A holiday tradition

(It's been a while since posting here. With all the awful things going on in the world it's hard to find the right words sometimes. But in this season, I think it might be time to repost an old favorite from Hamlet. I wish it was to be so.)

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to quote the sentry Marcellus as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. Marcellus and Bernardo have invited the student Horatio to join them in their lonely night vigil where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.

Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes

Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,

The bird of dawning singeth all night long:

And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;

The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,

No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,

So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Inshallah.

It's a tradition: annual Christmas Hamlet quote

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to quote  what the sentry Marcellus has to say about Christmas as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. Things aren't going great in Denmark. King Hamlet (senior) has died under mysterious circumstances. Gertrude, his widow, married Claudius, his brother, with unseemly rapidity. Meanwhile, Fortinbras, the young Norwegian prince, is making warlike moves.

If all that wasn't enough, two guards on the night watch have seen what seems to be the ghost of the dead king on the battlements--and they're convinced this is an ill omen.

The guards, Marcellus and Bernardo, have invited the student Horatio, Hamlet's best friend, to join them in their lonely vigil, where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.

Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio something that has become a mantra of mine on many things spiritual, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Would that it were so this holiday season and beyond.

Annual Christmas Hamlet quote

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to quote the sentry Marcellus as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. Marcellus and Bernardo have invited the student Horatio to join them in their lonely night vigil where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.

Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Would that it were so this holiday season and beyond.

Speaking of Christmas

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to for the annual Christmas Shakespeare quote as spoken by the sentry Marcellus as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. The legitimate ruler is no more. A usurper is on the throne. There are wars and rumors of war and evil portents in the land.

I feel sorry for those guys...

Marcellus and Bernardo have invited the student Horatio to join them in their lonely night vigil where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.


Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Would that it were so this holiday season and beyond.

(Note: this post was reprinted from this this blog at time last year. In one form or other it shows up here most years at Christmas. So have I heard and do in  part believe it. Meanwhile, I wish I'd written this Christmas commentary by Chris Reagan.)

Annual Christmas Shakespeare feature

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to quote the sentry Marcellus as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. The legitimate ruler is no more. A usurper is on the throne. There are wars and rumors of war and evil portents in the land.

I feel sorry for those guys...

Marcellus and Bernardo have invited the student Horatio to join them in their lonely night vigil where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.

Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Would that it were so this holiday season and beyond.

Annual Christmas Hamlet quote

That's right, it's that time of year again, which means it's time to quote the sentry Marcellus as he stands on the battlements of the castle of Elsinore in Act 1 Scene 1 of Hamlet.

The tone of the scene is pretty ominous. Marcellus and Bernardo have invited the student Horatio to join them in their lonely night vigil where for some nights past a ghost has appeared resembling the late King Hamlet, father of the prince who is the main character of the story.

Horatio represents a prototype of modernity, an intellectual familiar with the tradition but skeptical of it. Yet even he must concede the power of the unknown after witnessing the phantom, which he takes as a portent of bad things to come.

Marcellus then points out that there are also sometimes portents of good, particularly at this season of the year:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

At this point, all I can do is say with Horatio, "So have I heard and do in part believe it."

Would that it were so this holiday season and beyond.

Christmas wishes, Dante trivia and a bit of Shakespeare

Best holiday wishes to all from the humanoid and other animal inhabitants of Goat Rope Farm. By chance, I discovered some trivia about a Christmas Eve anniversary I'd like to share. A co-worker of mine regularly sends out emails highlighting events in monetary history.

I must confess that I don't always read them but this time I did and found something interesting. On Dec. 24, 1294, Pope Boniface VIII was consecrated. He instituted the first Christian year of Jubilee, which promised forgiveness of sins for those who confessed and made pilgrimages (which by chance or not enriched church coffers).

Boniface is best known today, however, for being the person chiefly responsible for banishing the poet Dante Alighieri from Florence. Dante calls him out in Canto 19 of the Inferno.

