Paul Adrian Fried / HAMLET'S BIBLE

Horatio says King Hamlet fought Fortinbras of Norway, “pricked on by emulate pride.” From their catechism, early audiences knew pride was the worst of the seven deadly sins. The kings had a signed agreement “ratified by law and heraldry” that the loser would forfeit land, but now the son of Fortinbras is gathering an army to get the land back. Marcellus notes, Denmark is so busy preparing for war that shipwrights are not even stopping to observe Sunday as sabbath and day of rest, as required by bible and church (note: more sin). Bernardo says that this must be the reason for the ghost’s visits, since the late king “was and is the question of these wars.” Then Horatio downplays the seriousness of the situation: “A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye.” Matthew 7:3-5 says that, if you wish to help take the mote (dust speck) from your neighbor’s eye, you should first take the plank from your own. Scholars have noted this allusion. But Horatio gets it backwards, claiming ...

When Scholars of Shakespeare’s Hamlet note that the name Marcellus contains an allusion to Virgil’s Aeneid, and Horatio alludes to the poet Horace and a Horatio in a Thomas Kyd tragedy of the time, consider that these allusions may have been intended for the 1%, or at least a more educated upper class among the first audiences of the play, and regular theater-goers. Meanwhile, most scholars neglect allusions in the character names of Francisco and Bernardo (the first two on stage) to Saints Francis of Assisi and Bernard of Clairvaux, associated with some of the hundreds of monasteries in England that were dissolved during the reign of Henry VIII. Allusions in the names of Francisco and Bernardo are more for the working class, the groundlings, whose ancestors back through the centuries had named their children after Christian saints. Stories associated with these saints offer relevant comparisons with the characters and plot in Hamlet, and deserve our consideration. Mentioning the M...

"O cursed spite / That ever I was born to set it right!" —What do Shakespeare’s Hamlet and “Star Wars: Rogue One” have in common that Hamlet and Disney’s “The Lion King” do not? (Hint: It's not about a "nunnery.") When “Lion King” opened (1994), one oft-quoted reviewer called it “Hamlet on the Serengeti.” It’s obvious: writers for the animated feature modeled their story after Shakespeare’s play. Shakespeare’s Hamlet begins with talk of the ghost’s appearance and soldiers wondering why Denmark is working so hard to prepare for war. The reason? Decades earlier, the king (Hamlet’s father) had slain Fortinbras, King of Norway, in single combat; now the fatherless son of Fortinbras is preparing an army to attack, take back the land, and avenge his father’s death. These soldiers may be among the first to die in such a war, so they have a right to ponder what their leaders are up to and who caused the mess. The play ends with Hamlet giving his “dying voice” i...

Among the most popular of my posts on Hamlet and the Bible (through the start of June 2017), these four seem to be holding strong, perhaps in part because LinkedIn indicates that a significant cluster of the views are from professors, lecturers, and teachers, and the posts offer ideas that may be useful as discussion starters in a classroom setting: "Four approaches to the names of the sentinels, Francisco and Bernardo," "Top 6 reasons Shakespeare probably named Francisco... after Francis of Assisi," "Shakespeare's Hamlet was something fresh in English revenge tragedies," and "Some of the harder biblical allusions to spot in Shakespeare's plays are the ones that are more thoroughly paraphrased, or subtle plot echoes." My most recent, which gives an example of a paraphrased bible reference, is also becoming popular in a short time. But just because they're popular doesn't mean they're flawless: Feel free to contribu...