6 - Narration and staging in Hamlet and its afternovels

Summary

In [genre fiction], the relationship between individual work and formula is somewhat analogous to that of a variation on a theme, or of a performance to a text. To be a work of quality or interest, the individual version of a formula must have some unique or special characteristics of its own, yet these characteristics must ultimately work toward the fulfillment of the conventional form. In somewhat the same way, when we see a new performance of a famous role like Hamlet, we are most impressed by it if it is a new but acceptable interpretation of the part. An actor who overturns all our previous conceptions of his role is usually less enjoyable than one who builds on the interpretations we have become accustomed to. But if he adds no special touches of his own to the part we will experience his performance as flat and uninteresting.

[Cawelti] compares the publication of a new detective story by a talented mystery writer with a successful revival of Hamlet; in each case the public wants the new work to exhibit some special character of its own without violating the familiar original form.

This comparison between popular fiction and stage revivals, which John Cawelti makes in 1976, and which George Dove reworks in 1990, equates the predictable conventions of genre fiction with the familiar contours of Shakespeare's play, the excellent fiction of the “talented mystery writer” with the renewed performance of Shakespeare's well-known characters. While the comforts of genre fiction emerge from its familiar, sometimes Shakespearean forms, its potential artistic value derives from the “special character of its own.” The impulse to yoke Shakespeare, and particularly Hamlet, with popular fiction recurs in criticism as well as the novels themselves. One concern then becomes how these collusions between narrative and performance, between novel and theatre, employ the original form and, without violating it, establish their “special character.” Another equally important issue, invoked by Cawelti's persistent metaphor, is why Shakespearean performance is so deeply implicated in popular fiction.