In the spirit of Christmas charity, I will, however, put in a good word for Boniface: if he didn't exile Dante, we might not have the Divine Comedy. And if that were the case, what would be the point of living?

SPEAKING OF LITERARY IMMORTALS, I make it a practice every Christmas to include these lines from Hamlet:

"Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time."

So have I heard and do in part believe it. May it be so this year!

Holiday wishes and other stuff

Sorry about irregular posts lately. The Spousal Unit and I are on the road visiting relatives, dodging storms and such. I always get a bit nervous on the road given possible calamities that can happen at or around the farm...until I recall that they can happen when we're there as well.

One such already happened when the Aged Parent had a fall and banged up her face.  Fortunately, I think she's going to be OK. I hope there's less drama on the animal front.

Re: current events, how 'bout that NRA? I kind of like a saying going around the internet that calls for putting a teacher in every gun store.

WORTH A LOOK. Here's a NY Times story on how class and inequality can play out in a college setting.

HERE IT COMES AGAIN. Meanwhile, it's that time of year again. Regular readers may recall that this is when I bring out the annual Christmas quote from Hamlet:

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say,  no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

So have I heard and do in part believe it. May it be so this time around.

How not to kill yourself

Every so often I teach a college class in sociology, often on the topic of "Deviance and Social Control." One of the topics usually covered is suicide. Sometimes I bring in literary readings, including Hamlet's "To be or not to be" speech (soliloquy being too difficult a word to spell); a section of Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf (not to be confused with the 70s rock group); and good old Moby-Dick.

Of the three, Moby has the best practical advice for people who may have self destructive thoughts but want to avoid acting them out. He has a safety plan. Safety plans are familiar to people working in the field of domestic violence. Potential victims are encouraged to devise a plan for escape if things ever get bad enough. As I understand it, even batterers undergoing treatment in intervention and prevention programs are encouraged to use safety plans when they feel the tension level rising. It's a way of getting the hell out of a situation when before the situation gets to you.

Ishmael, the windy narrator of Melville's classic, has his own safety plan when he gets a bit too morbid:

 Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off- then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship.

Maybe going off to sea on a whaling ship isn't the best option for people today when the hypos get the upper hand, but the basic idea is a good one. When things go bad, break the pattern.

We're just on the first paragraph of this greatest American novel and there's already been a potentially life saving tip. Who knows what else we'll find.

HERE'S ANOTHER GOOD IDEA: to wit, how not to give away the store and wind up with nothing when it comes to economic development incentives.

GOVERNMENT: WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR? Here are some ideas

SPEAKING OF READING, here's a look at how important it can be for the brain development of children. I say, make the little ones read Moby-Dick! (Actually, I think I did read a kid's version when I was young, which might explain a lot.)

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

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So hallow'd and so gracious is the time

There are certain annual traditions at this blog. Among these are the yearly Thanksgiving possum recipe and, more to the point, trotting out one of my favorite quotes from Hamlet.

The scene is early in the play when Horatio, Marcellus and Bernardo are on the battlements waiting for Hamlet Sr.'s ghost to appear. Marcellus says

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.

Horatio speaks my mind, saying, "So have I heard and do in part believe it." Here's hoping it holds true this year. Best holiday wishes to one and all from Goat Rope Farm!

Some vicious mole of nature?

Image by way of wikipedia.

One disadvantage of growing up in the scenic Mud River valley of El Cabrero's beloved state of West Virginia is that there's not a whole lot of live Shakespeare going on. I've seen several on stage but for Hamlet have had to rely mostly on the printed page and the screen.

My favorite film version has to be Kenneth Branagh's mammoth movie, which pretty much sticks to the original play. I mean no disrespect to the dead, but I wasn't that crazy about Olivier's version, which he both directed and starred in (sorry about the preposition thing).

In his version, "This is the tragedy of a man who could not make up his mind." I'm not sure that's entirely fair. Admittedly, the whole thing might have gone smoother if he would have just whacked Claudius in the beginning, but that wouldn't have been much of a play. I've always thought part of Hamlet's charm was that he recognized that he could just be wrong or plain crazy.

