Wednesday, June 5, 2019

Hamlet (Part 2)

As I continue to read Hamlet, I've decided that the Ghost is a major reason the play is so compelling for people. Although he only appears in a few scenes, his words are the motivating factor for Hamlet's angst (and eventually for Hamlet's actions).

627. Why did Shakespeare decide to call him simply "The Ghost" rather than "The Ghost of Old Hamlet"? Was he trying to create ambiguity about the reality of The Ghost?

628. What percentage of Americans believe in ghosts? I just did some quick research, and it looks like about 40% of us think ghosts are real.

-----------

Ghosts do not frequently appear in famous works of literature. I recall an August Wilson play (The Piano Lesson, I believe) with a ghost, and Toni Morrison's Beloved explores the ideas of ghosts.

All things considered, however, they are less present in literature than you'd expect. I'd posit that plenty of people are at least open to the possibility of ghosts and spirits ("ghost agnostics"?), so you'd think that famous authors might incorporate them into stories more often.

This is Paul Scofield, who plays The Ghost in the Mel Gibson version of Hamlet that I've been periodically watching as I read the play.

Shakespeare's willingness to think about ghosts, therefore, may be a reason that people are fascinated by Hamlet's story. In particular, readers (and theater goers) are probably interested in the idea of the ghost of a deceased parent coming back to advise and guide a distraught child.

I've been listening to lectures about the play by Peter Saccio (he teaches at Dartmouth, and I am feeling considerable regret that I didn't take his course about Shakespeare). Saccio explains that in pre-modern Europe there were three competing theories about ghosts:
  1. Catholics believed that ghosts visited from Purgatory. They were the actual spirits of the once-living humans they claimed to be, and they made requests of the living that would help speed them along to Heaven.
  2. Protestants believed that ghosts were demons. They were not who they claimed to be; rather, they were agents of evil attempting to corrupt the living.
  3. Skeptics believed that ghosts were hallucinations.
Saccio argues that Shakespeare brilliantly does not choose between the three theories. The Ghost claims to be visiting from Purgatory, but Hamlet considers the possibility that he is a demon, while Gertrude and Horatio consider him a hallucination. By creating ambiguity about the reality of The Ghost, Shakespeare forces the reader to consider his own beliefs about ghosts (and, more generally, about the afterlife).

This is fantastic analysis, and it goes back to the reason that I think The Ghost is such a crucial part of the play. Among its various other themes, Hamlet is concerned with the afterlife, and Shakespeare uses The Ghost to raise deep, fascinating questions about what happens to us when we die.

I'll close with a quote from The Ghost, both eerie and powerful:

I am thy father’s spirit

Doomed for a certain term to walk the night
And for the day confined to fast in fires
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature
Are burnt and purged away.

Here's a painting by British artist John Absolon, showing Hamlet and The Ghost.