Seeing and Interpreting the Ghosts in Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy - MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO FACULTY OF ARTS DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN ...

MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO
                         FACULTY OF ARTS
       DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN STUDIES

             Seeing and Interpreting the Ghosts
               in Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy

                        Major Bachelor’s Thesis

                           Jana Gajdošíková

Supervisor: Mgr. Pavel Drábek, Ph.D.              Brno 2006

I declare that I have worked on this bachelor thesis
independently, using only primary and secondary sources listed
in the bibliography.

                                2

I would like to thank my supervisor Mgr. Pavel Drábek, Ph.D.,
and Ass. Prof. Dr. Joanne Rochester for their kind and valuable
advice and help.

                               3

TABLE OF CONTENT

Introduction.............................................................................................................. 5

Revenge.................................................................................................................... 6

Religion, Death, and Ghost Lore.............................................................................. 7

The Spanish Tragedy...............................................................................................11

Hamlet.....................................................................................................................21

The Atheist’s Tragedy.............................................................................................37

Other Plays..............................................................................................................43

                    The Revenger’s Tragedy...................................................................43

                    The Duchess of Malfi........................................................................44

Conclusion..............................................................................................................46

Czech Resume........................................................................................................49

Bibliography...........................................................................................................50

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INTRODUCTION

This thesis deals with the interpretation of ghosts in Elizabethan revenge tragedy in

England. It focuses on the different purposes of their presence in the plays, and it

discusses the perception and interpretation of ghosts by the audience influenced by

Elizabethan religion, superstitions, and culture.

         The first two chapters provide an insight into the background of Elizabethan

England discussing the question of revenge, focusing on the period attitude towards the

ghost lore and the issue of Death, and how it was influenced by religion.

         The three following chapters, which are the core of my work, deal with the plays

by Thomas Kyd: The Spanish Tragedy, William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Hamlet,

Prince of Denmark, and Cyril Tourneur: The Atheist’s Tragedy. They focus on the roles

of the ghosts in these plays, their significance, and on the perception and understanding

of their presence. They also show the different use of the ghost figures in the individual

plays.

         In the chapter called “Other Plays”, the focus shifts on two other plays from the

period, John Webster’s Duchess of Malfi, and The Revenger’s Tragedy, whose author is

not definite. These two plays serve as an example of different treatments of ghosts,

where the function of the actual ghost is taken over by a skull and an echo.

         This thesis analyzes the doubts and anxieties about the conception of Death in

Elizabethan England. It relies on the works done by Eleanor Prosser, Stephen

Greenblatt and John Erskine Hankins about the possible nature of ghosts, and follows

Robert N. Watson and his analysis of the perception of Death in Elizabethan England. It

rethinks the ghost plays in this perspective and traces the connection of these anxieties

and their reflection in ghost figures in revenge tragedy.

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REVENGE

When focusing on Elizabethan revenge tragedy, one should know what revenge is, and

what it represented in Elizabethan England. Revenge is an action taken in return for an

injury or offence. Historically, it “was the first manifestation of consciousness of justice,

the only way the wrong done could be righted” (Bowers 3). It was assumed to be a duty

of an injured man to avenge himself upon the one who wronged him or any member of

his family. By the time Elizabeth I came to the throne the concept of justice had

changed. Fredson Bowers, in his book Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy (1940), describes

the evolution in detail. Starting with the system of wergeld, which was the earliest

English law, Bowers leads us through the history of the concept of justice. According to

the system of wergeld the “injured family had the responsibility of collecting payment”

(4) from those who wronged them. Modern “justice” arrives with Henry VII, who

introduced “indictment”, by which the accused person is “to be tried at once merely on

the presentation of information to the authorities” (8). By Elizabethan time, justice was

a privilege of the state and private blood revenge had no legal place in England. All

kinds of murder, including that of revenge killing, fell into the same category in law,

and punishment for the revenger was as heavy as for the original murder (11). Revenge

murder in Elizabethan times was considered to be the worst of all crimes, because as the

Bible says: “‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord” (Romans 12:19).1 On the

other hand, there was a deeply rooted tradition and sacred duty to “take revenge for

[one’s] murdered ancestor” (Bowers 39), which was still very much alive in the minds

of many Elizabethans. The dilemma is reflected in revenge tragedies that “depict

revenge as neither unquestionably desirable nor easy to accomplish, and, once achieved,

it brings destruction upon the revengers as well as their victims” (Griswold 91).

