Shakespeare and a Therapist II: Getting Into Hamlet's Head

The Project

In order to fulfill the requirement I set for myself to learn about psychological criticism's interpretations of Shakespeare, I decided to ask an expert in the field of psychology some basic questions regarding the characters in some of Shakespeare's works. I started the conversation a few articles ago. Dr. Reynolds has yet to email me back on this latest response I gave to his email back to me.

My letter to the Doctor

Dear Doctor Reynolds,

thank you for responding to my last email. Your response took some research, but I found a few valid sources after I made my initial psychoanalytic evaluation of Hamlet.

My View of Hamlet

Though there have been some performances I have heard about that portray Hamlet with the assumption that he has gone mad through the grief brought on by the loss of his father, each time I have read the play I gather that he puts on the facade of madness to cover his tracks while he haphazardly attempts to find whether or not the ghost of his father is a demonic impersonator and liar or a messenger of tragic truth. Even when he finds the truth, his tragic flaw (hesitation) robs the play of justice and replaces it with a blood bath. I think this psychological flaw of not acting out of fear or uncertainty allows for Shakespeare to send a message against those who hesitate their life away. Therefore, it is not Hamlet's madness that disturbs me, but his sanity. His id, ego, and superego are not balanced. The superego has too much of a sway in Hamlet's actions. Thus, it is clear that a conscience that is too strict is just as dangerous as a mind too focused on self gratification.

Shakespeare or What?

Bryan and Martin are Geniuses
I had quite the enlightening conversation with Bryan and Martin last class period. In light of that conversation, I spent a VERY LONG TIME trying to white out all of the dialogue in these pages of manga in order to either prove a point or look like a total idiot. All those who read this post, please leave a comment saying which of these mangas is a scene out of Romeo and Juliet! Manga 1 or manga 2?
 

Manga Hub II: Psychological Progress of England and Japan

It Began
I found myself lost on how to combine Manga with any form of literary criticism, until my last post. I noticed how I started comparing Japanese culture with Elizabethan culture, more to prove that the subjects brought up in Shakespeare's plays are universal rather than to prove the two cultures nearly identical. Carrying on in the spirit of the last post, I decided to have a bit of a research session dedicated to the development of psychology among the two nations.


Elizabethan Practices

Judge all you want, but this is how I envision a crazy Elizabethan.

.......I found an incredible article called Shakespeare and Medicine. I wanted to focus on the psychological side of the article, so I only quoted part of it here: 

Besides plague, venereal disease, and other afflictions of the body, mental illness and its symptoms—including depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and recitations of gibberish—were commonplace in Shakespearean London. In fact, because treatment was virtually nonexistent for the mentally disabled and because most of the mentally disturbed roamed freely for lack of institutional care, London and other European cities teemed with the eccentric, the paranoid, the schizophrenic. When Shakespeare ventured forth on the streets of London, he entered an alfresco asylum. All he had to do was etch images in his memory and he had raw material for his plays. .In his dramas, both mental and physical illness sometimes inhabit the same character at the same time. For example, in Richard III, Richard exhibits the symptoms of kyphosis (hunched back) and psychopathy (asocial and amoral behavior), which shape him into a grotesque killing machine. In the opening lines of the play, Richard soliloquizes on his appearance and his mindset: 

Manga Hub Time: Do the Japanese Get it?

Where I Began
In my pondering of Manga and Shakespeare, I have often returned to asking whether or not the Japanese culture can accurately interpret the elements of Shakespeare. Though manga as a genre has escaped the boundaries of Japan, the fact that it originated on the island nation allows many of the techniques and styles within manga to be drawn from historical and cultural elements of the Japanese. Therefore, I wanted to analyze important elements of the culture presented in Shakespeare's Elizabethan plays and see if there were any comparable elements in Japan's cultural history.

What I Did
I started by gathering awesome images on "Google images" which became my chief export for this section's research. There were some graphics that barely needed any explanation, but fit right into my comparison goal.


Class

Japanese Class System

Shakespeare and a Therapist

The Rundown

I needed to post about literary criticism, and I thought who better to speak on the matter than my favorite psychologist Doctor Reynolds. I found out that he is not only a psychologist now, but a fairly successful novelist. He is using his psychological background to narrate the inner workings of an arsonist, and letting the world know about the many fires in Southern California. I gave the good doctor an email with these questions, hoping he would answer each one individually on his own time:

Manga and the Mind

The Research

I found this great Article that Supports my idea that Manga is one of the best medias to present Shakespeare to modern audiences. I was going to just post a link to it, but I am going to use this article often so I wanted to have it on hand.

Top tips for teaching with manga

The Manga Shakespeare editorial team is led by a leading Shakespeare scholar and an educational editor. Advised by teachers and other educationalists, the team is expert in making serious works of literature more accessible.

Plays in the Manga Shakespeare series are abridged to allow teachers to focus on key scenes, while following Shakespeare’s text. Manga is a proven teaching tool and is widely used as an instruction medium in Japan. In the UK, use of manga and other new media has been endorsed by The Scottish Office NATE, The Reading Agency, and the Quality and Curriculum Authority in meeting the needs of students studying English.

In Her Defense

If the dagger halted before it tore
The skin of that legendary beauty
What would she find to prolong her life for?
What other man would find her not filthy?
Romeo's touches, tender at the time
Would turn to blows of condemning, mad hate.
His soft poetry, his most sincere rhyme
Would force upon the girl a lonely fate.
To those who would judge her action
and label her hasty, rash, or foolish;
I would ask for some human compassion
For the teen who saw her love turn bluish.
  Would you rather be grounded forever
  Or find an escape from all the pressure?

This is the sonnet I promised you Professor Burton. I know bluish sounds forced, but I looked it up and it is a legitimate adjective. I couldn't think of another word to describe a man dying by poison, and I thought blue is associated with cold, a stark contrast to the heat love produces. This can cause the line to perhaps expand from just a description of Romeo dying and turning blue, for if the word "love" does not refer to Romeo, it might refer to Juliet's feelings of love for her life. I also tried to use some language that would remind one that Juliet was a teenager (grounded, girl, teen) to further defend her position. One might also take a feminist angle and claim that a woman in her position had little other choice than death, considering her parents would be furious that she faked her death, and her status as a widow and a psycho who faked her own death would tarnish any chance of her finding another husband, which was the only route a woman could take during Juliet's generation, save joining a nunnery (which might not be a suitable route for Juliet, since she has already known the pleasures a wife of Romeo would know and not want a life of celibacy). I am not trying to promote teen suicide, I am condemning the society that had a hand in Juliet's decision.