The literary critic and philosopher Rene Girard once pointed out that you'd want anybody sitting with his finger on the nuclear button not to be too trigger happy. And as I've said before, our erstwhile President W could have used a bit more Hamlet in him in the buildup to the Iraq War.

Jacques Barzun has some interesting observations on this topic. As he put it in his monumental and delightful book Dawn to Decadence, his character should be seen in the context of the political hardball of the Renaissance:

...The common notion of Hamlet is that he vacillates. In Olivier's film, the play is called "the tragedy of a man who could not make up his mind." That the play is first and foremost political is ignored. Everybody since Coleridge has concentrated on Hamlet's character and forgotten his situation. It is true that his character is finer than that of his entourage; he has a conscience and does not kill first and think afterward. Killing a king accepted by the populace is not a bagatelle. Laertes is the impetuous boy, put in to make the contrast clear. Hamlet has to think and watch, because from the outset he is in danger, a threat to the usurper and his aides; all conspire against him, including, unwittingly, his betrothed. And he has his mother to consider. His soliloquies show him superior to his barbaric times, but what he thinks must not be taken for what he does. He wipes out the hired killers sent with him to England; he comes back resolved by wary and fails only by treachery.

I'll leave the last quote to Fortinbras, who spoke highly of him at the end of the play,

Let four captains
Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage;
For he was likely, had he been put on,
To have proved most royally: and, for his passage,
The soldiers' music and the rites of war
Speak loudly for him.

Good night indeed, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

HEALTH CARE CLIFFHANGER, continued.

AND HERE'S ANOTHER CALL FOR REFORM from a Kanawha County labor leader.

WHILE WE'RE AT IT, younger Americans are likely to have more health issues.

RESULTS ONLY WORK ENVIRONMENT? Here's an interesting item from yesterday's Morning Edition about some welcome changes in the workplace.

WORKERS WALKING WOUNDED? Sorry about the alliteration thing, but this article looks at the aftershocks of the recession on America's workforce.

URGENT JUPITER RED SPOT UPDATE here.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Absent thee from felicity awhile

Goat Rope is winding down a long series on Hamlet. We're now at the dead-bodies-all-over-the-floor part, which in Shakespeare is a pretty good sign the end is near.

Hamlet has been poisoned and is shuffling off this mortal coil, but he still manages to get in some great lines. One that I've always wondered about was this:

You that look pale and tremble at this chance,
That are but mutes or audience to this act,
Had I but time--as this fell sergeant, death,
Is strict in his arrest--O, I could tell you--
But let it be.

What would he have said that he hadn't said already?

His last request is that Horatio to "report me and my cause aright/ to the unsatisfied." Horatio, claiming to be "more antique Roman than Dane" reaches for the cup of poison. Hamlet stops him with lines that have always struck me for their beauty:

If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.

Horatio agrees and as the curtain closes prepares to tell the tale to those who have stumbled onto the scene of carnage. It's kind of a circular ending, with the story we're just seen or read about to be told. And so it rolls on through the centuries.

GIT R DONE. Here's the latest twist on health care reform. I say get it over with.

THE OTHER WARM BEVERAGE. Here's an item from the UK Guardian on the Coffee Party.

URGENT ANCIENT CHINESE MUMMY UPDATE here.

TENDER SUBJECT. El Cabrero was surprised this morning to find this article on Alternet that suggest goats are the new cows. It starts like this:

Goat is a great way for people to eat locally grown, humanely raised, tasty foods. And unlike the cattle industries, there aren't any massive, industrialized goat farms.

That's probably because if goats ever became a class of urban proletarians, there would be no way of containing their revolutionary militancy.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

A hit, a very palpable hit

Some of Goat Rope's regular readers will be glad to know that this is just about the end of a long jag on Hamlet. If you've already had your limit, scroll down to the links and comments section.

