A week of Hamlets: [2] From some perspectives ‘Hamlet’ is a play about taking responsibility for your country.
A week of Hamlets: [2] From some perspectives ‘Hamlet’ is a play about taking responsibility for your country. Part 1 of this blog can be found at this link. Yesterday Geoff and I saw, after its first launch, the streamed version of the National Theatre’s most recent Hamlet from the Lyttleton Theatre. The choice of … More A week of Hamlets: [2] From some perspectives ‘Hamlet’ is a play about taking responsibility for your country.
![A week of Hamlets: [2] From some perspectives ‘Hamlet’ is a play about taking responsibility for your country.](https://i0.wp.com/livesteven.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/image-17.png?resize=365%2C365&ssl=1)
![The best gift I have ever received is to allow darkness and obscurity to work on me, as in preference to relying only on what people present as light and clarity, or as Lorca says, ‘La luz me troncha las alas / y el dolor de mi tristeza / va mojando los recuerdos / en la fuente de la idea’. [Translated by D K. Fennell: ‘The light trims my wings / and the pang of my gloom / will moisten the memories / at the font of knowledge’ (the last line seems somewhat to travesty the Spanish)]. What follows is a blog containing some dark or obscure (for Lorca’s ‘oscura’) thoughts about Lorca as invoked by a new novel: Neil Rollinson (2026) ‘The Dead Don’t Bleed’.](https://i0.wp.com/livesteven.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/image-2.jpeg?resize=365%2C346&ssl=1)

![A week of Hamlets: [1] To start, there is a tendency to see Shakespeare’s character Hamlet as a part nightmare dream version of one’s autobiography. Riz Ahmed has won the prize for the finest version of such projects.](https://i0.wp.com/livesteven.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/mv5bnmnkyjvhmtctmthjyy00m2i3lwi1mdktmtmyodcwzdninwm3xkeyxkfqcgc40._v1_fmjpg_ux1000_.jpg?resize=365%2C365&ssl=1)






