Re: Horatio and Hamlet -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

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Date Posted: 14:15:53 04/28/08 Mon
Author: CS Holden
Subject: Re: Horatio and Hamlet
In reply to: Hwaet! 's message, "Re: Horatio and Hamlet" on 23:47:23 04/26/08 Sat

I agree. I don't think Horatio is the one who starts it--if we really want to find a cause, it's the Ghost, isn't it--or no, it must be Claudius, who killed the elder Hamlet--or perhaps it was Gertrude, for inspiring Claudius' envy... And so on.

At the same time, I don't mean that we should appropriate Horatio's reading and refrain from blame. Assigning blame, at least in critical terms, can help us see why the dominoes fell the way they did. We can learn from the blame game.

As a side note, I think the play falls a little short of explaining the rivalry between Claudius and the elder Hamlet. Obviously we have the structure and we know the story, but were Claudius and Gertrude maybe getting close when the soon-to-be-king stole her? Just a thought, and given the play, not terribly relevant.

In response to your discussion of Horatio as an outsider, though, I think we confused our terms. I originally meant Horatio as an outsider in terms of the society of revenge--he was outside the anger and the envy. He's not directly involved with Hamlet's schemes. He's just...kind of...there.

That's what baffles me. Horatio is either really smart, really dumb, or really lucky.

I think it would be interesting to see this staged in three ways: (1) Horatio is a diabolical mastermind who manipulates Hamlet seamlessly and causes the whole tragedy for his personal amusement, (2) Horatio is dumber than Danish rock, a sort of "Horatio is to Hamlet as Forrest Gump is to Lt. Dan" model, and (3) Horatio is totally chill, just the prince's sidekick, dancing through life.

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