We're now at the climax of the play, when Hamlet and Laertes are about to engage in a fencing match. The king, who has conspired with Laertes to poison Hamlet, pretends to have made a fine bet on his victory. As the courtier Osric puts it,

The king, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbary
horses: against the which he has imponed, as I take
it, six French rapiers and poniards, with their
assigns, as girdle, hangers, and so: three of the
carriages, in faith, are very dear to fancy, very
responsive to the hilts, most delicate carriages,
and of very liberal conceit.

Hamlet asks Laertes for his pardon, blaming his madness for the death of Polonius:

Give me your pardon, sir: I've done you wrong;
But pardon't, as you are a gentleman.
This presence knows,
And you must needs have heard, how I am punish'd
With sore distraction. What I have done,
That might your nature, honour and exception
Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness.
Was't Hamlet wrong'd Laertes? Never Hamlet:
If Hamlet from himself be ta'en away,
And when he's not himself does wrong Laertes,
Then Hamlet does it not, Hamlet denies it.
Who does it, then? His madness: if't be so,
Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong'd;
His madness is poor Hamlet's enemy.
Sir, in this audience,
Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil
Free me so far in your most generous thoughts,
That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house,
And hurt my brother.

I'm not sure I'd buy it if I was Laertes, but with all the twists and turns of plot it's hard to tell just how mad or sane Hamlet was. Laertes is not reconciled but pretends to agree to a truce.

I am satisfied in nature,
Whose motive, in this case, should stir me most
To my revenge: but in my terms of honour
I stand aloof; and will no reconcilement,
Till by some elder masters, of known honour,
I have a voice and precedent of peace,
To keep my name ungored. But till that time,
I do receive your offer'd love like love,
And will not wrong it.

You know how it turns out. They fight, exchange wounds and blades in the mixup and wind up poisoning each other. Gertrude drinks the poisoned wine intended for Hamlet. Laertes confesses all and says "The king's to blame." Hamlet finally revenges his father's murder by killing Claudius.

The thrill of seeing it live was of course the fight scene, something audiences were as crazy about in Shakespeare's time as our own.

But there are still a few great lines left, which will keep until tomorrow.

MEMORY LANE. Has it been 20 years since WV's great teacher's strike? I guess so. I remember it fondly. After the UMWA/Pittston coal strike ended in early 1990, I was going through labor dispute withdrawal when state teachers were kind enough to oblige me. The strike spread like wildfire from southern WV and won major gains for teachers. It was a short wild ride.

RETURNING VETERANS from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan face higher unemployment rates than civilians.

A NEW POVERTY TRAP. Private for-profit schools often lure students into heavy student loan debt without delivering on the promise of good paying jobs.

TALKING SENSE ON PRISONS. Here's an op-ed on prison overcrowding by my friend the Rev. Matthew Watts.

DID I MENTION that I hate the day after daylight savings time goes into effect?

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

The readiness is all

Certain lines from a work like Hamlet are bound to stick in one's head. One that has stuck in mine for years and years is "the readiness is all."

In another lifetime, when I was mired in poverty and stuck in a pretty much dead end job, a friend asked me what I wanted out of life. I answered, "To be ready." I think that's my final answer.

In context, however, those words are really about death rather than life. They appear in the play as things are headed towards the climax. Claudius and Laertes have conspired to poison Hamlet during a fencing match and the challenge has just been delivered.

Hamlet admits to Horatio about misgivings but refuses to cancel the engagement:

...we defy augury: there's a special
providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,
'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be
now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the
readiness is all...

Methinks he has a point.

JUST DO IT. Pass health care reform, that is.

ECONOMIC RECOVERY. Nobel economics laureate Joseph Stiglitz warns that cutting public expenditures too soon could make the recession worse.

FORECLOSURES. A new wave could be on the way.

GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS. The WV Senate Finance Committee advanced a bill that would provide for public funding of state supreme court races, but gutted the provisions which would adequately fund it. This legislation was in part a response to the 2004 fiasco.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

I have something in me dangerous

(Goat Rope is almost done with Hamlet, but you can skip to the links if Shakespeare doesn't do it for you.)

