The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 15.1664 Tuesday, 7 September 2004
[1] From: Norman Hinton <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Monday, 06 Sep 2004 10:55:29 -0500
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
[2] From: John W. Kennedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Monday, 06 Sep 2004 19:38:47 -0400
Subj: Re: SHK 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Norman Hinton <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Monday, 06 Sep 2004 10:55:29 -0500
Subject: 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
Comment: Re: SHK 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
>Another form of chiasmus, one that is much larger
>in scale and can encompass an entire passage in a single chiastic
>system, was used extensively in ancient Mediterranean cultures--most
>notably, biblical Hebrew. That style of complex form is generally
>believed to have fallen out of use several centuries ago, long before
>Medieval, Renaissance or modern day writers came onto the scene. In
I don't know who believes this had 'fallen out of use', but I can point
you to a number of studies of this kind of chiasmus in medieval
literature. (And art as well)
[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: John W. Kennedy <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Monday, 06 Sep 2004 19:38:47 -0400
Subject: 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
Comment: Re: SHK 15.1651 Legitimizing the Q1 Hamlet
It seems to me that any attempt to account for the Q1 Hamlet -- and let
us take the "To be" speech in particular to account for -- must take
into consideration its frequent complete breakdowns of meter and syntax,
which are far beyond the wildest license Shakespeare ever allows himself
in any text generally acknowledged as "good". I am completely open to
the possibility that Q1 represents in some way a Shakespearean ur-text
(to be distinguished from the hypothetical ur-Hamlet of the
oyster-wife), but am firmly of the opinion that there is more to it --
if not memorial reconstruction or plagiarism by stenography, then
perhaps stolen foul papers?
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