"Hamlet and His Problems" is a 1919 [1] essay by T. S. Eliot which offers a critical reading of Hamlet. Originally published in Eliot's The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism, it was reprinted in Selected Essays, 1917-1932. The essay introduced his concept of objective correlative and is noted for its bold description of Hamlet as "an artistic failure".
Eliot sets the ground rules by criticising the fixation on Hamlet the character as opposed to Hamlet the play, which is exacerbated, in the case of Goethe's treatment of the subject, by the creative ability to meld Shakespeare's creation into a 'Werther' while still professing to offer critical insight.[2]
The essay states the purpose of "interpretation" is to present the reader with those relevant facts that he is assumed not to know. In Eliot's view these are, in this case, the three Sources for Hamlet being The Spanish Tragedy; Kyd's Hamlet (based on Belleforest's Histoires Tragiques); and a version of the play performed in Germany during Shakespeare's lifetime. Eliot is not impressed with Shakespeare's efforts to copy, revise and amend his subject matter.[2]
Eliot declared the play an artistic failure, as Shakespeare's depiction of Gertrude did not supply an adequate chain of events for the private sense of disgust with which the play was overburdened (his Objective correlative).[3]
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