Hamlet

Universidade Estadual da Paraíba – UEPB
Departamento de Letras e Artes – CEDUC
Docente: Valécio Irineu
Componente Curricular: Literatura II
Turno: Diurno Discente: Ádria Ramos Lustosa

Composition:

Theatrical metalanguage in Hamlet

The Shakespeare's play, Hamlet, is a well-known play around the world. It is a famous tragedy of the American literature which is also studied and read by many academic specialists and scholars. Hamlet can be analyzed, interpreted and discussed in many perspectives, because a lot of discussions can be rise with it, such as: religions values, the madness, the death, the life value, incest, etc. Among them, one which called my attention was about the theatrical metalanguage used at the play. Therefore, I will try, in this brief rehearsal, to propose a small discussion about the use of this resource in the Hamlet’s play. Trying to understand what are the author’s intentions using it. Firstly, it is important to say that, before Hamlet, the theatrical metalanguage was already used by Thomas Kid in The Spanish Tragedy (1558-94). It was a very popular play which its story concerns in the murder of Horatio, and like Hamlet after him, Kyd makes use of a play about a murder to effect his revengeful purpose. So, according to Burgess (1998, p. 64), “he can be regard as the father of the popular ‘revenge tragedy’ of which Hamlet is the most notable example”. Certainly, Shakespeare was inspired by Kyd’s play when he decided to use this effect in Hamlet, but the question is: What is the purpose of these authors using this resource? Because, everything inside a play has a mean, nothing was made by chance, and if we analyze these small details, we can find new meanings and other critical interpretations about a play. This is what we will try to do from now on. After reading Hamlet’s play, the first logical conclusion that I made about the use of a ‘play inside other play' in this story, it was the most