Appendix 3, and first appendix on “Hamlet”: A crooked road to Elsinore

In the meantime, while I was distracted by films like “Macbeth” and “Irrational Man”, there happened a lot with “Hamlet”. As I said, I had a hunch that this play, which has always been one of my least favourite, would “get me”. And of course I was right about that. A few weeks ago I had a conversation with a friend about the play which probably lasted about an hour. There I presented my argument about Ophelia probably being pregnant which I based on just one expression in the text, and I think she didn’t really understand what I meant, so I knew that I had to examine this again. But, as it turned out, it was worth looking into. Not so much because I found definite proof for my theory but because I detected a basic principle of how this text works (for me? Of course I cannot know about others …)

The other massive influence was seeing Benedict Cumberbatch as Hamlet. I saw the show again yesterday, and I loved it even more, although I still think, as a production, it is highly overrated – as being in fact the fastest selling show in the history of the National Theatre! (And they have added again two recorded presentations in the cinema called “Cinema” in Munich where I go to watch these plays.) Apart from single exceptional performances - as of course the one by Benedict Cumberbatch, and Ciaran Hinds as the most convincing Claudius I have seen (though my favourite will probably always be Patrick Steward) – it wasn’t an exceptional show. It was “just” good theatre, which certainly isn’t the most insignificant praise I could think of! For somebody who has seen a lot of productions of this play and hopes to see some original ideas about certain characters or situations it might not be very enlightening. It is a well-done, classical approach, very suitable for schools, I’d say - and not too long! And it is very entertaining, which isn’t bad either. I only noticed this the second time I saw it that people were laughing all the time, even at moments where I couldn’t detect anything remotely funny. But there is a lot more of funny and ridiculous in “Hamlet” than you think if you are watching the play for the first time! - The main thing for me, though, was that, having thought a great deal about the play in the meantime, I enjoyed it a lot more than when I first saw it. And this is not a bad thing either. They had a clear and simple approach to all the characters, apart from the few that were weak, like Horatio (who, as a character, is probably not a good idea because he always turns out weak) or casted all wrong, like the Ghost. Maybe, generally, it is a fatal development that “classical” theatre only sells if the lead is played by an actor who is well known from tv and international film. Though, in most cases, this turns out very well as such because British actors, as a rule, don’t think of themselves as special just because they have been in a few major feature films, but instead work for an opportunity like this as if it was the last thing they would be doing. And Benedict Cumberbatch, who couldn’t escape knowing how special he is, is certainly one of these. (Which is probably the highest form of praise I could think of …) But I think it engenders a certain kind of approach to the play as such because everybody knows people are going to the theatre to see Benedict Cumberbatch play Hamlet, and what they do with the rest of the play will be noticed only by a few “nerds” anyway.

There was one thing Benedict Cumberbatch said about playing Hamlet that I felt is very important. He said that every actor “has a Hamlet in him”. Because this is what is really so difficult about this character: that he is such a general “mold” that every actor (of an appropriate age) could fit in. And, ideally, there would be as many Hamlets as there are actors, and all of them would kind of “work”. I think there is much to that, but of course, for me, certain actors and approaches to that character worked a lot better than others. For me Derek Jacobi and Kenneth Branagh didn’t work at all. Ethan Hawke worked really well, but, considering my approach to the play as a whole, the entirely subjective and contemporary perspective didn’t convince me. It was kind of “too small” for what is at stake in this play, and too much reduced to Hamlet himself, whereas, in Shakespeare, practically all the characters are important to make the play “emerge”. Which is probably true for every relevant work of fiction, and this will even be a central point in my approach later on. David Tennant was the only Hamlet that raised some really interesting points about this character I hadn’t noticed, and it was a brilliant performance, but “as a person”, in my opinion, he was completely wrong for Hamlet. And this was something ABOUT MY OWN APPROACH that really surprised me. And brought me to examine some basic prejudices I had about this character. But I know that I was biased from the start. Because I started to read “Hamlet” when I learned that I would see Benedict Cumberbatch playing him in October, and this was sometime in the spring. And, from this time onward, reading these lines, I always heard his voice in my head. So the idea that he would be playing Hamlet felt very convincing from the start. And, even though I was totally surprised, when I finally saw it, of the powerful, very “direct” and emotional approach which worked great all the way through, on the other hand I wasn’t surprised at all because I had always anticipated how he would play it and known that I would understand it and like it. So it is obvious that I knew very well what to expect – and, in this case, what NOT to expect! - from him as an actor. But the interesting question is, of course: WHY? Because there must have been an issue ABOUT HAMLET with me before. Something I wanted to see concerning this character. And what exactly was this, and why did I expected him to “crack” it? And I think I figured that out. And it has something to do with the concept of a hero which I brought up in my last blog – which is in fact a great coincidence! And with why, in my opinion, the way Shakespeare is going about this is just INCREDIBLY “contemporary”.