1
 http:// bibleresources.bible.com/passagesearchresults.php?passage1=Romans+12:19&version=49#cen-
NASB-28265B

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RELIGION, DEATH, AND GHOST LORE

The analysis of Renaissance society and its attitudes towards any of the current

questions of the time should, most importantly, take into account the issue of religion.

“The Elizabethan period was a time of profound and far-reaching religious change”

(Atchley 5). This is not surprising when we realize what had happened within thirty

years, with four different monarchs on the throne starting with Henry VIII who in 1532

declared himself Supreme Head of the Church and Clergy and “paved the way for

Protestantism in England” (Atchley 7). The statement of William Allen, “an English

cardinal and unapologetic Catholic” (Atchley 6), can gives a true picture of the religious

situation so much influential in shaping the beliefs of ordinary people:

          In one man’s memory… we have had to our prince, a man, who abolished the

          pope’s authority by his laws and yet in other points kept the faith of his

          fathers; we have had a child, who by his like laws abolished together with the

          papacy the whole ancient religion; we have had a woman who restored both

          again and sharply punished protestants; and lastly her majesty that now is,

          who by the like laws hath long since abolished both again and now severely

          punisheth catholics as the other did protestants; and all these strange

          differences within the compass of about thirty years. (qtd. in Atchley 6)

Allen is talking about Henry VIII, his son Edward VI, daughter Mary I, and her sister

and current Queen Elizabeth I. As Clinton Atchley puts it, “[o]ne can sympathize with

the average church-goer caught, as it were, in a political and religious tennis match,

bouncing from one side to the other” (6). It is difficult to imagine that people’s faith and

beliefs could be eradicated and exchanged for new ones whenever the new monarch

decided so. Their views of the world were still influenced by deeply rooted beliefs and

superstitions intermixed with the remaining religious rites and rituals.

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One of the things that this religious dilemma touched upon was the issue of

Death and with it the related existence of ghosts. “All animals die, but only human

beings suffer death – and their sense of what they suffer is, to a very large degree,

imposed by the culture to which they belong” (Neill 2). To understand why Renaissance

England was so much haunted by the image of Death, we have to take into

consideration the religious background of the time. To Elizabethans “the next world was

an intense and everpresent reality” (Wilson 58). Neither Catholics nor Protestants did

cast doubt on the existence of afterlife, which “was an unquestioned premise of English

Renaissance culture” (Watson 1994: 9), because there was nothing worse than a thought

that Death is the ultimate end of everything. “[D]eath is shameful because it is an

extreme form of defacement, a stripping away of the constituent forms of social identity

that amounts to nothing less than an absolute undoing of the self” (Neill 67).

Nevertheless, there was a dispute about the nature of the afterlife. “The Catholic Church

believed in a tripartite afterlife consisting of heaven, hell, and purgatory. Purgatory is a

temporary abode where the faithful who are saved remain until they have worked off

their sins and are allowed to proceed to heaven” (Atchley 8). That is precisely the

sticking point. For Catholics Purgatory meant a connection beyond the grave, it “forged

a different kind of link between the living and the dead, or, rather, it enabled the dead to

be not completely dead – not as utterly gone, finished, complete as those whose souls

resided forever in Hell or Heaven” (Greenblatt 17). It helped Elizabethans to confirm

their hopes in immortality. The prayers for the dead were a means of communication

related to a sense of family and solidarity. Unlike Catholics, “[r]eformers denied the

existence of purgatory; at death, one went immediately to heaven or hell, and there was

no return from either” (Atchley 9).

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With such strong Christian beliefs in afterlife, whatever its shape, it makes one

wonder why this culture was so awfully dismayed by the thought of Death. The

explanation suggests itself; as Michael Neill explains, with the Reformation, placing a

ban on masses for the dead and any kind of “liturgy of remembrance… it was no longer

possible for the living to assist the dead… [and] death became a more absolute

annihilation than ever” (38). Without the contact with the deceased, the link with the

afterlife, with the other world, suddenly disappeared. There was no connection left; a

dark blank gap remained. “[T]he dead were officially ‘beyond the grave’” (Rist 2003).

For Elizabethans, ready to believe in their immortality, there was nothing worse than the

image of the inevitable passage towards one’s grave, knowing that once you cross the

border, there is no way back, just a hollow nothingness.

