Claudius, Hamlet, and Chaucer's Physician's Tale (Part 4, Claudius series)
Chaucer may have influenced Shakespeare’s naming of Hamlet’s uncle, “Claudius,” as there are two Claudiuses of questionable moral character in the Chaucer tale.
- In Chaucer, Appius Claudius lusts after Virginia and is willing to act immorally to possess her.
- In Hamlet, Claudius wants to possess both the throne and his brother’s wife, and is willing to kill to obtain and keep them.
- Chaucer’s Appius Claudius employs another Claudius, a “churl,” to lie for him in court.
- Hamlet’s uncle Claudius enlists the help of Polonius, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, to spy on the prince.
- Chaucer’s Virginia is virtuous and hopes to be saved from scandal.
- In Hamlet, Gertrude and Ophelia are virtuous (or “seeming virtuous” as the ghost calls his wife) [3]. Hamlet had made “almost all the holy vows of heaven” to Ophelia [4], but her father thinks he must save her from (a non-existent?) scandal [5].
- In Chaucer, Virginius (Virginia’s father) offers to save her from being owned by Appius Claudius as a slave - by taking her life. Chaucer borrowed the idea of a sacrificed daughter in part from the biblical tale of Jephthah.
- In Hamlet, the prince sings or recites to Polonius part of a song about Jephthah [6], Hamlet’s way of comparing him to Jephthah, as Polonius is willing to sacrifice his own daughter to his ambition [7].
- In Hamlet, Gertrude is also saved - from an “incestuous marriage” - perhaps by offering herself in sacrifice, testing the chalice for poison to save her son (5.2) [8].
Most Shakespeare readers and audiences today are less familiar with Chaucer than they were in Shakespeare’s lifetime, so we might not think of his choice of the name “Claudius” (instead of “Feng”) as influenced by Chaucer among various others.
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POSTSCRIPT:
Some may wonder: Were the works of Chaucer available in Shakespeare's time, in print?
At the Folger website, Dieter Mehl notes: (FN 7):
7. There were several editions of Chaucer’s works printed during the sixteenth century: The Workes of Geffray Chaucer, ed. William Thynne (1532, 1542, 1550); ed. J. Stowe (1561); ed. Thomas Speght (1598, 1602). For details of these editions, see Chaucer’s Fame in England, ed. Jackson Campbell Boswell and Sylvia Wallace Holton, STC Chauceriana, 1475–1640 (New York: Modern Language Association, 2004). Speght’s edition of 1598 contains a long biography of Chaucer and brief “arguments” of each work. Of “The Knight’s Tale” it says, “Palamon and Arcite, a paire of friends and fellow prisoners, fight a combat before Duke Theseus, for the lady Emeli, sister to the Queene Ipolita wife of Theseus. A Tale fitting for the person of the Knight, for that it discourseth of the deeds of Armes, and loue of Ladies.”
"A Modern Perspective: The Two Noble Kinsmen"
https://www.folger.edu/explore/shakespeares-works/the-two-noble-kinsmen/the-two-noble-kinsmen-a-modern-perspective/
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INDEX on “Claudius” in Hamlet instead of “Feng” (Nov 19, 2024-)
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/11/index-why-claudius-not-feng-whats-in.html
NOTES: All references to Hamlet (and other Shakespeare plays) are to the Folger Shakespeare Library online versions: https://shakespeare.folger.edu/shakespeares-works/hamlet/entire-play/
[1] Drawing on “Shakespeare's Chaucer” by Ann Thompson, and “The Swan at the Well” by E. Talbot Donaldson, Michael Plunkett cites nine Shakespeare plays that show clear influences of Chaucer:
The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1594–1595)
The Taming of the Shrew (1593–1594)
Romeo and Juliet (1594–1595)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595–1596)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1600–1601)
Troilus and Cressida (1601–1602)
Cymbeline (1609–1610)
The Tempest (1611–1612)
The Two Noble Kinsmen (1612–1613)
(Listed, for better or worse, according to E.K. Chambers' 1930 chronology)
See Michael Plunkett,
Shakespeare and Chaucer: Dream Visions and Dramatic Designs (Ph.D dissertation):
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4011&context=gc_etds
[2] As mentioned earlier in the series, I’m indebted to Riccardo Cocchi for noticing the possible connection between Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Chaucer’s “The Physician’s Tale” with its characters of Appius Claudius and his “churl” (yet another) Claudius.
