Hamlet

'My lord, I saw your father last night.'
'What do you mean?'
'Come to the castle walls at midnight... Then you'll understand.'

When the ghost of Hamlet's father reveals the terrible secret of Elsinore, the result is chaos and tragedy for the young Prince of Denmark. Is he really mad? Who are his true friends? Does he love the beautiful Ophelia?

William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in the English Midlands on St George's Day, April 23rd, 1564. (St George is the patron saint of England.) He was the third child of John Shakespeare, a glove-maker, and Mary Arden. He went to Stratford Grammar School, here he received a good education, but he had no university education. In 1582, he married Anne Hathaway. They had three children.

Shakespeare probably left Stratford around 1586. He joined a company of traveling actors and went to London. He became a very popular writer of plays and poetry. Shakespeare wrote 38 plays - tragedies, comedies, historical plays and romances. Halmet, like man of his dramas, was performed at the Globe Theatre in London. The Globe was very different from a modern theatre – the plays took place in the open air in daylight when the weather was good. There was no scenery on the stage. Boys played the female parts. Between two and three thousand people, from all classes of society, were in the audience.

When he retired from writing, Shakespeare went back to Stratford and lived in a large, comfortable house called New Place. He died on his 52nd birthday in 1616 and was buried in Holy Trinity Church. After his death, some friends published his works for the first time in a book called the First Folio (1623). If you go to Stratford, you can visit his birthplace. You can also see Mary Arden's house, Anne Hathaway's cottage and, of course, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre.

Shakespeare's Life

Shakespeare's Times

Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

Films of Hamlet

Dramatis Personae



Part 1 - The Ghost

Part 2 - Hamlet and Ophelia

Part 3 - The Play

Part 4 - Murder and Exile

Part 5 - Suicide

Part 6 - The Rest is Silence