       Nevertheless, despite the Reformation “the border between this world and the

afterlife was not firmly and irrevocably closed. For a large number of mortals – perhaps

the majority of them – time did not come to an end at the moment of death” (Greenblatt

18). As Catholics believed, Purgatory was a place for restless spirits, who “might be

permitted by the normal operation of divine law to return to earth for any purpose, and

[…] obedience to any command was considered a religious obligation” (Prosser 106).

Although reformers denied the existence of Purgatory, they conceded that ghostly

apparitions might exist, but “any ghost that was not the hallucination of a sick mind was

a demon masquerading as the spirit of a dead man in order to tempt the living” (Prosser

104). The popular belief of Elizabethan England is clearly illustrated in Religio Medici,

written by Thomas Browne in 1643:

           I believe… that those apparitions and ghosts of departed persons are not the

           wandering souls of men, but the unquiet walks of devils, prompting and

           suggesting us unto mischief, blood, and villany; instilling and stealing into

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our hearts that the blessed spirits are not at rest in their graves, but wander,

            solicitous of the affairs of the world… [and] that those phantasms appear

            often. (Sect.37)2

Nevertheless, ghosts, present or absent, were omnipresent whenever the issue of Death

appeared. “Instead of doing away with ghosts, the abolition [of Purgatory] caused them

to flourish” (Low 455), because the blank spot that remained after the prayers for the

dead stopped asked to be filled in order to ease people’s anxiety about Death. Portraying

Death helps to “repress the suspicion that death consists of a banal extinction” (Watson

1994: 41). It can be given as many faces as people’s imagination allows such as an act

of revenge or a ghost. “The problems death implies are the central problems of life, and

hence they are the central subject matter of art, of all that tries to comprehend and

express those problems” (Spencer vii).

        English Renaissance tragedy was “concerned with death… because it catered for

a culture that was in the throes of a peculiar crisis in the accommodation of death”

(Neill 30). Thus, it is not surprising to find out that “[i]n the extant drama produced

between 1560 and 1610, twenty-six plays include fifty-one ghosts” (Prosser 259), and

they are as different and varied as Death itself. For “‘Death’ is not something that can

be imagined once and for all, but an idea that has to be constantly reimagined across

cultures and through time” (Neill 2). It is not that difficult to see where the popularity of

revenge tragedies in the Elizabethan period lies. Revenge tragedies are not only life

stories of English society, they mirror the difficulties of life’s decision that people have

to make every day. They are to be seen as “the spiritual biography of the age” (Ornstein

45).

2
 Browne, Thomas. Religio Medici. Renascence Editions: An Online Repository of Works Printed in
English Between the Years 1477 and 1799. 

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Any approach to revenge tragedies has to take into account the time the

individual plays were written in, and the culture and people they were written for. The

fact that people believed in afterlife and ghosts, that the dead were an inseparable part of

the world of the living, and the deep anxiety about one’s fate after death, is important

for understanding of the perception of ghosts in Elizabethan revenge tragedy.

                              THE SPANISH TRAGEDY

Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy, written sometime in the late 1580s, is the

foundation stone of Elizabethan revenge tragedy. Drawing heavily on the Senecan

drama that enjoyed considerable popularity at that time (Bowers 41), Kyd’s play

establishes the revenge tragedy tradition and creates the patterns that form its core. The

origin of the Ghost of Don Andrea lies in Senecan tragedy where “[g]hosts are the

standard-equipment starters” (Watson 1990: 200).

       Despite the fact that Bowers considers the presence of the Ghost in The Spanish

Tragedy superfluous (68), the Ghost of Don Andrea is not only “effective for

expounding the plot and for giving the desired atmosphere of tragedy” (Spencer 197);

he is also an inseparable part of the plot. If he were removed, the meaning, and the

whole structure of the play would fall apart. What is even more certain, without the

Ghost the audience’s insight into the play, their attitude to it and understanding of it

would be considerably different.

       The role of Don Andrea’s Ghost as one of the characters in The Spanish Tragedy

should be clarified before focusing on his identity. If this Ghost comes from the

Senecan stock, his function should be merely “that of prologue … a serviceable piece of

dramatic machinery, [which] enabled the playwright to place his audience in possession

of the preliminary data – the most difficult of all a dramatist’s tasks” (Wilson 55-56).

