Hamlet and Protestant Aural Theater

Abstract

Over past half-century many Shakespeareans have argued that either Protestantism or Catholicism informs general Christian ethos of Hamlet. John Dover Wilson, Raymond Waddington, Roland Mushat Frye are among many who find King Claudius a Lutheran who, though longing to repent of his fratricide, harbors a trapped, limed soul (3.3.68) whose inability to pray, to use Martin Luther's words, clearly manifest[s] that endeavor effect of free will are simply nothing (135). Peter S. Milward finds something Lutheran [Hamlet's] brooding emphasis on corruption of human nature (161), Charles Cannon stresses play's Calvinism, saying that the problems of theater dealt Hamlet lead Shakespeare [...] toward possibility of predestination (203). More recently, Anthony Low has argued that play stages dismissal of Catholic doctrine of Purgatory, Hamlet Purgatory Stephen Greenblatt echoes Low's claim. Still, a 2001 Commonweal review of Greenblatt's influential book, Edward Oakes approvingly quotes a Jesuit friend's comment on Hamlet: What a Catholic play that was! (29). My purpose here is not to argue that Hamlet is a Catholic or a play. Agreeing with David Daniell, I believe that Shakespeare's plays declare their author's allegiance to neither faith to exclusion of other (2). Thus, I will not assert that Hamlet's oblique instruction to Guildenstern, Hide fox, all after (4.2.30-31), is a cryptic reference to John Foxe's Book of Martyrs, (1) or that Horatio's description of post-haste romage land signals Denmark's energetic papalism (1.1.107). I will, however, argue influence of what Daniell calls Shakespeare's Protestant on Hamlet. Both play its eponymous hero seem specifically constructed to record display views on theater's potential for good or for evil, ideas expressed much English discourse near time of play's creation. Elsewhere I have argued that Shakespeare's exploration of those ideas at brink of seventeenth century inspired him to construct his greatest tragedy as an unusual anti-play (63). Here I will demonstrate that Hamlet's paradoxical drama may also be described as aural theater. I As Daniell has cogently maintained, Shakespeare's inheritance can logically be inferred from fact that, in his fifty-two years, Shakespeare lived a nation that was officially, aggressively, massively Protestant. Quoting Peter Lake, Daniell writes that, though some late-sixteenth century Catholics met barns private households, godly inherited public space of parish church, which altar was now a communion table the rood loft with its doom and images of saints had been removed. The liturgy was English, not Latin; mass had been replaced with a communion service. No trace of cult of saints or notion of Purgatory [...] was left either service book or outward ceremonial face of Church (2). Many of views expressed by most popular pastors of age--among them Thomas Playfere, Stephen Egerton, John Field, Lancelot Andrewes, whose London parish contained the Fortune Red Bull theatres whose services were eagerly attended by some players (Story xv)--showed influence of John Calvin's theology. In Shakespeare's lifetime, moreover, 142 editions of The Geneva Bible were printed; this, Daniell notes, ha[d] to do with demand (6). Whatever Shakespeare's personal beliefs or private instruction may have been, it is inarguable that his environment recurrently exposed him to strains of thought, it thus is not surprising that echoes of moral views should be found his greatest tragedy. The particular aspect of thought that I want to trace Hamlet is one Jonas Barish has famously called anti-theatrical prejudice. …

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