The next thing that happened was that I was on a train and got started on Dover Wilson. And I was even sorry that I wasn’t on a slow train, as he was when he became involved with “Hamlet”, because I didn’t get very far. As I was totally fascinated by the way he became involved. Of course we live in very different times, and maybe there is nothing like a war to put people “on hold” and generate a state where you either “convert, or fall in love”, or develop a “mania for wild speculation” (which, in my opinion, is a much more productive occupation than the other two. We will see why ...). So this kind of thing probably happens much less in an age where there is no significant part of the population involved in a war, and with planes instead of slow trains … But it kind of happened to ME, and this is of course why I was so fascinated. I loved the way Dover Wilson got started on his “road to Elsinore” because it was through an article by a Dr. Greg about “Hamlet” which raised a question that probably irked me every time I saw this play: Why does Claudius, who later breaks off the play when he sees his own murder presented on stage, seem unmoved when he sees the same content presented in the dumb-show before that? I always noticed this, and never tried to “explain it away”, and this is the first important thing. Because, if it happened to this Dr. Greg and me, it must have happened to countless other people, and of course this is only one of probably hundreds of these questions about seemingly minor oddities in “Hamlet”. But Dr. Greg tried to answer this question – as I think in a ludicrous way, at least as presented by Dover Wilson. But by speculating about this issue he got started on one of the central issues about the play which is, of course, an issue about the central plot around Hamlet himself: Is the ghost Hamlet sees meant to be a hallucination, or is he “real”? Personally I don’t see this question as very important, but it is probably one of the central questions about this play people have asked from the beginning. And certainly part of the “big question” about “Hamlet”. Which, of course, develops round the character of Hamlet himself and would be something like: What happens to him, and what is he about? And - as this obviously is the case! - why is this character (still) so important?

My own approach was similar because I entered into “wild speculations” about another question that I saw as important but nobody else seemed to care about: Why does Ophelia become mad? It was not that I detected this as a central question about the play, though a rather important question about this character. But the reason for asking a question about Ophelia was, as I see it now, that I knew there would be no point in asking questions about Hamlet himself. And the reason is an issue I raised in connection with Othello, and which is even more important for Hamlet: that this character is the centre of a web of prejudices which what I would call the “received structure” of the play consists of. And there is just no way of getting past it by a direct approach to the character. So I tackled Ophelia instead.

But why Ophelia? I think it was probably BECAUSE she appeared to me as the weakest, least interesting of the main characters – probably with the exception of Horatio who is certainly the most boring character. And maybe even more because I had always disliked her. And, at the same time, I knew I must be wrong about this. At least I knew that there must be A LOT MORE TO HER than I thought. And why did I know that?

Now I am once again at the center of my favourite issue about reading which is about method. At uni I learned a lot about method concerning the interpretation of fictional text, and I found this fascinating and, at the same time, always had doubts about it. Because what is taught as methodical approach often runs so obviously against what you do when you are reading. But I was a very docile student then – or pretended to be – and always masked my wild speculations with a sound methodical approach. And, of course, I realized already during my first semester what a methodical approach is for: to learn to ask questions and notice things you usually WOULDN’T SEE. In fact I think I LEARNED to read then, but in a very crooked way. Because reading always happens WHERE you become personally involved with the text, but, in this case, often the most crooked paths lead to the best places.

(And this might even be another important point about how reading improves us, and where my teacher has been right about fiction being a method to solve problems. Because the real world is always more complicated than we think it is. And there is always more to any significant issue about life than we think. If anything, something like “Hamlet” is much simpler than, for example, one single “living” political conflict, or one important personal relationship. At least I am convinced of this. And I am convinced as well that there is usually no direct and simple approach to solving such a conflict or improving a personal relationship we care about. But the only “playground” where we can probably learn to understand the complexity, the nature and causes of these real life issues, even analyze and “tackle” them without being directly involved, is the realm of fiction. This is probably the reason why truth and truthfulness are such central issues for me where fictional worlds are concerned. Though it is probably one of the most difficult and speculative issues in this field at the same time. And now I might just have taken a forbidden shortcut and touched the centre of “Hamlet” completely unintentionally …)