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Such a ghost seems to be nothing more than a convenient means for a playwright, a nice

picture used to decorate and liven up an otherwise vapid backdrop. As Dover Wilson

fittingly says, the Senecan ghost is “a classical puppet… popping up from Tartarus at

appropriate moments” (55). The Ghost of Don Andrea does not fit such a description,

and his role diverges from that assigned to prologue ghosts by Seneca. In the very first

scene Don Andrea gives an impressive and long speech presenting himself, and

describing his way to Hades: “Through dreadful shades of ever-glooming night, / I saw

more sights than thousands tongues can tell” (1.1.56-57). It is true that he serves as a

prologue, but the picture he draws is one-sided. He is not aware of the real state of

affairs. Don Andrea, accompanied by Revenge, appears at the end of every act in the

play commenting on what has happened, again, from his point of view. A more

appropriate prologue figure should be Revenge who obviously knows not only what has

already happened but also what is yet to come. The two characters seem to complement

each other, framing the whole play both from below and above. Don Andrea, as an

unconscious spectator, is closely associated with the audience watching carefully what

is happening on the stage. They both respond emotionally to the injustice they observe.

Revenge, on the other hand, is omniscient, and serves as a representation of the

supernatural, watching the world from above. It sees people in the same way as gods

from Olympus, with the playwright in Zeus stand, as puppets whose destinies depend

solely on its will. Although the two figures supposedly “serve for chorus in this

tragedy” (1.1.91), the actual information usually provided by such figures is missing.

Don Andrea talks but knows nothing: “I will sit to see the rest” (3.15). Revenge knows

but does not tell, and only commands patience, because: “The end is crown of every

work well done; / The sickle comes not till the corn be ripe” (2.6.) What it leaves the

audience with is a sense of lack.

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With the role having been outlined, the question arises of the Ghost’s effect on

the individual characters in the play. On the face of it, it seems to have no effect at all

since there is no contact with any of the characters. Looked at from a different angle,

however, Don Andrea is actually the driving power behind all the events. This power

comes partly from his connection to Revenge. Don Andrea’s revenge is the reason for

Revenge being present, and Revenge is why Don Andrea’s Ghost is here. It is not

difficult to imagine only one character embodying the essence of those two, where the

Ghost represents “the desire for vengeance, [and] the figure of Revenge seems to

symbolize the destined course of events set in motion by that desire” (Hallet and Hallet

22).

       A greater part of Don Andrea’s influence comes from memory. “Plato’s most

influential metaphor for memory was that of wax in which an impression is left. The

metaphor expresses beautifully the way in which mind can keep the image of something

that is no longer present” (Greenblatt 214). When he died, Don Andrea left a strong

impression behind, an intermixture of passion, memory, and revenge, where one leads

to another as in a chemical reaction, all activated by a memory of passion. A closer look

at some issues in the play should illuminate the influence of Don Andrea, who is only

seemingly a passive character.

       The Spanish Tragedy is a revenge tragedy, and as such has to have a revenger.

At the beginning of the play we are presented with a Ghost who wants revenge. Don

Andrea was killed in battle, which, while distressing, is honourable. Only later it is

suggested that his death is not as honourable as Don Andrea himself initially thought.

There is no real family of Don Andrea mentioned, only Horatio, his friend, and Bel-

Imperia, his lover. Bel-Imperia does not comply with the requirements of an avenger,

since she is a woman. But there is Horatio who, enchanted by her passions, can serve as

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a revenger. The problem is that Horatio lacks his own passion, so necessary to revenge.

Here comes the Ghost in the shape of a bloody scarf that was originally given to Don

Andrea by Bel-Imperia: “‘twas my favor at his last depart” (1.4.47), and ties them

together: “But now wear thou it both for him and me” (1.4.48). Nevertheless, Horatio

and Bel-Imperia, however close they were to Don Andrea, are not his family, where

blood calls for blood. This situation is about to change. Horatio, taking Andrea’s place

as Bel-Imperia’s lover, now becomes the object of Lorenzo and Balthazar’s malice,

whose focus turns from Don Andrea to him. This is not the only substitution Horatio

must make. His murder substitutes for Andrea’s since, as Robert Watson puts it, “[t]he

murder of Horatio systematically re-enacts the death of Don Andrea, in order to

reconceive it as a crime” (1994: 59).

        With the murder of Horatio, the call for blood can be answered. Hieronimo is

the perfect revenger, for the death of his son brought out the great passion that only a

father can feel for a lost child.

