Hamlet and Homer - part 8 (Louden, Aguirre, Hornback)

Names, common themes, and similar incidents in Homer and Hamlet are too explicit and numerous to avoid (Laertes, Hyperion, Pyrrhus, Priam, Hecuba... See my previous posts in this series).[1] The text of Hamlet expects readers and audiences to view Hamlet through the lens of Homer, both for its similarities and for the ways it diverges from the old heroic texts.

Bruce Louden observes [2] that among the many new characters and plot elements in Hamlet that are not found in the Saxo Grammaticus and Belleforest sources, four of them are found in Homer:

1. the Ghost;
2. the coming of the actors to Elsinore;
3. the play-within-the-play;
4. the pirates who intercept the ship…. (33-34)

Louden notes that Hamlet identifies with Pyrrhus, who wears black in mourning for the death of his father, and who hesitates before killing Priam (35).
He also finds parallels between the following:

Hamlet, and Telemachus’ “skepticism, initial inability to act, and cunning” (36);
The Ghost (supernatural visitor), and goddess Athena disguised as Mentes (36-37);
The players, and Homer’s poet Phemios and bard Demodokos (37-40);
Claudius, and the suitors (40-41)
Gertrude, and Penelope (41-43)
Polonius, and Nestor (43-44)
… and more.

Louden observes. "By employing Greek heroic subtexts Shakespeare may suggest that Christianity problematizes traditional modes of heroic action..." (35), a point similar to one made by Peter Lake, mentioned in a previous post. [3]

Louden’s treatment of the topic is among the better ones I’ve found.

Manuel Aguirre’s 1996 essay, “Life, Crown, and Queen: Gertrude and the Theme of Sovereignty” [4] also finds a number of interesting parallels between Homer, Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and the Saxo Grammaticus Amleth source tale on which Hamlet is based.

Bert G. Hornback concludes with helpful observations:

“The one poet whose work best compares with Shakespeare's is Homer. But Homer never wrote a Hamlet. In the Iliad, Achilles - a young man, maybe twenty years old - learns the folly of violence, the futility of revenge, but he can't keep his learning. At the end of the poem, after the truce which he declares for Hector's funeral, he will go back to fighting….

“In the Odyssey, Odysseus — forty, perhaps? — comes home, having lost a whole generation of Ithakans through his adventuring. Then, avenging himself, he slaughters all their younger brothers in clearing his palace of Penelope's suitors. In the final scene of the poem he tries to kill their doddering fathers, the old men who have come protesting against him. He chases them, despite Athena's warning to stop. At last Zeus casts a thunderbolt at him to make him quit his violence. Odysseus, reputed to be the wise man, hasn't learned a thing.

“But Hamlet learns, and remains true to his learning. Shakespeare's vision is different from Homer's. Homer's seemingly cynical irony pushes us to learn what his heroes can't keep or comprehend.” [5]

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NOTES:
[1] Links to previous posts in this series: See "POSTS IN THIS SERIES," below.

[2] Bruce Louden, “Telemachos, the Odyssey and Hamlet,” p.33-50 in Text & Presentation, 2014, ed. Graley Herren, McFarland: https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/Text-Presentation-2014/

A preview of this essay is available via Google Books.

[3] See my post on Peter Lake’s book, Hamlet’s Choice: Religion and Resistance in Shakespeare's Revenge Tragedies https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2022/07/peter-lake-on-four-genres-represented.html

[4] “Life, Crown, and Queen: Gertrude and the Theme of Sovereignty” by Manuel Aguirre
The Review of English Studies
Vol. 47, No. 186 (May, 1996), pp. 163-174 (12 pages)
Oxford University Press
https://www.jstor.org/stable/518100

[5] “Hamlet's Heroism,” Bert G. Hornback
Colby Quarterly, Volume 30, no.4, December 1994, p.291-297
https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3039&context=cq

IMAGES:
Top left: Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus and the Ghost (Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 4), print, Robert Thew, after Henry Fuseli (MET, 42.119.545). Creative Commons Universal Public Domain. Via Wikimedia: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hamlet,_Horatio,_Marcellus_and_the_Ghost_(Shakespeare,_Hamlet,_Act_1,_Scene_4)_MET_DP109516.jpg

Top center: Pablo E. Fabisch, illustration for Aventuras de Telémaco by François Fénelon (1651-1715). 1699. Public domain, via Wikimedia: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Telemachus_and_Mentor1.JPG

Top right:  Eugène Delacroix, “Hamlet Wishes to Follow the Ghost of his Father (Act I, Scene IV), 1835. National Gallery of Art, Rosenwald Collection. Photo: https://purl.org/nga/collection/artobject/58056 . Creative Commons Universal Public Domain. Via Wikimedia: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eug%C3%A8ne_Delacroix,_Hamlet_Wishes_to_Follow_the_Ghost_of_his_Father_(Act_I,_Scene_IV),_1835,_NGA_58056.jpg

Bottom far-left: Penelope, circa 1514, by Domenico di Pace Beccafumi (–1551). Seminario Patriarcale, Venice. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Domenico_Beccafumi_-_Penelope_-_WGA01540.jpg

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Two studies in seated melancholy: Telemachus and Hamlet:

Bottom center-left: Angelica Kauffmann (1741–1807), “The Sorrow of Telemachus,” 1783 (crop/detail). Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bequest of Collis P. Huntington, 1900. <https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436809> Digital photo file donated to Wikimedia Commons by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

Bottom center-right: J. Gurney & Son, photographer. Edwin Booth. Hamlet "To be or not to be, that is the question" / / Gurney, Fifth Avenue, cor. 16th St., N.Y. , ca. 1870. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2005696075/. Library of Congress. Public domain.
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Bottom far right: William Gorman Wills (1828-1891), “Ophelia and Laertes (or Ophelia here is Rosemary)," c.1880. Public domain, via Wikimedia:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:William_Gorman_Wills-Ophelia_and_Laertes.jpg



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POSTS IN THIS SERIES:

INDEX: Holding up The Odyssey as mirror in Hamlet
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/08/index-holding-up-odyssey-as-mirror-in.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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