Shakespeare in Purgatory

About this episode

This episode explores the contemporary relevance of Shakespeare's Hamlet and Ophelia through various adaptations and the concept of Purgatory.

Shakespeare's great tragedy Hamlet is having a moment. Between director Chloe Zhao's film adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell's bestselling novel, Hamnet, and Taylor Swift's song "The Fate of Ophelia," two of Shakespeare's most tragic characters have hit pop culture payday. In this episode, we explore these creative iterations of Shakespeare's life and work, and why Hamlet and Ophelia continue to resonate. We talk about the concept of Catholic Purgatory, and how Zhao's film captures the emotional power of this in-between spiritual space — one that haunts Shakespeare's original play and (as we discuss) his original audiences. In the second half of the episode, we give Ophelia extra time in the spotlight as we mine the Victorian origin stories that solidified her reputation as nothing more than a beautiful, hysterical girl who drowns herself; and then we turn to the play itself, where she's alive and fully sane most of the time, and listen to what she's really saying.

People in this episode

Hosts: Caroline Bicks, Michelle Ephraim

Topics covered

• Shakespeare
• Hamlet
• Ophelia
• Catholic Purgatory
• pop culture adaptations
• Victorian origin stories

Keywords

• Shakespeare
• Hamlet
• Ophelia
• Chloe Zhao
• Maggie O'Farrell
• Taylor Swift
• Catholic Purgatory
• Victorian
• tragedy

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Hamlet, Hamnet, The Fate of Ophelia

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