Ordinarily, you don't want a lot of drama at a funeral. Dealing with death is enough of a task. But, this being Shakespeare and all, there is quite a bit at Ophelia's funeral.

Hamlet's banter with the gravedigger is interrupted by a funeral procession which turns out to be hers. Her brother Laertes is already outraged by the abbreviated funeral rights, which are due to the questionable nature of her death. In the past, suicides were typically denied Christian burial and hers could have been interpreted as such.

Laertes curses Hamlet, who he blames for her madness:

LAERTES: O, treble woe
Fall ten times treble on that cursed head,
Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense
Deprived thee of! Hold off the earth awhile,
Till I have caught her once more in mine arms:

(Leaps into the grave)
Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead,
Till of this flat a mountain you have made,
To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head
Of blue Olympus.

Hamlet then announces himself and leaps into the grave himself. Laertes goes wild and tries to choke him. Hamlet has a great response, one that I hope to use next time somebody chokes me:

I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For, though I am not splenitive and rash,
Yet have I something in me dangerous,
Which let thy wiseness fear: hold off thy hand.

He claims a far greater grief for her that Laertes (not that either of them did her a lot of good):

'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do:
Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself?
Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile?
I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine?
To outface me with leaping in her grave?
Be buried quick with her, and so will I:
And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us, till our ground,
Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth,
I'll rant as well as thou.

Methinks he doth protest too much. Eventually, the two are separated and it's pretty clear that the trouble between them isn't over.

THE WAITING is the hardest part, as philosopher Tom Petty noted some time ago. Lately, unemployed workers have been waiting longer than at any other time on record before they find another job.

SPEAKING OF WHICH, the Senate yesterday passed a bill extending unemployment benefits and other provisions aimed at spurring recovery.

CONTRARY TO WHAT YOU MAY HAVE HEARD, most Americans want changes to health care.

WHO'D A THUNK IT? It might be possible to generate electricity from "bottled air" stored underground.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

A fellow of infinite jest

(Goat Rope is almost done with a long jag on Hamlet. If you like this kind of thing, click on earlier posts. If not, scroll on down to the links and comments section below.)

If you ask just about anyone what image comes to mind when he or she thinks about Hamlet, chances are it is the prince holding Yorick's skull so there's no way I can pass by the graveyard scene in act 5 without including it.

Hamlet and the gravedigger have been bantering back and forth when the former picks up a skull and asks who it belonged to.

First Clown: A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was?

HAMLET: Nay, I know not.

First Clown: A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a' poured a
flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull,
sir, was Yorick's skull, the king's jester.

HAMLET: This?

First Clown: E'en that.

You know what comes next. He takes the skull and launches into the second most famous speech in English literature:

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow
of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath
borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how
abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at
it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know
not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your
gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,
that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one
now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?
Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let
her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must
come; make her laugh at that.

The thing is, that back that bore him a thousand times was probably the major--and possibly the only--source of affection in his childhood. Hamlet Senior seemed to be pretty busy smiting the sledded Poles and engaging in combat with Norway to get too involved and his mother was probably preoccupied with her own affairs (no pun intended).

A NEW KIND OF BUSINESS? Here's an interesting item from NPR about how lawyers are working to create some kind of legal status for corporations that are more interested in positive social outcomes that the bottom line.

FREE LUNCH OR FREE MARKET. In this piece, Dean Baker takes on the misconception that conservatives rely on the market while progressives rely on government intervention. In fact, both groups use government to pursue their ends. The real question is, who benefits?

PAY EQUITY. Here's a new look at the gender gap in wages.

MORE THAN LINES. This National Geographic article looks at the Nasca culture in ancient Peru.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

How absolute the knave is!

Goat Rope is still climbing Mount Hamlet, although we're nearing the summit. If you don't care for Shakespeare, you can scroll down to the links and comments section--although if you do, you'll be missing the graveyard scene.

