This post was also posted on the Team Blog…
Hi everyone…
Ever since we discussed the whole ‘pirate’ scene of Hamlet (IV.vi), and after reading Wango’s Act IV.vi post I have been wondering about this scene. It seems that in my head this scene has been replaced by the more popular film adaptation of having Hamlet swap letters on the way to England as opposed to being captured by pirates…The text we are using, however, does not seem to mention this event. It is interesting how our memories can be altered by other things!
I did a bit of snooping about this. One thing we need to keep in mind is that there are various versions, or folios of Hamlet floating around. It is like an author putting out a revised version of a book. Sometimes they change certain parts of the book in the next edition. Perhaps this is the case with the ‘pirate’ scene, but I have yet to find any evidence to support this…
I did, however, find some neat commentary via Google regarding the possible meanings of the pirate scene. I have pasted them below:
Shakespeare uses a problem that seriously threatened Elizabethan/ Jacobean security: the prevalence of pirates. Some critics speculate that Shakespeare means for us to infer that Hamlet, knowing that pirates lurk in every bay, has arranged for the pirates to subvert Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s mission. It is equally likely that the ship bound for England carrying Hamlet and his treacherous “friends” was beset by pirates, and Hamlet, always the smooth talker, was able to connive his own release. In either case, the outcome is critical to the play’s action. ( Yahoo Education )
I agree with the idea that, at the time, the possibility of pirate raids would be a believable situation for Shakespeare to use. I also find the possibilities of Hamlet’s scheming mentioned above intriguing…perhaps Hamlet did scheme to have this ‘raid’ arranged in order to keep himself safe. He does allude to the fact that he knows Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are up to no good (III.iv.222+)..the most important part of this scene though is that Hamlet is returning to Elsinore…and we all know what comes next!
Just a few thoughts…
