Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (The New Cambridge Shakespeare) - Softcover

Shakespeare, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521293669 ISBN 13: 9780521293662

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1985

Synopsis

Philip Edwards aims to bring the reader, playgoer and director of Hamlet into the closest possible contact with Shakespeare's most famous and most perplexing play. In his introduction Professor Edwards considers the possibility that Shakespeare made important alterations to Hamlet as it neared production. These would explain some of the differences between the two early texts, quarto and Folio. This edition offers a new synthesis of the two early texts, presenting variants in the collation. The commentary clarifies the rich and complex language, showing how each phrase contributes to the whole, challenging some passages which are still persistently misread. The stage history concentrates on the strange story of the continued mutilation of the text in the theatre.

About this title

Review

Undoubtedly the most famous of all of Shakespeare's plays, Hamlet remains one of the most enduring but also enigmatic pieces of western literature. The story of Hamlet, the young Prince of Denmark, his tortured relationship with his mother, and his quest to avenge his father's murder at the hand of his brother Claudius has fascinated writers and audiences ever since it was written around 1600.

For many years interest focused on both Hamlet's inability to avenge his father's death, claiming that "the native hue of resolution / Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought", and, according to none other than Freud, his oedipal fixation with his mother. However, more recently critics have turned their attention to Hamlet's bold theatrical self-reflexivity (most famously reflected in the performance of "The Mousetrap"), its fascination with issues of theology and Renaissance humanism, and its dense, complex poetic language. What is so remarkable about the play is the way in which it tends to uncannily reflect the concerns of different epochs. As a result, Hamlet has been at different moments defined as a romantic rebel, an angst-ridden existentialist, a paralysed intellectual and an ambivalent New Man. Whatever subsequent generations make of Hamlet, they are unlikely to exhaust the possibilities of this most extraordinary play. --Jerry Brotton

Review

Praise for "William Shakespeare: Complete Works: " A feast of literary and historical information. "-The Wall Street Journal""

"Gorgeous new Shakespeare paperbacks."
--Marlon James, author of A Brief History of Seven Killings

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1985
• ISBN 10: 0521293669
• ISBN 13: 9780521293662
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 257
• Editor: Edwards Philip