Paul Adrian Fried / HAMLET'S BIBLE

Thank you to readers of this blog this past week, which the blog's analytics say come from the following countries (and "other"): Whether your country is listed or not, thank you for your interest. I am grateful and humbled.  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ My current project is a book tentatively titled Hamlet’s Bible , about biblical allusions and plot echoes in Hamlet. Below is a link to a list of some of my top posts (“greatest hits”), including a description of my book project (last item on the list): https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2019/12/top-20-hamlet-bible-posts.html I post every week, so please visit as often as you like and consider subscribing.

Those teaching Hamlet know that many students today are unfamiliar with the story of Jephthah and his daughter in Judges 11, or why Hamlet would call Polonius Jephthah - or in a broader sense, what Jephthah might have to do with the play. Besides assigning students to read Judges 11, what brief readings might be helpful? [ Pietro della Vecchia, 1650. Palmer Museum of Art, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons ] James G. McManaway's 1970 essay, "Ophelia and Jephthah's Daughter" * is a great place to start, in part because pondering the character of Ophelia is often popular among many students, and in part because McManaway's essay is brief and accessible in illuminating aspects of the Jephthah allusion that might otherwise be difficult to grasp, especially certain similarities between Jephthah's daughter and Ophelia that might be easy to overlook. * Shakespeare Quarterly , Vol. 21, No. 2 (Spring, 1970), pp. 198-200 (3 pages). Among the many things McMan...

There are three occurrences of the word "instrument" in Shakespeare's Hamlet , one on the lips of Claudius, a second from Prince Hamlet, and a third from a dying Laertes. Each of these, considered in their contexts in the play as well as together, may strengthen the argument for Polonius being based at least in part on William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and the Jephthah allusion as pointing at least in part to what scholars usually call The Bond of Association (full text of which is provided below, near the end of this blog post, with some highlights for emphasis).  I have blogged recently about Polonius and Cecil, on November 24 of this year , and also on December 8 . This connection between Polonius and Cecil is not new or original with me, as many other scholars have noted the same thing for many years since at least 1869 when George Russell French suggested it (as noted by Connie Beane).[1] Scholars have also long associated the swearing of vows in the play (and in its all...

Thank you to readers of this blog this past week, which the blog's analytics say come from the following countries (and "other"): Whether your country is listed or not, thank you for your interest. I am grateful and humbled.  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ My current project is a book tentatively titled Hamlet’s Bible , about biblical allusions and plot echoes in Hamlet. Below is a link to a list of some of my top posts (“greatest hits”), including a description of my book project (last item on the list): https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2019/12/top-20-hamlet-bible-posts.html I post every week, so please visit as often as you like and consider subscribing.

When Hamlet compares Polonius to Jephthah in 2.2 (1451-66), it is commonly thought that this merely refers to an ambitious Jephthah making reckless (or unholy) vows that will later result in the death of his daughter.          [ "Jephthah Sees His Daughter" (detail). Giovanni Francesco Romanelli (1610/1611-1662). Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna . Public Domain.] But this week I will explore the idea of Jephthah as a marginalized person, marginalized for being the son of a prostitute and therefore driven out, treated as "other" and outsider, likely traumatized by that marginalization. For that reason, Jephthah may have been desperate for acceptance by those who had excluded him. This may explain why he makes his rash vow that he will sacrifice to God whatever comes first across his threshold if he returns victorious from battle, and his daughter becomes the victim. These aspects of the Biblical Jephthah tale may also offer a lens through wh...