Hamlet Annotated Bibliography
Cook, Patrick J. Cinematic Hamlet: the Films of Olivier, Zeffirelli, Branagh, and Almereyda.
Athens, Ohio: Ohio UP. 2011. Print. This book focuses on the many versions of Hamlet that have been made for the silver screen. The play by William Shakespeare is one of the most frequently filmed works and each version of the story has a unique perspective. Director, screenwriter, and of course actor each influence the overall position of the film. Each chooses which elements of the story to emphasize and which to underplay. Even films that use the complete text of Shakespeare's work still alter the original by the act of interpretation. By examining each version, focusing on the three four major ones, the author helps explain what was important to the artists and by extension to the audience who would have seen the film.
In the context of a paper, each film would be watched and particular attention paid to the actor's depiction of Hamlet and his psychological issues. A major question of the play is whether or not Hamlet has truly gone insane or if it is all an act. Shakespeare himself never makes this clear. The film's artistic contributors make the determination in their given media. Some, like the Zeffirelli film have Hamlet's pretense of insanity more strong, indicating that he is not crazy. Others, like Branaugh's version make the likelihood of insanity far greater.
Eliot, T.S. "Hamlet and His Problems." The Sacred Wood. 1921. Print. Author T.S. Eliot wrote a rather fascinating critique of Hamlet in 1921. He states that the play is not the masterpiece that many have hailed it as. Several key inconsistencies are relayed in the article but the one that seems to give Eliot the most trouble is in Hamlet's sanity or lack of sanity. He tells the audience that he will pretend...
Heaven and earth! Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him as if increase of appetite had grown by what it fed on: and yet, within a month, -- Let me not think on't, -- Frailty, thy name is woman! -- a little month; or ere those shoes were old With which she followed my poor father's body Like Niobe, all tears; -- why she, even she, --
.. O, woe is me, t' have seen what I have seen, see what I see!" (3.1. 116-164). The connotation is that her heart is breaking. This scene combined with her original startled outcry to Polonius in Act I further illustrates that Ophelia was in love with Hamlet, and that she did not meet him with ill intent despite the ulterior motives of everyone else. This further builds upon previous evidence
To act in a murderous, vengeful way that is contrary to his true nature, and to assume madness creates madness. At first, Hamlet suggests that vengefulness in a corrupt court is a kind of sanity, when he vows to put on an antic disposition, but he acts in a way that is more and more contrary to his moral nature as the play goes on, rebuking his mother against
He questions whether he should try to clear the court of corruption or just give up and end his life now. It is this emotional doubt that drives Hamlet to act deranged at times, but he overcomes it, and almost manages to answer the difficult questions posed in his life. In Act V, when calm returns, Hamlet repents his behavior (V, ii, 75-78) (Lidz, 164). In Lidz's book Freud is
Throughout the play Shakespeare presents Ophelia as the symbol of innocence who is destroyed by the evil and harshness of the world; which has its origins in the murder of the King. We experience her slide towards insanity in terms of the terrible predicament of her situation. It is also tragically ironic that the real cause or her madness is the murder of Hamlet's father, which has also driven Hamlet
After Hamlet has killed Polonius and Laertes has returned from Paris demanding satisfaction, Hamlet justly observes "by the image of my cause, I see the portraiture of his." It is the contrasts between these three characters which give significance to the parallelisms. The intelligent, sensitive Hamlet and the hot-headed Machiavellian Laertes perish on the same poisoned foil, leaving the kingdom to the cool-headed Norwegian, who has been a shrewder contriver
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