Responses to Course Material

So, Hamlet...

At the last "Responses" post, we finished our big preliminary read of Hamlet, and now we have concluded analyzing this text inside-out, upside-down, etc. Our first assignment, the forums, was really interesting because of the different perspectives. Come to think of it, that word, "perspective," sums up the past month pretty nicely. Anyways, back to the forums. My favorite would definitely have to be the prisoner sound byte from NPR. Of course, there is a bit of bias from my love for the radio, but either way, I really enjoyed hearing about this rendition of the play in probably one of the most unexpected places ever. Especially after watching the Tenant version, I can kind of see some strong correlations between the play and the prison. There is the connection between the idea of surveillance, except in a prison, I am pretty sure it's a good thing, but there is also the idea that everyone is out to get you, i.e. no one is really on your side. I think that's how those 4 prisoners were able to relate to Hamlet's anger and frustration. In a way, it kind of reminds me of that thing where football players do ballet to increase their flexibility; people can find their strengths in some of the most improbably places. I did not really enjoy the other two as much, and I was a bit averse to the Hamlet in the Bush thing, because that leaned in the direction of racism (to me). It sort of reminded me of Heart of Darkness because the narrator seemed to blame the Africans, making them sound dumb.

And then there were movies. My favorites were the Jacobi and Tenant versions, and my least favorite was definitely the Hawke version. I think the real reason behind my choices was the fact that they make Hamlet seem a lot more insane relative to the others. They allowed me to keep rooting for Hamlet, even though he does some pretty wicked deeds, because I empathized with his horrible mental state. Of course, each had its own strengths and weaknesses. I think that the Oedipal complex was definitely overplayed throughout the versions, especially in the Jacobi or Branaugh closet scene, where Hamlet almost sexually assaults Gertrude (but then again, that kind of plays into the insanity, oh well). Especially after watching the plays, I found a lot of connections between my previous Shakespeare experience, namely Macbeth. The themes of usurpation and defying fate play a huge role in the two, but they sort of take opposite sides to the issue: Hamlet's throne has been taken from him while Macbeth steals the throne for himself. I also remember Ms. Huntley talking about certain pairings of themes in Macbeth, like fate vs. freewill and fair vs. foul, which I found myself recalling in Hamlet often, such as the "special providence" or the horrible maggot imagery with Polonius. Also, both can be seen to have gone insane, but at different points in the play, based on interpretation. Back to the closet scene, I kind of liked the idea of Hamlet in a more peaceful conference, like in the older productions with the "office" environment. Honestly, the Branagh version just seemed overly dramatic: if a scene was meant to be creepy, it was made extremely creepy; if Hamlet got angry, he got really angry. My favorite of the Ophelias was probably the Tenant one because I felt that she made herself more modern and equal to Hamlet, which is how I envisioned her as I read the play. She sort of blends my previous Shakespeare heroines: Juliet's innocence and wit with the cunning and fallibility of Lady Macbeth.

Now that we have analyzed our Shakespeare text of the year, I feel that we have built a big knowledge base, which we can pull from on the AP exam. However, especially with these annotations, I think that I have some trouble recognizing the structure. I don't know about anyone else, but after a while I feel like the annotations just mesh into this one big read, and everytime I stick down a note, I am pretty sure I have something similar elsewhere. Anyways, I look forward to hopefully entering the realm of novels. Plays are cool and all, but novels are just so much easier to read for me. Well, that's that. Ta ta for now!