As I mentioned yesterday, the gravedigger is the only person in the play who can hold his own against Hamlet. In their first exchange, Hamlet asks a simple question:

HAMLET: ...Whose
grave's this, sirrah?

First Clown: Mine, sir.

Sings
O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.

HAMLET: I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in't.

First Clown: You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is not
yours: for my part, I do not lie in't, and yet it is mine.

HAMLET: 'Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine:
'tis for the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest.

First Clown:'Tis a quick lie, sir; 'twill away gain, from me to
you.

HAMLET: What man dost thou dig it for?

First Clown: For no man, sir.

HAMLET: What woman, then?

First Clown: For none, neither.

HAMLET: Who is to be buried in't?

First Clown: One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's dead.

HAMLET: How absolute the knave is!

Hamlet, just back from his pirate adventure, has no idea that the grave will be Ophelia's. They banter some more before that becomes clear. It turns out that the gravedigger has had the same job since the day Old Hamlet slew the king of Norway and young Hamlet was born. He even knows about Hamlet's madness and trip to England, although he doesn't realize who he's talking to.

Playing along, Hamlet asks about reports of himself:

HAMLET: Ay, marry, why was he sent into England?

First Clown: Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits
there; or, if he do not, it's no great matter there.

HAMLET: Why?

First Clown: 'Twill, a not be seen in him there; there the men
are as mad as he.

HAMLET: How came he mad?

First Clown: Very strangely, they say.

HAMLET: How strangely?

First Clown: Faith, e'en with losing his wits.

HAMLET: Upon what ground?

First Clown: Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here, man
and boy, thirty years.

Hamlet is usually untouchable in verbal sparring, but he can't score a point on this guy.

HEALTHY AND HAPPY. Here's an interview with Richard Wilkinson, co-author of The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better.

WHO'S POOR THESE DAYS? Lots of people.

DEFICITS aren't the main problem right now, according to economist James Galbraith.

DOES EVOLUTION HAVE A DIRECTION? Maybe.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Your dull ass will not mend his pace with beating

Goat Rope is still plowing, albeit not in a straight line, through Hamlet. We're all the way to one of my favorite parts, the gravedigger scene at the beginning of Act 5. If Shakespeare doesn't do it for you, you can scroll down to the links and comments section below.

Harold Bloom has noted that Hamlet plays Falstaff to himself, meaning that he provides his own comic relief. In fact, there's only one person in the whole play who can hold his own with him in a verbal sparring match and that person is a gravedigger. Here's some banter between the digger and his companion before Hamlet and Horatio arrive on the scene:

First Clown : ...There is no ancient
gentleman but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers:
they hold up Adam's profession.

Second Clown: Was he a gentleman?

First Clown: He was the first that ever bore arms.

Second Clown: Why, he had none.

First Clown: What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the
Scripture? The Scripture says 'Adam digged:'
could he dig without arms?

I suppose every profession has its own pride of place, but our friend makes a strong case for his own:

First Clown: What is he that builds stronger than either the
mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?

Second Clown: The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives a
thousand tenants.

First Clown: I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallows
does well; but how does it well? it does well to
those that do ill: now thou dost ill to say the
gallows is built stronger than the church: argal,
the gallows may do well to thee. To't again, come.

Second Clown: 'Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or
a carpenter?'

First Clown: Ay, tell me that, and unyoke.

Second Clown: Marry, now I can tell.

First Clown: To't.

Second Clown:Mass, I cannot tell.

First Clown: Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull
ass will not mend his pace with beating; and, when
you are asked this question next, say 'a
grave-maker: 'the houses that he makes last till
doomsday.

I think he may have a point.

SPEAKING OF GRAVES, a lot more people will be in them if we don't reform health care. Here's a report on this from Families USA and here's some WV coverage of the same issue.

GOT FIGS? Here's the latest edition of the Rev. Jim Lewis' Notes from Under the Fig Tree. I see he's got a little Shakespeare of his own going on this time.

