There was constant anxiety about the problem of succession: who should rule England when the monarch died? Whoever, succeeded would inherit a dangerously discontented country. In Kurland’s ‘Hamlet and the Scottish Succession’ (in Studies in English Literature, 34, 1994, Kurland argues that there are echoes of the Elizabethan-anxiety over succession, which was accompanied by fear of intervention. Hamlet is a threat to the King no only as a private avenger but as a possible alternative ruler. Kurland is confident that “Unlike some modern readers, Shakespeare’s audience would have been unlikely to see in Hamlet’s story merely a private tragedy or in Fortinbras’ succession to the Danish throne a welcome and unproblematic restoration of order.” I agree with Kurland in this view; The Elizabethan audience could not disassociate their own political fears from the play when their own personal situation reflects it so precisely.
In contrast, many nineteenth and twentieth century critics have tended to neglect the political dimension of the play in favour of a personal one, preferring to see Hamlet as an “intellectual Everyman,” an ineffectual outsider in a corrupt society, rather than a Renaissance prince, but these dimension need not be mutually exclusive.
The play’s opening scene conveys an atmosphere of political instability and tension The sentinels seem nervous, as if they expect to be attacked; they feel the need to identify themselves as “Friends to this ground” and “Liegemen to the Dane” (Act I, scene I, line 15.) The first few lines consist of short staccato sentences building an atmosphere of immediate tension.
Bernado: Who’s there?
Francisco: Nay, answer me. Stand, and unfold yourself.
Bernado: Long live the King!
Francisco: Bernado?
Bernado: He
The Ghost appears in armour, specifically the armour worn by the late King in a famous battle with Norway- and Horatio at once assumes that “This bodes some strange eruption to our state” (Act I, scene I, line 69.), going on to detail the threatened military action of young Fortinbras, against which urgent and unusual preparation are in hand, as most likely “fear’d” event to which the Ghost is “prologue” (Act I, scene I, lines 121-3.)
An audience is likely to anticipate that a political drama is about to unfold, and this impression will be confirmed by the opening speech of Act I, scene ii, the new King’s formal address to the court, apparently the first public occasion since his wedding with his brother’s widow.
Many critics have found in this balanced and careful piece of rhetoric evidence of Claudius’ self-assurance and political competence, but Hamlet’s opening speeches reject the language of impersonal ritual and insist on private feelings as the touchstone for behaviour. His first soliloquy Hamlet reveals the depth of his pain about his mother’s hasty marriage. This unadulterated communication with the audience may have been intended by Shakespeare to create sympathy for Hamlet from the audience. We can learn from historical sources that in the Elizabethan period, Claudius’ marriage would have been considered unlawful and incestuous by society. It is also a union forbidden in Leviticus XVIII. His objections also imply that Hamlet is a religious man which also would have been admired by the audience. However, we are also shown that he is aware that it is dangerous in the current climate to reveal his feelings: “But break my heart, for I mist hold my tongue” (Act I, scene ii, line 159.) This line can also be interpreted as the first sign of Hamlet’s undying affection for his mother. Many critics follow this line of argument further and apply Freud’s theory of the Oedipus complex to Hamlet’s feelings for his mother (For example, Earnest Jones.) Jones suggests the essence of Hamlet is about a man who is driven by sexual desire for his mother; thus supporting the argument that Hamlet is an essentially personal tragedy. However, I disagree with this interpretation. Unless you read the text searching for latent desire, you will find nothing that suggests that Hamlet has an Oedipus complex. We must not forget that Hamlet is just a character in a play and so cannot be fully psychoanalysed. We also know that Shakespeare cannot have intended for Hamlet to be interpreted in this way as Freud was born in the 19th century.
The arrival of Hamlet’s friend Horatio and his news of the Ghost complicates the issue further. Horatio was portrayed in the previous scene to be a military man, but now appears as Hamlet’s friend and fellow student on a short visit from Wittenberg. This inconsistency, or shift in the role of hamlet’s chief confidant perhaps signals a change in emphasis from the political to the more personal significance of what he reveals. The speculation about the Ghost’s appearance relating to a forth-coming conflict with Norway is not mentioned again throughout the play.
In earlier versions of the story Hamlet’s feigned madness is an explicitly politically motivated device to protect himself and avert suspicion from his revenge plot, but his is not so clear in Shakespeare’s text. There are a number of critical approaches to this question that we as a 21st century audience can take into consideration when considering the question of whether Hamlet’s feigned madness is politically or personally motivated.
As I mentioned before, Kurland believed it impossible that the Elizabethan audience could not believe Hamlet’s feigned madness to be politically motivated, and although I agree with this view. There are other critics which are interesting to explore while formulating my own opinion. For example Karin S. Coddon (in Renaissance, XX, 1989.) Coddon relates Shakespeare’s Hamlet to the decline and fall of Elizabeth’s former favourite, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, who was finally executed in 1601, though he had been falling out of Elizabeth’s favour since 1597 and he had notably lost the Queen’s favour over his disastrous military expedition to Ireland in 1599. Coddon explores the question of Essex’s melancholy or madness, seen at the time as a product of thwarted ambition which became displaced by treason. Without wanting to make an exact equation between the fictional Hamlet and the historical Essex, Coddon sees the representation of madness in the play as relating to the “faltering ideological prescriptions to define, order, and constrain subjectivity.” She argues madness is used as “an instrument of social and political disorder.” I believe his interpretation to be particularly accurate. Hamlet’s feigned madness is used to cover his intentions to disrupt the political system in Denmark, however, his reason for doing which (avenging the murder of his father) are personal. Again it is difficult to decide which response one agrees with more, personal or political?
Another factor that must be taken into account is the associations with Hamlet’s genre. It was a common theme with conventional tragedy that the events at the top of the social strata reflect on the entire state. This is emphasised in Act I, scene I, line 69 by Horatio “This bodes some strange eruption to our state.” If the political aspect of Hamlet was insignificant, why would it by highlighted at the start of the play?
In conclusion, the Elizabethan audience are less likely to have been as well informed or educated as a 21st century audience and therefore may not have been intelligent enough to analyse the relationships between the characters of the significance of the soliloquies. However, we can be sure that they could not ignore the fact that fictional Denmark almost perfectly mirrored their own Elizabethan England; thus supporting my argument that the Elizabethan audience were likely to have seen Hamlet as a political tragedy. Even from a 21st century perspective, the political aspect of the play cannot be ignored, particularly when we are educated of the historical time period in which its first audiences would have viewed it. However, as a member of a 21st century audience, contrasting with my conclusion of the Elizabethan response, my response is to interpret it as primarily a personal tragedy rather that a political one.
