Research Catalog

Hamlet in purgatory

Title
Hamlet in purgatory / Stephen Greenblatt ; with a new preface by the author.
Author
Greenblatt, Stephen, 1943-
Publication
Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2013.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Filter by

1 Item

StatusFormatAccessCall NumberItem Location
TextUse in library JFD 14-1067Schwarzman Building - Main Reading Room 315

Details

Description
xv, 322 pages : illustrations; 22 cm.
Summary
This book delves into the author's longtime fascination with the ghost of Hamlet's father, and his daring and ultimately gratifying journey takes him through surprising intellectual territory. It yields an extraordinary account of the rise and fall of Purgatory as both a belief and a lucrative institution as well as a capacious new reading of the power of Hamlet. In the mid-sixteenth century, English authorities abruptly changed the relationship between the living and dead. Declaring that Purgatory was a false poem, they abolished the institutions and banned the practices that Christians relied on to ease the passage to Heaven for themselves and their dead loved ones. Greenblatt explores the fantastic adventure narratives, ghost stories, pilgrimages, and imagery by which a belief in a grisly prison house of souls had been shaped and reinforced in the Middle Ages. He probes the psychological benefits as well as the high costs of this belief and of its demolition.
Series Statement
Princeton classics
Uniform Title
Princeton classics.
Subject
  • Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616
  • Purgatory in literature
  • Christianity and literature > England > History > 16th century
  • Christianity and literature > England > History > 17th century
  • Ghosts in literature
  • English drama (Tragedy) > Christian influences
Note
  • Previous edition: 2001.
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-314) and index.
Call Number
JFD 14-1067
ISBN
  • 9780691160245
  • 0691160244
LCCN
2013937134
OCLC
864548171
Author
Greenblatt, Stephen, 1943- author.
Title
Hamlet in purgatory / Stephen Greenblatt ; with a new preface by the author.
Publisher
Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2013.
Edition
First Princeton classics edition.
Type of Content
text
Type of Medium
unmediated
Type of Carrier
volume
Series
Princeton classics
Princeton classics.
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-314) and index.
Research Call Number
JFD 14-1067
View in Legacy Catalog