Paul Adrian Fried / HAMLET'S BIBLE

The First Commandment, "THOU SHALT HAVE NO OTHER GODS BUT ME,” doesn’t mention pride, but Christian tradition considered it to be like playing god, the worst of the seven deadly sins from which the others proceed [1].  By apocryphal tradition it was the sin of Satan and the fallen angels, who in their pride believed they were equal to God or might usurp God’s throne [2].  KING HAMLET & OLD FORTINBRAS: Horatio in 1.1 notes pride: […] our last king, [...] Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway, Thereto pricked on by a most emulate *pride,* Dared to the combat… (1.1.92-96)  King Hamlet was “Dared to the combat”; instead of humbly urging peace instead of violence, “pricked on by… emulate pride,” he accepted the challenge and killed the Norwegian king, both of them gambling their lives and sons’ inheritance – and the future of their countries – on pride.  No “sealed compact,” “law” or “heraldry” (1.1.98-101) can excuse this sin of pride, and it may be among t...

Marjorie Garber of Harvard University thinks the drinking games of Claudius, with cannon fire and “earthly thunder,” are possibly blasphemous, adding yet another sin to his list. Claudius breaks a number of the Ten Commandments: Thou shalt not kill (Deuteronomy 5:17, Genesis 4:3-15) [1], nor covet thy neighbor’s house or wife (etc.) (Exodus 20:17) [2], nor bear false witness (Exodus 20:16) [3]. But more essentially, Claudius breaks the first commandment, which is to love God and have no other gods (Exodus 20:3-5). Garber notes the blasphemy implied in his drinking game: No jocund health that Denmark drinks today But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell, And the King’s rouse the heaven shall bruit again, Respeaking earthly thunder. (1.2.129-132) Garber writes, “It even approaches blasphemy, when we hear [...] that every time the King drinks, the cannons will blaze away, and ‘The King’s Rouse the heavens shall bruit again, / respeaking earthly thunder’.... Properly, thunder is heave...

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, is Claudius an alcoholic? Jeffrey Wilson explores this possibility in his (open-access) essay, “Sigma Alpha Elsinore” [1] using the analogy of university fraternities and drinking culture, among other things. [Left: Alan Bates as Claudius (1990), dir. Franco Zeffirelli. Fair use. Cropped, via screen grab from YouTube . Center: Derek Jacobi as Claudius (1996), dir. Kenneth Branagh. Fair use. Cropped, via Shakespeare Wiki . Right: Patrick Stewart as Claudius (2009), dir. Gregory Doran. Fair use. Cropped, via BBC. ] Wilson is a lecturer at Harvard who has written and published frequently on Shakespeare-related topics. I follow him on Twitter <@DrJeffreyWilson> in part because he often advocates online open access, as well as the idea that scholars should share their ideas more freely to stimulate good thinking and collaboration, rather than hoarding their ideas in fear they might be stolen before publication. (As a blogger, I agree.) His essay remin...