Studi di archivistica, bibliografia, paleografia

Series | Studi di archivistica, bibliografia, paleografia
Volume | «Con licenza de’ Superiori»
Chapter | Il rito di Amleto

Il rito di Amleto

Abstract

In the tragedy, Hamlet is a crown prince deprived of the succession to his deceased father. The king was poisoned by his brother, who succeeded him on the throne and in the queen dowager’s conjugal bed. It was an ancient custom to mock scandalous remarriages with a skimmington, but in the courts where Shakespeare performed this folkloric humiliation of a sovereign, however usurping, was unthinkable. Loved and supported by the people, Hamlet, pretending to be crazy, then gets help from actors to stage a tragedy that reveals the betrayal. In the age of absolutism, the court theater assumed the functions performed in the past by a plebeian ritual.


Open access

Submitted: May 22, 2023 | Published Oct. 23, 2023 | Language: it

Keywords Usurpation of the throne • Uxoricide • Shakespeare • Honour • Reporting a scandal • Regicide • Rite of mockery • Skimmington • Madness in Hamlet • Elizabethan theatre

Copyright © 2023 Marco Fincardi. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-727-2/014


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