|
kenwolman
Posts: 4
Joined: Jun 2004
|
November 25, 2005 3:00 PM
|
|
I am surprised that Ms. Asquith has allowed to get by her the most glaring bit of Catholic doctrine in, of all places, Hamlet. Where, first, is the young prince studying? Wittenberg: the capital at the time of the Protestant Reformation, the town where Luther committed has first act of public defiance at the Roman Church. Wittenberg: a place of real enlightenment or an escape zone from the realities awaiting Hamlet when his father dies and he is called home.
What is Hamlet's father but The Ghost...who is where but in Purgatory? Now, I do not know my Anglican Church history well enough to tell whether Purgatory at that stage was still part of the official theology, but it's never ceased to be so for Rome.
Was Hamlet, then, thrust back either into an ancient and dying culture or into the real one of his family and upbringing, the world of a truth forgotten?
I don't know what difference it will make to readers and viewers of the plays but it will surely drive partisan scholars into fits for generations to come.
-------------------------
39. Not observing the imperfections of others, preserving silence and a continual communion with God will eradicate great imperfections from the soul and make it the possessor of great virtues.
~St. John of the Cross, Maxims on Love (The Minor Works)
|
|
|
|
|