          Where shall I run to breathe abroad my woes –

          My woes, whose weight hath wearied the earth –

          Or mine exclaims, that have surcharged the air

          With ceaseless plaints for my deceased son? (3.7.1-4)

Here the tragedy becomes even more tragic. Not only is Hieronimo condemned for

taking up the act of revenge, but he unconsciously does so unconsciously on behalf of

Don Andrea. Since Hieronimo does not know who he should bring to justice, Bel-

Imperia steps in again and “becomes a spokesman for Andrea and Revenge in the

human world” (Hallet and Hallet 143). She informs Hieronimo about what has

happened, and calls upon him to revenge: “Revenge thyself on Balthazar and him

[Lorenzo], / For these were they what murdered thy son” (3.2.28-29). At first,

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Hieronimo doubts her in the same way as Hamlet initially does the Ghost of King

Hamlet, “Hieronimo, beware, thou art betrayed, / And to entrap thy life this train is laid.

/ Advise thee, therefore, be not credulous” (3.2.37-39). Bel-Imperia is also here to

remind Hieronimo of this loss and to urge him to revenge when she feels that he loses

his passion, “Hieronimo, are these thy passions [?]” (4.1.4), and neglects his duty,

“Thus to neglect the loss and life of him” (4.1.11). Hieronimo, however, is far from

forgetting. He has his own mementos that serve him as ghosts. The bloody scarf

changes its owner once again to serve to its original one: “It shall not from me till I take

revenge” (2.7.52). In addition, there is yet another ghost, even more powerful and more

dreadful, Horatio’s own body, and his father will not part with the remains just as he

clings to the scarf: “I’ll not entomb them till I have revenged” (2.7.54). The action is in

motion and cannot be stopped. All the characters are directly or otherwise taken into the

whirl of passions elicited by Don Andrea. His passions are awoken in Bel-Imperia who

uses Horatio as a tool for revenge. His death flares deep emotions in Hieronimo who,

unaware, becomes the true revenger of the play, and his son’s body carries the message

passed on by Andrea. Finally, the bloody handkerchief seems to encompass all the

passions and emotions activated by Don Andrea, and “[a]s always in revenge tragedy,

the innocent suffer along with the guilty” (Videbaek 37). Since Andrea comes from the

world of the dead, his presence brings nothing less than Death.

       Even though, as Charles and Elaine Hallet point out, Don Andrea cannot be

wholly blamed for the death of all those people, it is his passion, almost lust, which sets

Revenge in motion, and makes it do its job (23). Once set free, there is nothing that

could prevent Revenge from pursuing its aim. There is only one way with only one

possible result, however contrary the events might seem, for “Though I [Revenge] sleep,

/ Yet is my mood soliciting their souls” and “Nor dies Revenge, although he sleep

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awhile” (3.15.19-20,23). Separately, Don Andrea’s Ghost and Revenge mean nothing

“for they function essentially as a unit” (Hallet 46). The importance lies in their

relationship, similar to that of Golem and its shem.

       No less interesting and even more important is the insight into the understanding

of the Ghost of Don Andrea by the Elizabethan audience. By no means is it possible to

positively determine what exactly people felt at that time, how they interpreted what

they saw, and what their attitudes were like. Nevertheless, there have been a number of

writings focusing on the period background of these people, on their culture and society.

It cannot be denied that understanding of any kind of issue, including art, depends

essentially on people’s backgrounds. Art is influenced by its culture. The way they

perceived the figure of the Ghost might have influenced their comprehension of both the

play as a whole, and the individual characters as well.

       One of the things that first pops up is Death, because for Elizabethans “[l]ife and

the reminders of death were closely united” (Spencer 36-37). Death is everywhere in

Kyd’s play; a ghost of someone who died; there is revenge because someone wants to

avenge someone’s death; there is a corpse, a bloody scarf, violence, murders, wars and

battles, despair and tears. What all these have in common is Death. It is hidden behind

every word and behind every effort, and only Revenge knows where it all leads, and

how everything ends; “Their love to mortal hate, their day to night, / Their hope into

despair, their peace to war, / Their joy to pain, their bliss to mystery” (1.5.7-9). Life

leads to Death, and Death leads to life. One cannot be without the other. The borders

still mingle no matter what century it is. It certainly must have been a much greater

issue for a time so obsessed with Death as Elizabethan period was.