Concerning method, I became convinced that we use some methodical approach of a basic kind probably in any significant act of reading, which is every time we create meaning of our own. We just don’t become aware of it. Or at least not when everything works fine. The totally exciting thing about “figuring out” Ophelia was that I became aware that I had “created” a methodical approach by repeating a technique I had used on another text. And this methodical approach I had only used – and noticed! – because something I wanted to work just didn’t. To illustrate this I have to tell the complete story. It was about the tv production of “North and South” where Richard Armitage played John Thornton. I really noticed him for the first time in “The Hobbit” – as might be the case for most people who don’t usually watch British television. But, even though I loved his performance in “The Hobbit”, it took some time until I became aware “who” he was because I never “look up” my favourite actors, and nobody would recognize him from seeing “The Hobbit”! I first became aware of him as a real person when I saw an interview with him which made me laugh - because I had seen him “as a dwarf”! - when he kind of folded his long frame into the interview chair. And then I realized that I had seen him before, approximately five years ago, in “North and South”. I had borrowed the dvd and watched the series probably three times, as I usually do. I liked it but didn’t mark it down as “must have”, so I didn’t buy it. Which I did, of course, after having seen “The Hobbit”. And I could see then how great the acting was, but it still didn’t “work” on me, that is: nothing interesting “happened”. I was disappointed about this because I liked him so much as an actor, and you can see how much he had loved playing this. And I probably didn’t watch the “specials” the first time because there is an interview with him which is remarkable, even more so as you can see him positively beaming with pride and happiness about this achievement. And I kind of could see that he was right, so, in a way, I just HAD to be wrong!

But I still didn’t like the story. I know I must have read the book, probably a long time ago, because I recognized the story when I saw the series for the first time. But I didn’t remember having read the book, and I didn’t have it, so I probably hadn’t liked it. And I realized that it had to do with what KIND of story I thought it was. That it was probably the kind of love story I don’t like and have never been interested in. The kind where women make men “in their own image”. And I don’t even think I was completely wrong about this, but there is, of course, much more to it than the love-story. And there is more to the love-story than I could see as I was blinded by my prejudices. But the way I finally came to see that there was “more” I totally loved because it was through looking away from what I liked, looking instead at the characters I positively disliked. Which were Margaret’s mother, Maria Hale, and John Thornton’s sister. His mother I kind of liked, although she is horrible, because she is so tough. Maria Hale is played by Leslie Manville, an actress I like a lot, and who is brilliant at playing these unstable, self-pitying characters – as I guessed from her interview on “Another Year” strangely BY making herself “believe” in them and their good qualities! And I suppose it was her who made me “look”. But it was Fanny Thornton who finally made me ask the RIGHT question: WHAT is WRONG with her?

What is wrong with her, of course, is her mother! Although this is never said expressly anywhere it is so obvious that her mother never properly cared for her because the only person she has ever loved and is interested in is her son. Even her education must have been neglected, and how is somebody like this supposed to turn out as a proper human being? And this is such a common structure, in real life, that I couldn’t believe that I had missed it. And, of course, after this, I detected a lot of these structures. About Maria Hale: My god, I thought, this poor woman! What has she left, being forced out of a life she loved, forced to be in this dark house all the time, with no distractions, no social contacts, no real reason for ever leaving her prison … Yes, for me, this was like BEING IN PRISON! And this kind of character, with no potential at all for becoming tough and mean!, would never survive a prison.

And, after that, I suddenly saw a lot of this. In particular I saw a lot of prison walls. And all of them had a story written on them. Most of these prisons are for women, but there are a few, less visible, for men, especially where John Thornton is concerned. And this is where the story becomes interesting and genuinely moving: where people work their way round these walls to get at the life they really want. And, of course, great actors know exactly how to “hit” these “places”.

I still don’t “have” the story and I haven’t read the book because I still dislike Margaret Hale. I have always disliked heroes that “walk through walls” and people everybody thinks are great when they obviously haven’t done anything special. Though I can see better now why this kind of heroine has probably been important for women at the time! (And I am probably a real spoilsport for love-stories. I always imagine what their life together would probably be like. And, in this case, although they will probably be fine in bed (I never imagine that part!), the one thing I could imagine really well was their first row. I just couldn’t imagine how it would end because neither of them would probably give in …) So I haven’t “obtained” the story, but, by following the “crooked path”, I obtained the part of the story I was interested in.

And, from this experience, I knew this time that I did something deliberate by getting involved with Ophelia. I did something similar, not such a long time ago, when I finally “got my foot” into “Macbeth” by “accidentally” examining the porter’s scene and came up with the principle of “equivocation” which, in my opinion, is a moving principle of this play. So, this time, when I tackled Ophelia, I definitely knew what to expect but was still extremely surprised, as usual, about the nature and the significance of what “fell out”. The way I am planning to do this now, the appendix about “Hamlet” will be in three parts. This one being the first, the second will contain my argument about why I think Shakespeare suggests deliberately that Ophelia might be pregnant, and the third will be about the “ruling principle” of “Hamlet”, and why I think this play, and this “hero”, are at least as significant for the 21^st century as they probably were for Shakespeare’s own time.