guilty. This a spect of his character is perhaps more relevant today than ever. The theme of powerlessness, along with the tangible frustration and guilt that comes with it, can easily find a home in the listen of a modern audience member. In addition, Hamlets intensely relatable human all too human qualities, his probing thoughts on the afterlife and the theme of the nation as diseased body are so universal and timeless that they shed much light on the plays appeal. Perhaps there will come by a day when Hamlet fails to strike a chord with audiences. But for now, Shakespeares masterful creation and revolutionary character study is safely inbred in our consciousness.BibliographyBeale, Russell. The Readiness is All. National Theatre, 2000. http//www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/?lid=2485Billington, Michael. The Guardian, September 6, 2000.Crystal, David, and Crystal, Ben. The Shakespeare Miscellany. Penguin New York, 2005.de Jongh, Nicholas. The Evening Standard, September 6, 2000.Halliday, F. E. A Shak espeare Companion 1564-1964. New York Penguin, 1964.Hoy, Cyrus. Hamlet An Authoritative Text, clever Backgrounds, Extracts from the Sources, Essays in Criticism. New York W. W. Norton and Company, 1991.Levin, Harry. The Question of Hamlet. New York Oxford University Press, 1959.Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Braunmuller, A.R., Orgel, Stephen (Eds.). New York Penguin Classics, 2001.Taylor, Paul. The Independent, September 6, 2000.Wilson, John. What Happens in Hamlet. New York Cambridge University Press, 1951.