       Thus, when people came to the theatre and the first thing they saw was a ghost

and Revenge, thoughts about Death presumably crossed their minds. Don Andrea, who,

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as all ghosts are, is neither alive nor dead either, is “himself a liminal creature

compromising the boundary between life and death” (Hattaway 313). Revenge, as a

character, belongs to the mythological Underworld and is sent to the human world by

Proserpine, but its identity reaches further. Revenge is materialized, it has been given

body, face, and voice. What a striking resemblance to man! In order to understand

something, to grasp its essence, that something must be made more human. As

Theodore Spencer aptly puts it, “[i]n desiring to get nearer to God, man made God more

and more like himself” (16). This can be easily applied not only to revenge but to love,

desire, and Death as well. Don Andrea’s Ghost personifies the memory left behind,

Revenge is the personification of passions, and both are the embodiment of the path

between life and Death.

       Identification of the Ghost himself would not be in this case a great puzzle for

the audience. Coming back from pagan Hades as a spirit of a warrior and lover, Don

Andrea cannot find his place in the Underworld until his past human affairs are resolved.

That is why he still stands with one foot in the human world and with the other on the

other side of Acheron. Having all those ideas in mind, the audience could now turn to

the play, and judge it accordingly.

       Let us focus on several important issues of the play, where the existence of the

Ghost might have influenced their interpretations in the eyes of the Elizabethan

audience. In a literal sense, the connection between the Ghost and revenge has been

presented. In a figurative sense, this relation gains even more significance. As has

already been mentioned, the question of revenge had never had a clear answer among

Elizabethans, whose irreconcilable feelings struggled between reason and passion.

Reason should prevail, otherwise the universal order would be destroyed. Nevertheless,

passion cannot be put aside, it cannot be forgotten. It is part of a man who “is by nature

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a passionate rather than a rational animal” (Ornstein 41), and even though it might be

seen as “a dark and irresistibly destructive force, [or] a curse from the gods”

(McAlindon 14), it is included in the equipment that people are given when entering this

world. “[P]assion, appetite, and desire are as natural to man as reason and moral

prohibition” (Ornstein 37). It might be hidden deep inside waiting for the right key that

would set it free. Such is the case with Hieronimo who, his passion set seemingly aside,

has faith in reason and justice, since he himself is one of its representatives. Justice is as

a friend Hieronimo believes in and trusts, but when he turns to his good friend for help

and support, he walks away. Hieronimo is left alone with his burden surrounded by all

his ghosts. Reason cannot help Hieronimo to carry the burden. It is becoming heavier

and heavier, and he is short of breath. Calling for revenge, he is not able to wait any

longer. His passion is awake and thirsty, and “naught but blood will satisfy [its] woes”

(3.7.68).

       The audience watching Hieronimo’s immense struggle is aware of the two

figures, the Ghost and Revenge, standing on his shoulders and pulling strings. They

understand his desire to revenge, and they can imagine the reasons for his fight: anger,

grief, and anxiety; anxiety about one’s own mortality. Hieronimo is trying to fight a

losing battle with Death. Horatio, when still alive, served as lebenselixir to his father.

Hieronimo’s “immortality is precariously located in his child” (Watson 1994: 56). No

wonder that he seeks rectification in vain hope that “death can be corrected by

eliminating its ‘author’” (Watson 1994: 57). Until the moment of his fatal decision there

is still hope. Elizabethans could feel his inner fight, the conflict of passion and reason. If

he only shook Revenge off his shoulder, Hieronimo would be able to breathe, and with

the fresh air let reason come in again. They certainly knew as well that he would not do

that, and that his path leads to damnation, because “[n]ot only is the revenger guilty of

                                             18

blasphemy and malice, he cuts himself off from the possibility of forgiveness and thus

is damned forever” (Prosser 7). Hieronimo cannot free himself from Revenge, since

Revenge is tied to the Ghost, and “the Ghost’s state of mind is reflected in Hieronimo’s;

[and] Hieronimo’s desire for revenge mirrors that of Andrea” (Hallet 50).

       Although the lost of his son and the strong influence of the Ghost on Hieronimo

might have seemed to justify his actions in the eyes of Elizabethan audience, they were

far from approving. Not only was revenge a delicate issue with a considerable religious

pressure, but Hieronimo has also done something that must have at least given the

audience a pause for thought if not shocked them completely. Hieronimo has decided

not to pay the last honours to his only son: “See’st thou those wounds that yet are

bleeding fresh? / I’ll not entomb them till I have revenged” (2.5.53-54). In the

Renaissance people believed “that happiness beyond the grave was somehow contingent

upon proper disposal and preservation of one’s mortal remains” (Neill 265). There is

also Don Andrea’s Ghost to remind us that “churlish Charon, only boatman there, / Said

that my rites of burial not performed, / I might not sit amongst his passengers” (1.1.20-

22). Don Andrea was not allowed to cross the river of the Underworld until his worldly

remains were properly buried. Hieronimo, a loving father, denies his son access to the

afterlife “Under green myrtle trees and cypress shades” (1.1.44). The question is if he

acts only as a puppet in the hands of the Ghost and Revenge, or if he “longs for revenge

solely as a means for realizing his own misery” (Prosser 45), realizing and fighting his

own mortality.

