SHAKSPER 2005: Gertrude-Ophelia

From: Hardy M. Cook (editor@shaksper.net)
Date: 11/30/05 

The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 16.1975  Wednesday, 30 November 2005

[1] 	From: 	S. L Kasten <kostensl@012.net.il>
	Date: 	Tuesday, 29 Nov 2005 23:21:45 +0200
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 16.1956 Gertrude-Ophelia

[2] 	From: 	Edmund Taft <taft@marshall.edu>
	Date: 	Wednesday, 30 Nov 2005 10:57:05 -0500
	Subj: 	Gertrude/Opheli


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		S. L Kasten <kostensl@012.net.il>
Date: 		Tuesday, 29 Nov 2005 23:21:45 +0200
Subject: 16.1956 Gertrude-Ophelia
Comment: 	Re: SHK 16.1956 Gertrude-Ophelia

  M Yawney  generalizes:

 >The difference is in Shakespeare's dramaturgical practice. Shakespeare
 >does not conceal major plot points or leave the action ambiguous. There
 >are issues of motive and character that he does leave ambiguous, but the
 >only unclear plot points are found in corrupt texts of his play.

Act IV scene 5 begins with the Queen uttering six emphatic monosyllables 
the, last of which, the pronoun "her", implying to me the same sort of 
rejection as "that woman" uttered by a former US president.  In our case 
"her" refers to a newly orphaned young woman whose putative fiancé has 
gone off his rocker and whose only surviving relative is off in Paris. 
Whence the Queen's unambiguous animus?

What are the "dangerous conjectures" Horatio refers to?  They apparently 
are strong enough to justify his summary overriding of the Queen's "will 
not".

Upon which, the Queen in an aside gives us a glimpse of her state of 
mind: jealousy and a guilt that threatens to engender more guilt.

Of which there is no overt sign in her lyric description of Ophelia's 
death, nor in her unctuous "sweets to the sweet" hypocrisy, the threat 
of dangerous conjectures or grounds for guilt and jealousy ending with 
Ophelia's death.

This play has so many words; in general it is hard to find a superfluous 
one in anything he has written.  What got into the author to lengthen 
the play with this introduction to Ophelia's mad scene?  Are we being 
blinded by our attitudes to Motherhood?

Invoking Shakespeare's "dramaturgical practice" brings to mind the 
compositional practice of Beethoven who wrote nine symphonies, each of 
which is comprised of four distinct movements except for the one in 
which the third movement blends without a pause into the fourth.  Would 
anyone argue that Shakespeare was not big enough to stray with effect 
from the strictures of "practice"?  What was it that Henry said to 
Catherine about their being the ones to make custom rather than being 
its slave?

Best wishes
Crank Kasten

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		Edmund Taft <taft@marshall.edu>
Date: 		Wednesday, 30 Nov 2005 10:57:05 -0500
Subject: 	Gertrude/Ophelia

In another thread, Bill Lloyd writes,

 >"Was Edmund Lear's illegitimate son or did Gertrude murder
 >Ophelia? Ask the question-- ok I guess. But they're silly
 >questions, not really worth much discussion [oops, a value
 >judgment!] so let's move on."

It's not so easy to tell when a question is silly and when it isn't. 
I've been silent throughout much of this debate because apparently I'm 
part of the problem ("marginal academics"?), but it's time to speak out. 
Those of us with some scholarly memory should be able to recall the 
early 1950's and the problems Harold Goddard faced when he published his 
big book on Shakespeare. At first, it was either ignored or vilified. 
Goddard, you may recall, asked all kinds of embarrassing questions about 
Shakespeare and his intentions - embarrassing at least to the 
Shakespeare establishment, which, at that time, was firmly in an Old 
Historicist/ultra-conservative mindset about Shakespeare. As late as the 
1980s, I remember taking a seminar from a well-known Shakespearian who 
grimaced at Goddard's very name and firmly told one of his grad students 
"not to use that crackpot who NEVER wrote a worthwhile word!"

Well, what do we think of Goddard now? In some ways, he's a founding 
father of postmodernism - and he surely is no crackpot, though he was 
almost universally considered such until recent years.  I think that 
Shakespeareans who fancy themselves more learned, more intelligent, and 
more published than riffraff like me ought to hold their fire and 
remember the lesson of Goddard. To a lesser extent, his story also holds 
true for the likes of A.C. Rossiter, L.C. Knights, and a host of others 
in the 50s and 60s who were once thought to be "crackpots."

Which brings me to the current issue: the way posters have dumped on the 
idea that Gertrude might in some way be involved in Ophelia's death. 
This is a "crackpot" idea only if you don't bother to think about it a 
little bit.  In fact, Gertrude's narrative about how Ophelia drowned is 
just one of many instances in the play that are designed to cast doubt 
on Gertrude and make her a character draped in shadows. When did her 
affair with Claudius begin? Was she involved somehow in Old Hamlet's 
death? Did she know about it? Does she now?  At the end of 3.4, has 
Hamlet "won" her over or is she just playing along with him, convinced 
by the slaying of Polonius and the "absent" (to her) ghost that Hamlet 
is truly mad?  The report of Ophelia's death comes soon after her mad 
scene, in which it's clear that she "knows too much," and thinking 
spectators/readers cannot help but wonder why Gertrude, who was 
apparently an eyewitness to Ophelia's death, did not help her or call 
for help - the drowning takes a long time, even in the telling on stage!

Shakespeare seems to want to raise such issues without answering them - 
part and parcel, perhaps, of the espionage, intrigue and 
counter-intrigue that permeates Elsinore.  So, while there seem to be no 
final answers to the questions I've raised, calling them crackpot ideas 
or theories is just an easy way not to think deeply about this play.

Let me offer a modest proposal to my self-proclaimed literary betters: 
sometimes you can learn from those who are not as smart as you are. This 
is one case in point.

Ed Taft

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