Shakespeare's Hamlet was something fresh in English revenge tragedies
Shakespeare's Hamlet was something fresh in English revenge tragedies. The most popular of them, The Spanish Tragedy, either conveyed the assumption that God was on England's side, against Spain and Rome, or according to some, the play's violence was so over-the-top that it may have been intended to cause its audience to question the impulse for revenge against national enemies.
Hamlet turned this on its head and used the end of a royal house in Denmark as an analogy for England's hope for a heroic ending to the House of Tudor.
Think of the film, Avatar, which worked as an analogy for resource wars led by the US against smaller (and increasingly Muslim) nations, and against indigenous peoples over centuries. Planet Earth wants to mine "unobtanium" at the cost of many alien lives; earthlings are, mostly, the bad guys, while the aliens live in better harmony with their planet. But the film Avatar struck a nerve and was a record-breaking box-office hit.
Obviously, some viewers didn't buy into the political rhetoric about God on our side.
In the context of The Spanish Tragedy, the most recent and best-known revenge tragedy in England, Hamlet was the Avatar of its time.
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Links to a description of my book project:
On LinkedIn: https://lnkd.in/eJGBtqV
On this blog: https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2017/05/hamlets-bible-my-book-project-im.html
[Originally posted around the week of 3/27/17 on LinkedIn]
Hamlet turned this on its head and used the end of a royal house in Denmark as an analogy for England's hope for a heroic ending to the House of Tudor.
Think of the film, Avatar, which worked as an analogy for resource wars led by the US against smaller (and increasingly Muslim) nations, and against indigenous peoples over centuries. Planet Earth wants to mine "unobtanium" at the cost of many alien lives; earthlings are, mostly, the bad guys, while the aliens live in better harmony with their planet. But the film Avatar struck a nerve and was a record-breaking box-office hit.
Obviously, some viewers didn't buy into the political rhetoric about God on our side.
In the context of The Spanish Tragedy, the most recent and best-known revenge tragedy in England, Hamlet was the Avatar of its time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Links to a description of my book project:
On LinkedIn: https://lnkd.in/eJGBtqV
On this blog: https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2017/05/hamlets-bible-my-book-project-im.html
[Originally posted around the week of 3/27/17 on LinkedIn]
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