       Hieronimo is determined to fight a losing battle. He is ready to rebel “against

natural law on behalf of human immortality” (Watson 1994: 9), ready to fight reason

and follow his passions. There is both reason and passion in a man. They cooperate if

passion does not oppose reason, and reason rules insofar as man’s passion can tolerate.

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Hieronimo in his decision to follow the Ghost’s command chose to follow his passions

and leave out the reason. To eliminate reason is foolish in the same way as completely

eliminating one’s passions. There is an interconnection that, if violated, causes

disruption of the mind. In the Renaissance it was assumed “that irrational emotions

distract and craze the psyche” (Hallet and Hallet 9). Hieronimo’s road towards madness

is paved. The last straw that pushes him over the edge seems to be the moment when he

is becoming conscious of “the irreversibility of his son’s annihilation in death”

(Hattaway 314).

       The very end of the play offers a ghastly spectacle. The stage covered with dead

bodies of Lorenzo, Balthazar, Bel-Imperia, the Duke of Castile, Hieronimo, and what is

left of Horatio. Don Andrea and Revenge enter into the last conversation of the play.

Don Andrea is, for the first time, satisfied: “now my hopes have end in their effects”

(4.5.1). His passion grew over the course of the play. His desire for revenge is nothing

else than a call for blood, and only “blood and sorrow finish [his] desires” (4.5.2). The

pile of dead bodies seems to satisfy the thirst for blood. Their deaths deliver them to

Andrea’s control where he can torture them for his own revenge. At that very moment

Don Andrea has lost the audience’s support and understanding. There is no doubt left

about how just this revenge actually was (4.5.16) after the Ghost, the authority where all

this came from, cannot wait to show his hate (4.5.26). The disillusioned audience was

left with the impression of absolute vanity. How foolish to die in the battle of

immortality. However, the deep belief in afterlife, in something beyond the grave was

confirmed after all. It depends on how people live whether they end up in heaven or

“begin their endless tragedy” (4.5.48).

                                            20

HAMLET

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, written probably in 1601, follows

the tradition of revenge tragedy established over ten years earlier by The Spanish

Tragedy. The Ghost of King Hamlet is the most famous and the most discussed

apparition of all the ghosts in Elizabethan revenge tragedies. Since the turn of the

seventeenth century his ambiguity and mysteriousness have been raising a number of

questions that might never be fully and satisfactorily answered.

        Seemingly one of the Senecan ghosts, “pale, colorless beings introduced merely

to create an atmosphere of horror” (Hankins 131), and crying for revenge, the Ghost of

King Hamlet, who “is, in a sense, a return to Kyd’s Ghost” (Hallet 59), significantly

exceeds the role and impact of Don Andrea’s Ghost. To begin with, this Ghost “does

not [just] frame the action… [he not only] dominates the initial stage of the play”

(Maslen 3), but he is “the prime mover of the action in this play, from start to finish”

(Austin 79). Although he only appears on the stage in the first act, and then in the closet

scene, his presence is felt through the whole play. “He is there not in person, but in

principle, so to speak; not visible all the time, but all the time perceptible – by the task

he has laid on his son’s shoulders… He is the originator of the task – and what happens

with the task, its ups and downs, the near miss, the near fulfillment, that is the play”

(Flatter 6).

        At the very beginning the Ghost enters the play in the lines of a minor character:

“What, has this thing appeared again tonight?” (1.1.21) A few lines later “this thing”,

“this dreaded sight” (25), “this apparition” (28) appears on the stage: “Look where it

comes again” (1.1.40). The audience carefully watches the strange specter together with

Horatio, and feels the same anxiety as he does: “it harrows me with fear and wonder”

(1.1.44). It does not take more than fifty lines without a single word for the Ghost, the

                                             21

usurper of the night (1.1.46), to establish the tone of the play. The uneasiness of the

characters caused by this “intervention from another world” (Hankins 132) reflects the

anxiety of the audience about the perception of Death. The main role of the Ghost lies in

intervening in the life of Hamlet; he is the driving power, the key necessary to start the

car that, once in motion, cannot be stopped. The relationship of the Ghost and Hamlet

resembles that of Revenge and Andrea’s Ghost. The interaction of the two in both cases

is an essential prerequisite for the plots to happen. The Ghost’s role depends on his

interpretation and understanding by the characters, in this instance by Hamlet. The

Ghost is perceived in different ways, but, nevertheless, his main function remains the

primary stimulus of the whole play.

