Hamlet

[KEV67]

Right, I read it. I read the Arden Shakespeare edition, including the introduction. Three things puzzled me most:
 

1. When Hamlet killed Polonius, wasn't that, like, an extremely crazy thing to do? I know life was cheap back then, but killing someone before finding out who they are and what they are doing seems beyond criminally reckless. I was a puzzled that the rest of the scene was about Hamlet banging on about his feelings, rather than focusing on the enormity of what he had just done.
2. How old was Hamlet? I thought he must be a teenager, maybe eighteen. He talks about having known Yorrick, who, according to the grave digger, had been dead 23 years. That makes Hamlet about thirty. Apparently there is another version of the play in which Yorrick had been dead about a dozen years, which makes Hamlet about nineteen. If Hamlet is about thirty, why didn't he become king instead of Uncle Claudius? Gertrude would have been around fifty. To be blunt, why wouldn't Uncle Claudius marry a younger, prettier woman who could bear him children? The monarchy used to pass down the matrilineal line among the Picts. Did it pass down the matrilineal line among the Danes? Among the Anglo-Saxons the kings were selected by the Witan, who would usually select the old King's heir as the new king, but not necessarily. Hamlet would be around the right age at thirty and apparently quite popular with the subjects so why would a witan elect Uncle Claudius to be king instead of Hamlet.
3. Is the play Hamlet really so fascinating? There are endless productions of the plays; endless scholarly essays and books. Is it as good as all that?

 

[lunababymoonchild]

I don't have answers for questions 1 and 2, unfortunately. As to question 3, yes, I do think it's a fascinating play and cannot be performed/studied/written about too much. And it is meant as entertainment not historical fact.

 

As to question 2, I always get confused by Hamlet's age, I always think that he must be about 17 but, as you say, he's actually 30 so my problem is : why is he going to school? Perhaps this will make things clearer : Hamlet's Age - A Puzzle

[Madeleine]

I read somewhere that Hamlet was 29? I also thought he killed Polonius thinking that he was someone else, but I'm only going by a film version so the interpretation of it in the film might be different from the play.

[KEV67]

Another thing I wondered about was the names. I don't know about Gertrude and Hamlet, but Claudius, Polonius, Laertes and Ophelia sound Roman rather than Danish. Rosencratz and Gildernstern sound Dutch. I thought Danes at the time had names like Harald Bloodaxe and Sweyn Forkbeard.