This essay is going to discuss the works of Shakespeare's Hamlet and John Updike's Gertrude and Claudius.
This essay is going to discuss the works of Shakespeare's Hamlet and John Updike's Gertrude and Claudius. It will look to compare and contrast certain aspects of each book in relation to each other. Some central characters in each book will be looked at and how they are similar in each book, along with the views that would lead you to believe that Gertrude and Claudius are truly in love or just lusting over each other. The ghost in each writing will be looked at to see if they relate to each other or not and the character of Polonius will be examined in each of the two works. Also some foreshadowing from Gertrude and Claudius on to Hamlet will be addressed.
Shakespeare's Hamlet has a lot to do with the character of Hamlet himself, as he is the central character in the play. It starts off with the introduction of a ghost who turns out to be in the image of Hamlets murdered father, Old Hamlet. This Ghost plays a vital role in the play because it is the ghost that enduces Hamlet to get revenge for his father murder. In this first act we are introduced to basically all the main characters. We learn that Hamlets mother, Gertrude the queen, is no married to Hamlets uncle, now the King, Claudius. This puts unrest on the kingdom of Denmark because it is almost seen as incest and the fact that it takes place so close to the funeral of the late king. Its also told that a Young Fortinbras is building and army to attack Denmark so there is uneasiness in the land of Denmark. We see a love interest for Hamlet by the name of Ophelia and her father and brother, Polonius and Laertes respectively, are introduced. For the first while we are just let known who the characters are. Then Hamlet himself sees his father's ghost and learns that Claudius murdered him and the ghost wants Hamlet to enact revenge on Claudius. This in turn gives Hamlet the idea to act mad so he can set up a plot to murder his uncle. Hamlet comes up with the idea to put on a play that reenacts the murder of his father so as to see if the king's reaction proves his guilt, and it does. As Hamlet acts mad this in turn makes people ask questions as to why he is doing so and with this we get the death of Polonius, by Hamlets sword, he tries to ease drop on Hamlet and the queen arguing. This, along with the denial of affection by Hamlet toward Ophelia, causes her to go mad and kill herself. With this the king orders Hamlet to England with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern with the intention of Hamlet getting murdered but Hamlet turns it around and escapes and gets his accompaniers killed. Upon return we learn that Laertes and the king are planning to have Hamlet and Laertes have a 'playful' dueling match with rapiers but the weapon that Laertes uses is laced with poison and as a back up the king will have a chalice full of poison for Hamlet to drink should the first plan fail. When the dueling begins it turns out that the queen drinks the poisoned chalice and both Hamlet and Laertes get cut by the poison rapier, but before Hamlet dies he avenges his fathers' murder and hands the throne over to Young Fortinbras.
In John Updikes book Gertrude and Claudius we are told the story of how the two came into being the new king and queen of Denmark. Were first told that the marriage of Old Hamlet (Horwendil) and Gertrude (Gerutha) and how it was an arranged marriage that Gertrude did not initially want. We are told of Claudius (Feng) and how he is always traveling around. It's told of how the queen liked the way Claudius looked and how the almost flirted with each other. The queen went to visit Claudius's estate and her they learn of their first ...
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In John Updikes book Gertrude and Claudius we are told the story of how the two came into being the new king and queen of Denmark. Were first told that the marriage of Old Hamlet (Horwendil) and Gertrude (Gerutha) and how it was an arranged marriage that Gertrude did not initially want. We are told of Claudius (Feng) and how he is always traveling around. It's told of how the queen liked the way Claudius looked and how the almost flirted with each other. The queen went to visit Claudius's estate and her they learn of their first feelings for each other. Then we learn that Polonius (Corambus) is being considered for retirement by the king, which only intensifies Polonius' disliking of the king(Old Hamlet) which will later help lead to the kings murder. Then Polonius agrees to allow the queen to go to his small abode where she and Claudius share in many days and nights of adultery. The king then learns of the adultery and threatens to kill Polonius and banish Claudius so the two of them scheme up a plan to murder the king by pouring poison into his ear while he sleeps which they do. So Claudius asked for the queens' hand in marriage and goes about his scheming ways as king. We are told of young Hamlets melancholy and the affection that he and Ophelia share for each other while Polonius and the queen try to get them together. There is a worry that Young Fortinbras is mounting an attack so they build up arms then every one lives happily ever after.
We will look first at the two ghosts that are present in the two stories with the first being the ghost of Old Hamlet in Hamlet. This ghost is one that seems to be ever present throughout the play. This ghost is able to be seen by people unlike Updikes ghost who is never seen once but just more or less felt. The Old Hamlet ghost is one that is caught in purgatory and seems to be a 'good' ghost but he does incise Hamlet to revenge for his murder but he does show humanity in the way he confesses his sins by implying that he was killed before he could confess them when he says: "No reck'ning made, but sent to my account with all my imperfections on my head" (Shakespeare 52). This ghost also gives us a good example of the disease and sickness that run through Denmark when he describes what the poison did to his body, because the King is also called Denmark. With the Updike ghost we see it in many different places throughout the story. This ghost is Old Hamlets father Gerwindil who Feng felt was watching him: "The ghost of their father, Gerwindil, watched" (Updike 77). But we also get the ghost of Old Hamlet in Gertrude and Claudius, with Claudius saying they must sneak around as is if the ghost of her dead husband was watching: "...as if your husbands' ghost keeps jealous guard over your virtue" (Updike 168). This is true because it turns out that the ghost is watching over them and he does somewhat confront Gertrude which kind of confused her because she says "The blessed dead do not haunt the living; only the damned do, tied to the living fallen, and her late husband had been a model of virtue and a very pattern of kingship" (Updike 195). This is the ghost trying to convey a message to the queen by making his presence felt because this would imply that something was not right because if he died properly then he would mot be damned to haunt. Both the ghosts are out to carry a message to the living. Both ghosts are, "...banished by the sunlight that flooded the great hall" (Updike 203), meaning that this ghost can't be around in the day just like the Hamlet ghost who leaves when the crows alert him of the coming morning. These ghosts are here to set right the wrongs that have occurred by contacting the people that need to know and who can set the wrong right.
