Hamlet on the Potomac

Hamlet…..how I love that play; I estimate that I taught Hamlet to 40-50 classes, maybe more. [“Taught” means spending four weeks reading and explaining the play, line by line.] Recently, I came across two articles which use selections from Hamlet to comment on George Bush. It is no secret that I loathe George Bush, his dreadful war, his Imperial presidency, and his attempts to take away numerous freedoms using the pretext of his imaginary war on the idea of terror. The first article below, by Robert Sheer, is a superb parody of the famous “To Be or not to Be” soliloquy. Shakespeare can and should be studied to understand the issues in our world and to learn how issues/scenarios are resolved. Symbolically, it is all there, if we can only face the truth and see past the moment to the resolution…i.e..Shakespeare tells us how the issue will be resolved. Paying attention is sometimes way too painful.

Robert Scheer: Brooding Prince’s Soliloquy

And from The Huffington Post: Bill Robinson, “Where Bush Got His Twenty Thousand.”