What Is the Function of Polonius-ophelia- Laer Family in Hamlet
| Polonius | |
|---|---|
| Hamlet graphic symbol | |
 Polonius behind the curtain by Jehan Georges Vibert, 1868 | |
| Created by | William Shakespeare |
| In-universe information | |
| Affiliation | Male monarch Claudius |
| Family | Ophelia (girl; deceased) Laertes (son; deceased) |
Polonius is a character in William Shakespeare's Hamlet. He is chief counsellor of the play'due south ultimate villain, Claudius, and the begetter of Laertes and Ophelia. Generally regarded as wrong in every judgment he makes over the course of the play,[1] Polonius is described by William Hazlitt as a "sincere" male parent, but also "a busy-torso, [who] is appropriately officious, garrulous, and impertinent".[2] In Deed II, Hamlet refers to Polonius as a "boring old fool"[iii] and taunts him as a latter mean solar day "Jephtha".[4]
Polonius connives with Claudius to spy on Village. Hamlet unknowingly kills Polonius, provoking Ophelia's descent into madness, ultimately resulting in her (probable) suicide and the climax of the play: a duel betwixt Laertes and Hamlet.
Character [edit]
Male parent of Ophelia and Laertes, and counselor to King Claudius, he is described as a windbag by some and a rambler of wisdom past others. Information technology has also been suggested that he just acts similar a "foolish prating knave" to keep his position and popularity safe and to continue anyone from discovering his plots for social advancement. It is important to note that throughout the play, Polonius is characterised as a typical Renaissance "new man", who pays much attention to appearances and ceremonious behaviour. Some adaptations evidence him conspiring with Claudius in the murder of King Hamlet.
In Act one, Scene three, Polonius gives advice to his son Laertes, who is leaving for France, in the form of a listing of sententious maxims. He finishes by giving his son his approval, and is evidently at ease with his son's departure. Even so, in Act 2, Scene 1, he orders his servant Reynaldo to travel to Paris and spy on Laertes and report if he is indulging in any local vice.
Laertes is not the only character upon whom Polonius spies. He is fearful that Hamlet's relationship with his daughter will hurt his reputation with the king and instructs Ophelia to "lock herself from [Village's] resort". He later suspects that Ophelia'south rejection of Hamlet's attention has acquired the prince to lose his wits, and informs Gertrude and Claudius of his suspicion, claiming that his reason for commanding Ophelia to refuse Hamlet was that the prince was in a higher place her station. He and the king examination his hypothesis by spying on and interrogating Ophelia.
In his last effort to spy on Village, Polonius hides himself behind an arras in Gertrude's room. Village deals roughly with his mother, causing her to cry for help. Polonius echoes the request for assistance and is heard past Hamlet, who so mistakes the vocalisation for Claudius' and stabs through the arras and kills him.
Polonius's expiry at the hands of Hamlet causes Claudius to fear for his own life, Ophelia to go mad, and Laertes to seek revenge, which leads to the duel in the final act.
Sources [edit]
The literary origins of the graphic symbol may be traced to the King'south counselor found in the Belleforest and William Painter versions of the Hamlet legend. However, at least since the 19th century scholars have also sought to sympathise the character in terms of Elizabethan court politics.
Polonius was first proposed as a parody of Queen Elizabeth's leading counsellor, Lord Treasurer, and Main Secretary William Cecil, Lord Burghley in 1869.[v] Israel Gollancz also suggested that Polonius might have been a satire on Burghley. The theory was often finessed with supplementary arguments,[6] but also disputed. Arden Hamlet editor Harold Jenkins, for case, criticised the idea of any straight personal satire of Burghley every bit "unlikely" and "uncharacteristic of Shakespeare".[7]
Name [edit]
Gollancz proposed that the source for the character'southward proper noun and sententious platitudes was De optimo senatore, a book on statesmanship by the Polish courtier Wawrzyniec Grzymała Goślicki, which was widely read after information technology was translated into English and published in 1598 under the title The Counsellor.[8] "Polonius" is Latin for "Polish" or "a/the Smooth man." The English language translation of the book refers to its author as a statesman of the "polonian empyre".
In the get-go quarto of Hamlet, Polonius is named "Corambis". It has been suggested that this derives from "crambe" or "crambo", derived from a Latin phrase meaning "reheated cabbage", implying "a boring old human being" who spouts trite rehashed ideas.[ix] [x] Whether this was the original name of the character or non is debated. Various suggestions have been fabricated to explain this. G. R. Hibbard argues that the proper noun was originally Polonius, simply was changed because Q1 derives from a version of the play to exist performed in Oxford and Cambridge, and the original proper noun was too close to that of Robert Polenius, founder of Oxford University. Since Polonius is a parody of a pompous pseudo-intellectual, the name might have been interpreted equally a deliberate insult.[11] The title page of Q1 specifically states that the play was recently performed in London, Oxford and Cambridge.
