THE GHOST OF JONAH HAUNTS SHAKESPEARE’S HAMLET

Hamlet, upon hearing from the ghost that Claudius killed his father, says, “O, my prophetic soul!” —and so the playwright invites us to associate the prince with biblical prophets. Sure enough, the play names the player queen "Baptista," which calls to mind John the Baptist, a prophet who was executed for criticizing the incestuous marriage of the king.

Later Hamlet is on a westbound ship, like Jonah, a biblical prophet who was called to be a prophet, but who learned the old adage, "you can run, but you cannot hide."



In the Saxo Grammaticus source tale, Amleth (Hamlet) goes to England, marries a princess, returns. But Shakespeare cuts it short mid-sea: Hamlet gets swallowed (figuratively) by a pirate ship that brings him back east to Denmark.

Hamlet’s ocean-motion echoes that of prophetic soul Jonah: Called to prophecy in Nineveh, he took a westbound boat to Tarshish to flee his fate. In a storm, Jonah was swallowed by a fish that returned him eastward where he belonged.

The effect on Jonah: He finally accepts divine will.

The effect on Hamlet: His life seemingly spared by God via pirates, Providence becomes more his inner compass than his earthly father, who no longer appears or is mentioned for the rest of the play.

Shakespeare may have performed in “A Looking Glass for London,” a play based on the Jonah tale. Former MLA president Paul A. Jorgensen noted how phrases in “A Looking Glass for London” are similar to phrases in Hamlet.

The word "Jonah" never appears in the play; the metaphor is missed by many commentators.

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May 16, 2019

This spring I gave a paper/presentation at the Rocky Mountain Medieval & Renaissance Association Conference in Denver, Colorado, USA. Over the course of a year, I had developed more ideas about parallels between Hamlet and Jonah. Here's a slide from that presentation:

SEE ALSO:
Stephen Greenblatt, Hamlet in Purgatory, 2001, page 238 - Hamlet's description of the father's ghost being spit from the "marble jaws" of the tomb - Greenblatt says it's not Jonah, but actually that's the echo.
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December 18, 2023:
Also note that Hamlet fleeing to England on his sea-voyage but avoiding Claudius' plans for his death
echoes Jesus, Mary and Joseph fleeing to Egypt, avoiding the Pharaoh's plans for Jesus' death.
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IMAGE: Fair use. Reverse-image search tools reveal that one of the earliest sources of the above image of the Mediterranean, with a hypothetical planned route of Jonah, is a December 18, 2014 use of the image here:
https://twentyeighteighteen.com/2014/12/18/jonah-part-2-4-lessons/
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INDEX: Index of posts on Jonah in Hamlet
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/08/index-of-posts-on-jonah-in-hamlet.html

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Disclaimer: If and when I quote or paraphrase bible passages or mention religion in many of my blog posts, I do not intend to promote any religion over another, nor am I attempting to promote religious belief in general; only to explore how the Bible and religion influenced Shakespeare, his plays, and his age.
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Thanks for reading!
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