Studying Hamlet and remembering

Damn. Damn. Damn. ("Good Times", Season 4, ep 1)

Studying Hamlet made me think of my old professor, who wasn't that old when he was mine. I wanted to reach out to him to say, "I'm finally studying Hamlet lol" only to find that he had shuffled off this mortal coil (Hamlet 3.1.75) a mere 7 years ago.

Professor Stephen F. Evans took time for me outside of class and helped me get over my language hurdle with Shakespeare. He introduced me to the Arden and Oxford editions with all of their lovely commentaries and footnotes. He also introduced me to the OED (Oxford English Dictionary), of which I am now the proud and recent owner of a used "compact" (i.e., really, really, really, really, extremely, tiny print) edition. And whatdyaknow, I love words words words (Hamlet 2.2.210)! He took me from scoffing at Shakespeare to loving Shakespeare in a few short months.

For the current endeavor, I started out studying the 2nd series edition of the Arden Hamlet. However, I found the lengthy introduction by Harold Jenkins to be quite dense and dry — I could consume it and take a lot of nourishment, yet I could not enjoy the experience. It took me an hour to read 44 pages and I learned so much about differences between the Q1, Q2, and F versions of the text, and the remainder of the 159 page intro appears to be more of the same (aside: I will complete this, later).

As good luck would have it (Merry Wives of Windsor: 3.5.85), my old paperback edition of the 2nd series Hamlet barely survived one journey to work and back; so I switched to an ebook version of the Arden Hamlet 3rd series.

In reading the 3rd series edition of the Arden Hamlet, its lengthy introduction by Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor is equally dense with knowledge and yet is divided into flavorful and delicious bites that caused me to discover that I had read the entire 198 page prefaces, introduction, and "additions and reconsiderations" in one 2.5 hour sitting. I gained much more sustenance from this experience than I had in the previous series edition.

Of the many items in this overall introduction to Hamlet, perhaps the one that excited me the most was learning that Vladimir Vysostky had performed Hamlet as an actor in Moscow in 1971.

The otherwise bare set for Yuri Lyubimov’s 1971–80 production at Moscow’s Taganka Theatre featured a huge woollen curtain which moved mysteriously around the stage, suggesting a hostile force at work, but also a prison wall – with ears (see Fig. 18). Vladimir Vysotsky, a well-known ballad singer, a dissident and an alcoholic, played the prince, and the politics of resistance seemed to be exemplified in his starting the play by reading Boris Pasternak’s poem ‘Hamlet’ from the epilogue to his banned novel Doctor Zhivago (see Stříbrný, 119–20).

A sample of the rehearsal (17"3s): YouTube: Репетиция «Гамлета» Владимира Высоцкого и Юрия Любимова. Театр на Таганке. Shout out to Inna V. for the link!

One thing that I recall from Professor Evans' class is that he told us that we couldn't truly experience Hamlet until we've read it in the original Klingon. No, sorry, scratch that. He told us that we couldn't truly appreciate Hamlet until we were over 35. Well, I'm over being over 35, yet I understand this sentiment. Just like one should not study kabbalah until the age of 40, so much wisdom and worldliness goes into understanding the character of Hamlet, who is supposed to be a college student at the University of Wittenberg, that, perhaps, one cannot understand Hamlet's drives until one has lived them. Similarly, when I saw Star Wars as a kid, I thought that Luke Skywalker was the coolest! Yet, when I saw it in the theaters again in the late 1990s (was I even 30?), I thought that Luke was a whiney kid. As a former teen, I could see Luke as an impatient teenager who thought that he could change the world through the intensity of his feelings (Gee, Freud, should I tell you about my mother in our next session? Oh, you'd rather hear about my lightsaber collection?). Today, while reading the first spoken line by Hamlet (Hamlet 1.2.69), I thought, "What a little turd." When I was in my 20s, I probably thought, "You're darned right!" Perhaps studying Hamlet again as a quinquagenarian is not the right time, either.

To Professor Evans, I recall fondly having to memorize and recite,

What a piece of work is a man, how noble in
reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving
how express and admirable; in action how like
an angel, in apprehension how like a god: the
beauty of the world, the paragon of animals — and
yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? ... (Hamlet 2.2.327-332)

You still reach me across the years. Good night, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest (Hamlet 5.2.397-398).