Now we are going to look at the love or lust between Gertrude and Claudius and just exactly which it was that they felt. When we look at the view that Hamlet took we are lead to believe that their relationship was one of just lust because of the way they were always groping each other at the age that they were and having a lot of sex. Even though we were told this through the mouth of Hamlet it was pretty obvious to everyone that they were pretty affectionate toward each other for even a married couple which is implied when Hamlet says "Why, she should hang on him as if increase in appetite had grown by what it fed on..." (Shakespeare 38). We get the picture of the two of them, Gertrude and Claudius always hanging off each other and flirting and giggling like teenagers, which would just entice Hamlet to hate Claudius more. When we look at the Updike novel we see that they frequently had many a days and nights at the place Polonius allowed them to use and we learn that Claudius was quite a good lover who was well aware new and different sexual pleasures that would only entice the queen to more sex. "... a Byzantine technique he had taught her. She liked it, this blind suckling, this grubbing at natures root. She fought gagging, and tugged at his balls" (Updike 134). She would always be talking about the physical features of Claudius and how he was a smooth talker. The fact that Old Hamlet passed out in their wedding night probably made her forever think he never found her attractive and when Claudius came along and showered her with compliments of her physical beauty and made great love to her then she would forever want him physically. She spoke of Old Hamlets nobility and how he was a great king but never about his love making or physical attractiveness, well as compared to Claudius. The opposite was said about Claudius. The fact Old Hamlet was never around did sort of drive her into the arms of another man but she always had a thing for Claudius.
Polonius in these two stories is the exact same in both. A scheming, conniving and just an all around nosey person. He is more or less Claudius' right hand man and it is those two who plan the murder of Old Hamlet in the orchard with the poison. We even get this impression from Gertrude who had long thought of Polonius an old friend when she says: "...Lord Chamberlain's faith that human affairs could all be managed, manipulated with clogs and ratchets like millwheels and clocks, by a clever enough puppeteer" (Updike 189). He is seen as a person who is always indulged in other persons business which in turn gets him into more and more trouble. Like in Gertrude and Claudius he is ease dropping on Old Hamlet and Claudius when Old Hamlet found out about the adultery that was taking place and in turn got mixed up with Claudius in the murder of Old Hamlet. This caused him to be very cautious of Hamlet so in Hamlet he hid behind the curtain when Gertrude and Hamlet were arguing so he could hear what was going on and then was killed by Hamlet because he thought it was the king behind the curtain. Polonius even had someone spy on his son, Laertes, while he was away in Paris, which shows that he had to know everything that was going on with everyone.
It is also noticed that there are foreshadows of things to come that appear in Gertrude and Claudius that can be used to predict outcomes in Hamlet. For example, there was the second gift that Claudius got for Gertrude which was a chalice. It is ironic that the way she dies is by drinking from a chalice, maybe the very same one that Claudius got for her. When she received the chalice it is described as: "...a chalice, silver so thinly worked it could cut a lip..." (Updike 115). This could be an omen to the chalice being the thing that will cut her lip, or so much as to say, kill her later. "No, no, the drink, the drink -oh my dear Hamlet- The drink, the drink! I am pois'ned" (Shakespeare 151). There is also a line in Updikes book that mirrors how Ophelia died when she was mad and always singing, then she fell off a branch that broke and she drowned in the river. We see the picture of a female bird singing as it sits on a bent branch, as if almost to suggest it won't break yet but it will: "...smaller female who darted out the open window and waited, singing her song on the bent branch of a fresh leafed willow, for her mate to join her" (Updike 28). The waiting of the bird could also suggest the waiting of Ophelia for Hamlet.
All in all I thought the two books complemented each other very well, except for the ending of Gertrude and Claudius. The ending made it out to be that everything turned out great for everyone. Claudius, Gertrude, Hamlet, Ophelia, Laertes all never died and that Hamlet took over the throne along with Ophelia. I didn't quite understand why Updike decided to make his ending like that. The story of Gertrude and Claudius and how they got together really shined a light onto their story and characters in Hamlet. It gave us a much needed background into the underlying story behind Old Hamlets murder. It was kind of confusing at first when reading Gertrude and Claudius to get used to the name changes at the first of the book and each following part but all in all it was an enjoyable read. The carry over of the ghost from one story to the other was very well done and Updikes book was quite graphic in its sexual innuendo which caught me off guard at first, but the whole book was very well written.
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