ON THE BRIGHT SIDE, there's seems to be a drop in children's bullying.

THE BUTLER DIDN'T DO IT, an asteroid did.

URGENT INDONESIAN HOBBIT UPDATE here.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Like thieves of mercy (and an action alert)

There are some unlikely plot devices in Hamlet, but I guess you'll have that in a play that opens with a ghost.

One of these occurs when the prince is sent to England in the company of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who are carrying a letter to the king of England ordering Hamlet's death. Hamlet opens and reads the letters and changes it to order the death of his former friends. He was just lucky enough to be carrying with him the official seal of Denmark.

OK, I can buy that part, but then the ship is attacked by pirates (!) who wind up taking Hamlet with them and eventually dropping him off in Denmark. As he wrote in a letter to Horatio,

Ere we were two days old
at sea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave us
chase. Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we put on
a compelled valour, and in the grapple I boarded
them: on the instant they got clear of our ship; so
I alone became their prisoner. They have dealt with
me like thieves of mercy: but they knew what they
did; I am to do a good turn for them.

(I think I'm gonna use the captured-by-pirates story next time I'm caught playing hookie. )

Another unlikely device is the plan Claudius and Laertes come up with to deal with Hamlet when they find out he's alive after all. They will contrive a fencing match at which Laertes will use poisoned blades and Claudius a poisoned drink. They could have used "more matter with less art" themselves.

It occurs to me that several characters in this play could have used some lessons in The Art of Whack from Tony Soprano...

ACTION ITEM. If you live in West Virginia, please click here to support a bill that would create an office of minority affairs to address racial disparities. The bill passed the House but is in danger of dying in the Senate Finance Committee, which such things often happen.

TWO WEEKS? The White House is pushing for quick votes on its health care reform bill.

ON A RELATED NOTE, Senator Byrd has indicated he might support reconciliation as a way to pass health care reform.

WORLDS APART. Schisms in the US Senate reflect different political and moral universes.

SURVIVAL OF THE NICEST? Some researchers suggest that kindness and generosity may convey some evolutionary advances.

ON THE OTHER HAND, hate groups seem to be doing pretty good these days.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

There is a willow grows aslant a brook

Ophelia by John Everett Millais (1852), by way of wikipedia.

Goat Rope's long jag on Hamlet continues, although you can skip the Shakespeare if that isn't your thing and scroll on down to the links and comments section.

I have referred to the character of Polonius as a twit several times. I must now add that twitness of one kind or another seems to run in the male line of that family. After Polonius is killed by Hamlet, his son Laertes returns from France eager for revenge. Once there, he finds that his sister Ophelia has gone mad.

One would have hoped that he would have taken a little time to take care of her and covered some basic bases--like maybe keeping her from drowning herself, for example. But he couldn't be bothered over this small detail.

Here's how Gertrude, the queen of Denmark and mother of Hamlet describes her end:

There is a willow grows aslant a brook,
That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;
There with fantastic garlands did she come
Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,
But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them:
There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds
Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke;
When down her weedy trophies and herself
Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide;
And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up:
Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes;
As one incapable of her own distress,
Or like a creature native and indued
Unto that element: but long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay
To muddy death.

All the men in her life were useless at best, and deadly cruel at worst.

TO BE OR NOT TO BE? That is the question for health care reform and it may be answered fairly soon.

SHARE THE WORK. One of the links in yesterday's post was about the policy of work sharing, which could be a very effective way of helping people get through the Great Recession. Economist Dean Baker has written an op-ed on the subject that is worth a look. Here it is

A RISING TIDE, it is said, lifts all boats. But to benefit from that, first you need a boat. Here's an item from the Washington Post about how the recession and the Recovery Act are affecting minority communities.

YOU'VE HEARD OF THE TEA PARTY. Here's the Coffee Party. I've always preferred that beverage.

THE WAR ON SCIENCE continues.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED