Thursday, September 8, 2011

Shakespeare's Parenting?


After reading the first three acts of Hamlet, I cannot help but notice the common, interesting parenting styles in the play. There have been so many instances of parents admonishing their children do things that are pretty contrary to what society now thinks is "good." The play starts off with the ghost of Hamlet's father telling Hamlet to avenge his murder by killing his brother Claudius. It is interesting that a parent is telling his child to kill someone else...

Then throughout the play, all of the parents are spying on their selective children in order to find out information about them, instead of just being open with their children. Gertrude and Claudius spy on Hamlet through a few different means. For example, Claudius and Polonius hiding while Hamlet is in the room talking to Ophelia and having Rosencrantz and Guildenstern come to the court to find out what Hamlet is up to. Polonius also sends Reynaldo to spy on Laertes by spreading false lies about him, and tells Reynaldo that "Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth."

Is this the kind of parenting that we should emulate? Ha. No wonder all of the sons and daughters in this play are either super depressed or extremely volatile. It would certainly be hard to "honor thy father and thy mother" if they were always stabbing you in the back. I wonder if all of these terrible parenting strategies have some reflection of how Shakespeare feels about parenting....maybe he was scarred in his childhood by his parents or something?

2 comments:

  1. what an interesting idea! I took a human development class, and the general idea was that our social aptitude basically derives from our parents. Perchance why everyone is always decieving everyone else, cause that's what they grew up seeing!

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  2. I personally feel that I have acquired the character traits that my father and mother have. I have their idiosyncrasies, I talk like them, I like the same things, and I naturally feel disposed to be like them in numerous ways. It would follow, then, that some of Shakespeare's attitudes come from his family life. I agree. To what extent would be cool to know.

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