Hamlet Across Cultures

I got into a discussion with Edward Sakowsky over the idea of the canon. It’s the kind of semi-thought out “I’ll die on this hill” moment I sometimes find myself out here in the internets.

Nevertheless, I found myself thinking about Hamlet as it is and how much I like it, but that this all is a part of my upbringing and I would be lying if I said I didn’t think it belongs in the canon. However, I am reminded of this story about an anthropologist who went to West Africa and told them the story of Hamlet.

There the culture is completely different and the original offense of the brother marrying his dead brother’s wife was a custom. It goes downhill from there. I think the locals there believed the story didn’t truly speak to human nature.

What the story shows is how something we view as universal is in fact anything but.

They know human nature and tell her:

“Sometime,” concluded the old man, gathering his ragged toga about him, “you must tell us some more stories of your country. We, who are elders, will instruct you in their true meaning, so that when you return to your own land your elders will see that you have not been sitting in the bush, but among those who know things and who have taught you wisdom.”