Stage and film portrayals [edit]
In most productions of the 20th century, up to about 1980, Polonius was played as a somewhat senile, garrulous man of about 75 or so, eliciting a few laughs from the audience by the depiction. More contempo productions have tended to play him as a slightly younger man, and to emphasise his shiftiness rather than pompous senility, harking dorsum to the traditional manner in which Polonius was played before the 20th century. Until the 1900s there was a tradition that the role player who plays Polonius also plays the quick-witted gravedigger in Act V. This bit suggests that the actor who played Polonius was an histrion used to playing clowns much like the Fool in Rex Lear: not a doddering former fool, but an alive and intelligent primary of illusion and misdirection. Polonius adds a new dimension to the play and is a controlling and menacing grapheme.
One cardinal to the portrayal is a producer's determination to keep or remove the cursory scene with his retainer, Reynaldo, which comes afterwards his scene of genial, fatherly advice to Laertes. He instructs Reynaldo to spy on his son, and even suggest that he has been gambling and consorting with prostitutes, to find out what he has really been up to. The inclusion of this scene portrays him in a much more sinister calorie-free; almost productions, including Laurence Olivier's 1948 flick version, choose to remove information technology. The respective productions starring Richard Burton and Kenneth Branagh both include it. Although Hume Cronyn plays Polonius mostly for laughs in the Burton product, Polonius is more sinister than comic in Branagh's version.
Famous lines [edit]
Polonius's most famous lines are found in Act 1 Scene 3 ("Neither a borrower nor a lender be"; "To thine own self exist true") and Act 2 Scene 2 ("Brevity is the soul of wit"; and "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't") while others take become paraphrased aphorisms ("Clothes brand the man"; "Sometime friends are the best friends"). Also, the line he speaks when he is killed by Hamlet in Act three scene 4 ("Oh, I am slain!") has been bailiwick to parody and ridicule due to its obviousness.[12]
Notable portrayals [edit]
- Hume Cronyn won a Tony Laurels for playing Polonius opposite Richard Burton's Hamlet in John Gielgud's 1964 Broadway production. No other actor has ever won an accolade for playing Polonius in whatsoever professional American stage version of Hamlet, nor for playing him in a film version of the play.
- In "The Producer", a 1966 episode of Gilligan'southward Island, Polonius' "Neither a borrower nor a lender be" speech is performed satirically, get-go by series regular Alan Unhurt Jr. every bit The Skipper playing the part of Polonius (with Dawn Wells as Mary Ann playing Laertes) in a musical production of Village by the castaways, and then by Phil Silvers guest-starring equally a famous stage producer who finds himself on the island.[13]
- Actors who have played Polonius on film and television receiver include Hans Junkermann, Ian Holm, Michael Redgrave, Ian Richardson, Oliver Ford Davies, Bill Murray, and Richard Briers.
References [edit]
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to Polonius. |
- ^
'Village' in William Hazlitt, Characters of Shakespeare's Plays. - ^ "Polonius at Encyclopædia Britannica". Encyclopædia Britannica . Retrieved x July 2014.
- ^ Hamlet Human activity II scene two – William Shakespeare.
- ^ 2.two.346
- ^ French, George Russell (1869). "Notes on Village". Shakspeareana Genealogica. London, England: Macmillan. pp. 299–310. Archived from the original on ten Oct 2008.
- ^ See, for example, Lilian Winstanley, Hamlet and the Scottish Succession, 1921, 112; 114–118; John Dover Wilson, The Essential Shakespeare, 1937, 104; Joel Hurstfield, The Queen'southward Wards, 1958, 257; A.L. Rowse William Shakespeare: A Biography, 1963, 323; Shakespeare The Man, 1973 185, 186.
- ^ Jenkins, Harold, ed. Hamlet (1982), 142.
- ^ Cole, Daniel H. (May 1999). "From Renaissance Poland to Poland'due south Renaissance: The Struggle for Constitutionalism in Poland by Mark Brzezinski". Michigan Police Review. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan. 97 (6): 2062–2102. doi:x.2307/1290243. JSTOR 1290243.
- ^ William Shakespeare, Philip Edwards (ed) Village, Prince of Denmark, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p.71.
- ^ Courtney, Krystyna Kujawinska. "Shakespeare in Poland: selected Problems" Archived 25 November 2006 at the Wayback Car Cyberspace Shakespeare Editions, University of Victoria, 2003, p. ii.
- ^ One thousand. R. Hibbard (ed), Hamlet, Oxford University Press, 1998, p.69-75.
- ^ "Encounter all of Polonius's lines". Opensourceshakespeare.org . Retrieved ten July 2014.
- ^ Abele, Elizabeth (twenty November 2013). Dwelling house Front Heroes: The Rise of a New Hollywood Archetype, 1988–1999. Jefferson, N Carolina: McFarland. p. 187. ISBN978-0-7864-7333-5.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polonius
0 Response to "What Is the Function of Polonius-ophelia- Laer Family in Hamlet"
Publicar un comentario