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The History Of European Theatre
Hamlet Part 1: ‘That One May Smile and Smile and Be a Villain’
Episode 192:
And so, we come to perhaps the biggest challenge in all of Shakespeare's work, ‘The Tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmark’. Over the next two episodes and a special guest episode I hope I can get close to doing this monumental play justice.
The dating of the play and the complication of the ‘ur-Hamlet’
The early print history of the play and the three versions
The possible sources for the play
The opening of the play
The character and significance of Fortinbras
The character of Polonius
The ghost of Hamlet’s father and the responsibility of revenge
The position and character of Ophelia
Ophelia and the meaning of flowers
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern – appearances and honesty
The players and their play as an insight to acting genres and techniques of the time
The success of ‘The Murger of Gonzago’
The centrality and irony of Claudius at prayer
Hamlet, Gertrude and the ghost
Part two of this review of ‘Hamlet’ will follow as episode 194 (season 6 episode 81)
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1. Prologue and Pre History
25:26||Season 1, Ep. 1Episode 1An Introduction to the podcast and your host.Pre-history and how the urge to mimic and present might have been the start of theatre.Religious ritual and Shamanism.The Abydos Passion play and the Egyptian Book of the Dead.The beginning of Greek Theatre.A note on dates and the nature of translations.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy1. Trailer
03:52||Ep. 1An introduction to The History Of European Theatre PodcastThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy2. Dionysus and the beginning of Greek Theatre
26:53||Season 1, Ep. 2Episode 2An overview of the history of Greece to the 5th Century BCE including Minoan and Mycenaean periods, the Greek dark age and the rise of the city state.The development of the religious festivals and their main featuresAn overview of the main playwrights and their plays:AeschylusSophoclesEuripidesAristophanesMenanderThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy3. The Place Of Seeing
31:49||Season 1, Ep. 3Episode 3The vocabulary of the theatre we inherit from the GreeksThe layout of the Theatre of Dionysus in Athens and it's main featuresDevelopments in the theatre over timeThe ChorusStage MachineryMasks and costumeThe judging and prizesThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy4. Aeschylus: The First Tragedies
27:38||Season 1, Ep. 4Episode 4The situation of Athens at the time of the first extant tragedies.The very earliest dramatists and the little we know of themThe life of Aeschylus including his service in the Persian WarsHis earliest surviving play 'The Persians'This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy5. The Oresteia part 1
28:21||Season 1, Ep. 5Episode 5A detailed review of Agamemnon, the first part of The Oresteia trilogy by AeschylusThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy6. The Oresteia part 2
21:55||Season 1, Ep. 6Episode 6A detailed review of The Libation Bearers and Eumenides, the second and third part of The Oresteia trilogy by AeschylusThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy7. Sophocles: That Charming Man
30:44||Season 1, Ep. 7Episode 7The life of Sophocles almost spanned the 5th Century BCE and included events from the defeat of the Persian invasion to the relentless grind of the Peloponnesian wars. We look at his life and times and get an overview of the surviving plays and theatrical innovations the he created.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy8. Antigone: Nomos Vs Physis
27:47||Season 1, Ep. 8Episode 8A detailed look at the first of the Theban plays by Sophocles. Greek drama gets personal as the end of a great family drama is acted out, but it's also a political debate as Sophocles questions what happens when man made law bumps up against natural law.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy