Maynard Mack- tragedy and madness

Maynard Mack- tragedy and madness

1. Hamlet acted mad and became mad.

2. Mad people have a rare and unusual insight e.g. Ophelia with the flowers and Cassandra with the prophecies. An insight into the play.

3. Mack notes how often the tragic heroes suffer from madness. It seems to be a form of divine punishment while bringing a special insight and a freedom of speech

4. Art and madness allow a freedom of speech and expression to reveal painful truths

5. Their insights may be dismissed as fiction or nonsense.

6. An excess of passion approached madness

7. 'Single figure of tragic hero and buffoon'- wordplay and nonsense makes them seem like clowns but allows them freedom of speech that may not otherwise be allowed.

8. Madness can be a punishment. Hamlet asks for Laertes forgiveness saying he hasn't been himself. There is a further dimension than insight that affects the character and their behaviour

9. Ophelia gives flowers appropriate to issues she shouldn't know of

10. Madness is caused by suffering and downfall. Ophelia went mad and killed herself.

11. Shakespeare wrote in a paranoid time period. there were many conspiracies and it would have been dangerous for him to express his thoughts personally. he could however express himself through his art and the mad characters

12. Hamlet went made because of failure and his indecision. His fatal flaw.

13. Hamlet can be privileged in madness to say things e.g. the way that Denmark is decaying and like a prison. These complaints about corruption wouldn't have been tolerated if Shakespeare expressed these ideas personally

14. In madness we must also recognise the opposing voice that exists, rooted inside all of us and in the audience.

15. Shakespeare himself is able to express these painful truths through poetry and art. However many of us have dismissed these ideas as pure fiction.

16. Madness allows characters to talk without consequences

17. Method in the madness. Hamlet can act mad to further his scheme

18. No one believes Hamlet when he talks about the ghost, not even his mother. They all think he is mad. He is punished this way. Is the ghost real or part of the madness.