For whatever reason, William Shakespeare is a widely famed author when it comes to English Literature. When I took AP English Literature and Composition during my twelfth grade year, we had to read Hamlet , which is technically a play but formatted as a novel.
This was not the first of his work I have had to read over the years, but it had been so long that I had forgotten by this point how much I disliked other plays he has written. Reading Hamlet made me remember why. In this play, Shakespeare tells the story of Prince Hamlet, who finds reason to believe that his Uncle Claudius is responsible for the death of his father, the late King of Denmark.
Even more alarming for him, Claudius marries his mother, which some would consider to be quasi-incestuous, to become the new King. Hamlet experiences an inner conflict as he struggles to cope with the death of his father and seeks revenge against Claudius. He appears to be crazy by those around him as he seems to be talking to himself during a scene where he is convinced that he is communicating with the ghost of his father.
Personally, I generally tend to have a strong dislike for anything written in Old English, mainly because I do not care enough about the work to try to understand it, which is why I did not enjoy having to read this book. Here are just a few of the reasons why you might want to give Hamlet a try in October. This, of course, is a play, usually encountered these days with splendid backdrops, props, etc.
The whole atmosphere of the play depended on words rather than on visuals. For that reason , Hamlet establishes an atmosphere of dread and suspicion from the very first line.
If, like myself, you are enamored of shadowy eeriness, you will like this play. It makes Hamlet quite an interesting read if, like me, you have any interest in the origins of idioms. So, to that point, I will attempt to answer a few of the most common complaints about Hamlet. Language is a problem, especially since there are places in this play where Shakespeare uses words that we still use today, but whose meanings have changed drastically in the last years.
I find the best way to deal with it is, first, to read the sentences aloud. I find it also helps to break up especially long sentences. There are lots of parts in Hamlet that use a sort of sentence within a sentence, with the second sentence set off by dashes in the first. This, for example:. When faced with this kind of monstrosity, I usually read around the dashes the first time, then go back and read the lines inside the dashes, and finally read the whole thing together.
Hopefully, that should make these jawbreaker sentences a little easier to tackle. In an extreme twist of irony, the grave-digging scene ends up being rather amusing. A person who enjoys a bit of spookiness and some black humor should find this play very entertaining. Older books have stuck around not just because they appeal to a certain sense of aesthetics or because they speak to current events, but because they are true. They speak truth about their subjects, whether those subjects are human beings themselves, or ideas like honor, revenge, evil, and repentance, things we still grapple with to this day and, likely, always will.
If so, what did you think? The film also features Glenn Close as Queen Gertrude. Ethan Hawke plays Hamlet as a film student. It stars Derek Jacobi as Hamlet. Look at the following:. Read a Plot Synopsis. Before you sit down to read Hamlet, you should read a synopsis of the play. I provide one above, but you may want to do your own research and find a synopsis that you like. There are two books that I used for this purpose:. There are also many good synopses available online. These include SparkNotes , Shmoop , and eNotes.
In addition to reading a synopsis of the entire play before getting started, read a synopsis of each scene before reading that scene. Choose a Good Annotated Edition. In addition, he makes references to historical events that only people of his time would have understood.
Here are three popular annotated editions of Hamlet you can choose from:. Read Slowly and Carefully. Read each page once without referring to the annotations. You may even want to read it out loud. Then, read the page again, but this time refer to the annotations.
The BBC uses fantastic actors, and their adaptations closely follow the original material. In addition, Patrick Stewart plays Claudius. Take Notes. This will help you to make sure that you understood what you just read and saw, and it will help you to retain it. In addition, write down any quotes that caught your fancy.
Here are some of the most famous quotes from Hamlet:. This above all: to thine ownself be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. Find Additional Material. Going through this material will give you a greater understanding of the play, and it will provide you with different viewpoints and interpretations.
Read the Play Again. Read the play again, from start to finish. Watch Another Film Version. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Notify me of new posts by email. Gabriel Josipovici— Hamlet is the best-known work of literature in the English and perhaps any language, but it is also one of the most puzzling.
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