Hamlet, or about Death: A Romanian Hamlet directed by Vlad Mugur (2001)

Authors

  • Monica Matei-Chesnoiu Ovidius University of Constanta, Romania

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/2083-8530.20.05

Keywords:

geocriticism, Hamlet, Vlad Mugur, Shakespeare production, Shakespeare in Romania, spatial manipulation

Abstract

This essay looks at the 2001 Romanian production of Hamlet directed by Vlad Mugur at the Cluj National Theatre (Romania) from the perspective of geocriticism and spatial literary studies, analysing the stage space opened in front of the audiences. While the bare stage suggests asceticism and alienation, the production distances the twenty-first century audiences from what might have seemed difficult to understand from their postmodern perspectives. The production abbreviates the topic to its bare essence, just as a map condenses space, in the form of “literary cartography” (Tally 20). There is no room in this production for baroque ornaments and theatrical flourishing; instead, the production explores the exposed depth of human existence. The production is an exploration of theatre and art, of what dramatists and directors can do with artful language, of the theatre as an exploration of human experience and potential. It is about the human condition and the artist’s place in the world, about old and new, about life and death, while everything happens on the edge of nothingness. The director’s own death before the opening night of the production ties Shakespeare’s Hamlet with existential issues in an even deeper way than the play itself allows us to expose.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Monica Matei-Chesnoiu, Ovidius University of Constanta, Romania

Monica Matei-Chesnoiu is Professor of Shakespeare and early modern English literature at Ovidius University of Constanta (Romania). She is the author of Geoparsing Early Modern English Drama (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), Re-imagining Western European Geography in English Renaissance Drama (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), Early Modern Drama and the Eastern European Elsewhere: Representations of Liminal Locality in Shakespeare and his Contemporaries (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2009), and Shakespeare in the Romanian Cultural Memory, with an introduction by Arthur F. Kinney (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2006). She is a Fulbright Fellow (1998-1999), Humboldt Fellow (2009-2010), and SCIEX Fellow (2013-2014). Monica Matei-Chesnoiu is editor of five volumes of essays about Shakespeare in Romania (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2016) and director of the project Shakespeare in the Romanian Cultural Memory (2005-2008). Her main interests incorporate geocriticism and spatial literary studies, including representations of space, place, and geography in Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Monica Matei-Chesnoiu is member of the International Committee of Correspondents for the World Shakespeare Bibliography and has served in the Advisory Board of Multicultural Shakespeare: Translation, Appropriation and Performance. She has been a PhD supervisor in English Literature since 2014.

References

Călinescu, George. “Nae Ionescu.” Istoria literaturii române de la origini pînă în prezent. Bucureşti: Editura Minerva, 1982. 953-954.
Google Scholar

Călinescu, George. “Şerban Cioculescu.” Istoria literaturii române de la origini pînă în prezent. Bucureşti: Editura Minerva, 1982. 914-915.
Google Scholar

Constantinescu, Marina. “Hamlet sau despre moarte.” România Literară 27 (2001). https://arhiva.romlit.ro/index.pl/hamlet_sau_despre_moarte. 31 July 2019.
Google Scholar

Cover illustration to Shakespeare Quarterly 50 (Summer 1999). Arnold Schwarzenegger as Hamlet in John McTiernan’s 1993 film Last Action Hero. Movie adaptation written by Zach Penn and Adam Leff. With Arnold Schwarzenegger, F. Murray Abraham, Art Carney. Columbia Pictures, Oak Productions, 1993.
Google Scholar

Horasganian, Bedros. “Julieta, Ofelia, Romeo şi Hamlet.” Observator cultural 93 (December 2001). https://www.observatorcultural.ro/articol/julieta-ofelia-romeo-si-hamlet/. 31 July 2019.
Google Scholar

Ichicawa, Mariko. The Shakespearean Stage Space. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Google Scholar

Matei-Chesnoiu, Monica. Shakespeare in the Romanian Cultural Memory. With a Foreword by Arthur F. Kinney. Madison, Teaneck: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2006.
Google Scholar

Mugur, Vlad. “William Shakespeare. Tragedia lui Hamlet, Prinţ de Danemarca. Versiune regizorală de Vlad Mugur.” In Vlad Mugur, spectacolul Morţii. Ed. Magda Petreu and Ion Vartic. Cluj Napoca: Biblioteca Apostrof, Teatrul National Cluj, 2001. 45-88.
Google Scholar

Petreu, Magda and Ion Vartic, eds. Vlad Mugur: spectacolul morţii [Vlad Mugur: The Spectacle of Death]. Cluj Napoca: Biblioteca Apostrof, Teatrul National Cluj, 2001.
Google Scholar

Pfister, Manfred. “Shakespeare and Italy, or, the Law of Diminishing Returns.” Shakespeare’s Italy. Functions of Italian Locations in English Renaissance Drama. Ed. Michele Marrapodi, A. J. Hoenselaars, Marcello Capuzzo, and L. Falzon Santucci. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993. 295-303.
Google Scholar

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. The Arden Shakespeare. Third Series. Ed. Harold Jenkins. 5th ed. London: Routledge, 1993.
Google Scholar

Tally, Robert T. Jr. “Adventures in Literary Cartography: Explorations, Representations, Projections.” In Literature and Geography: The Writing of Space throughout History. Ed. Emmanuelle Peraldo. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2016. 20-36.
Google Scholar

Worthen, William B. Shakespeare and the Authority of Performance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
Google Scholar

Downloads

Published

2019-12-30

How to Cite

Matei-Chesnoiu, M. (2019). Hamlet, or about Death: A Romanian Hamlet directed by Vlad Mugur (2001). Multicultural Shakespeare: Translation, Appropriation and Performance, 20(35), 51–60. https://doi.org/10.18778/2083-8530.20.05

Similar Articles

<< < 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 > >> 

You may also start an advanced similarity search for this article.