[3] Hamlet 1.5.53. The ghost may be untrustworthy and the “seeming virtuous” Gertrude may have married Claudius only to avoid war with Norway (which, to many, may seem justified as virtuous).
On distrust of the ghost, see Horatio, who first expresses distrust of the ghost in 1.4.77-82:
“What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord?
Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff
That beetles o’er his base into the sea,
And there assume some other horrible form
Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason
And draw you into madness? Think of it.”
Hamlet does so in 2.2.627-632:
“The spirit that I have seen
May be a devil, and the devil hath power
T’ assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps,
Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
As he is very potent with such spirits,
Abuses me to damn me.”
[4] 1.3.122-123.
[5] 1.3.124-144.
[6] 2.2.427-444:
HAMLET O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure
hadst thou!
POLONIUS What a treasure had he, my lord?
HAMLET Why,
One fair daughter, and no more,
The which he lovèd passing well.
POLONIUS, aside Still on my daughter.
HAMLET Am I not i’ th’ right, old Jephthah?
POLONIUS If you call me “Jephthah,” my lord: I have a
daughter that I love passing well.
HAMLET Nay, that follows not.
POLONIUS What follows then, my lord?
HAMLET Why,
As by lot, God wot
and then, you know,
It came to pass, as most like it was—
the first row of the pious chanson will show you
More…
[7] Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus also borrows some of these Jephthah elements in the death of Lavinia.
[8] See the following previous posts arguing that Gertrude suspects poison and drinks in an act of love and risk for her son, and self-sacrifice:
[8.a] Part 28: Ophelia saved by faith alone, or by Gertrude's work of mercy?
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/01/part-28-ophelia-saved-by-faith-alone-or.html
[8.b] Part 34: Why Gertrude personifies the envious sliver of willow (Interlude D.1)
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/03/part-34-interlude-d1-why-gertrude.html
[8.c] Part 35: Why Gertrude likely suspects a poison cup (Interlude D.2)
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/03/part-35-why-gertrude-likely-suspects.html
[8.d Part 36: Gertrude builds a better mousetrap for Claudius (Interlude D.3)
https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2024/03/part-36-gertrude-builds-better.html
IMAGES:
Left: From the Huntington Library (California) manuscript of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales (a book which I was able to see on display there this year, August 14, 2024). Public domain, via
https://libraries.slu.edu/digital/mssexhibit07/images/chaucer01.jpg
And via https://libraries.slu.edu/digital/mssexhibit07/manuscripts/chaucer.html
Center: From
The complete poetical works of Geoffrey Chaucer
By Chaucer, Geoffrey, d. 1400,
[Pub. c1912] Macmillan.
Public domain via archive-dot-org:
https://archive.org/details/completepoetical00chau/page/144/mode/2up
Right (top): Romanino, The Death of Virginia, 1531-32, Castello del Buonconsiglio, Trento
Photo date 24 March 2007 by Laurom, released under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike License v. 2.5 via Wikipedia: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1f/Romanino_Virginia_Buonconsiglio_TN.JPG
Right (bottom): Woodcut illustration (leaf [m]2r, f. cij) of Verginia's trial before Appius Claudius and her death at the hand of her father Verginius, hand-colored in red, green, yellow and black, from an incunable German translation by Heinrich Steinhöwel of Giovanni Boccaccio's De mulieribus claris, printed by Johannes Zainer at Ulm ca. 1474 (cf. ISTC ib00720000). One of 76 woodcut illustrations.
Penn Libraries call number: Inc B-720 All images from this book
Date 22 December 2011, 07:53
Photo by kladcat
Via Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license, via Wikipedia
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d7/Woodcut_illustration_of_Verginia%27s_trial_before_Appius_Claudius_and_her_death_at_the_hand_of_her_father_Verginius_-_Penn_Provenance_Project.jpg
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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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