       The relation of the Ghost to the other characters seems to partly follow the

pattern of The Spanish Tragedy. The influence of the Ghost is imposed via Hamlet, who

is connected with the other characters. This is the case with Revenge, whose impact on

Don Andrea is projected onto other characters via memory and substitution. The

obvious departure from the rule are three witnesses whose commentaries on the

apparition of the assumed King Hamlet help to set the mood of the play as well as to

provide the audience with different points of views. The perception of the Ghost by

Horatio, Marcellus and Barnardo as well as Hamlet gives the audience the necessary

clues it needs for interpreting and understanding the specter. The problem is that we are

given far more clues than we like, and a conflict of comprehension arises.

       The essential fact is that “[e]veryone believes in ghosts” (Austin 80). What we

are trying to understand here is not one of our neighbours or friends, it is not really a

human at all, it is a ghost, and “[a] ghost is a problematic phenomenon, less substantial

than a human of flesh and blood, but much more powerful. A ghost is a disturbance.

Disturbed himself, this ghost creates a profound disturbance in all who see him” (Austin

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80). Above all the Ghost disturbs the audience. To know what the Ghost represents for

the characters is crucial for understanding his role in the play, and what he represents

for the characters mirrors the perception and attitudes of the audience. Despite Walter

King’s statement that “the identity of the ghost is secondary to its effect upon Hamlet”

(25), it is obvious that the knowledge of the Ghost’s identity is the condition upon

which the subsequent effect depends. Hamlet needs to know if he can trust what the

Ghost says and so to be sure of his identity: “I’ll have grounds / More relative than this”

(2.2.615). Here begins the search for the Ghost’s as well as Hamlet’s identity, the search

for hidden truth that goes on the whole play.

       In determining the nature of the King Hamlet’s Ghost, I found useful the

approach of John Erskine Hankins who divides the Elizabethan ghost lore into five

different theories, and “hints of all these theories appear in Hamlet” (134). They

represent the popular beliefs held by Elizabethan audience.

       1. All supernatural apparitions, including ghosts, have no objective existence

          whatsoever. They are hallucinations of a diseased ‘fantasy’ or imagination

          and are usually perceived when the mind is affected by some abnormal

          condition of the body. (134)

       2. The Ghost’s appearance is a physical phenomenon portending danger to the

          state. It is of the same nature as the appearance of the comet, the falling of

          bloody dew… all of which are ominous of great crisis in national affairs. (142)

       3. The Ghost is the ‘spirit’ of the deceased, stirred from its sleep in the grave by

          a vague consciousness of some earthly mission, after the performance of

          which it can find rest. (151)

       4. The Ghost is the actual soul of the elder Hamlet, returned from purgatory in

          full possession of all his faculties to bring a message to his son. (157)

                                            23

5. The Ghost is an evil demon who attempts to ensnare Hamlet’s soul by

          inducing him to commit a horrible crime. (166)

The first two possibilities, as will be illustrated, can be easily dismissed. We are left

with three remaining alternatives that are never in the course of the play fully testified.

We cannot decide, and we challenge every possibility. In the end, there is nothing else

certain than the fact that none of these possibilities is defendable. The whole play is

about uncertainty and doubts that are passed on to the audience.

       Let us turn to the very start of the play where we encounter the Ghost for the

first time, and where we are given the first clues to his identity. Barnardo and Marcellus

report their experience of seeing a ghost to Horatio, who challenges them, stating that it

must have been their imagination only, mere “fantasy” (1.1.23). Perhaps Horatio

believes that Barnardo and Marcellus have their minds clouded from excessive

celebration of the royal wedding and therefore “will not let belief take hold of him”

(1.1.24). Together with Horatio we shall soon find out that the fantasy materializes itself

into the “fair and warlike” (1.1.47) apparition that leaves a great question mark behind.

The significance here does not lie in Barnardo and his friend, but in preventing any later

doubts about Hamlet. He is the most vulnerable character, with a mind having been

completely absorbed in grief, anxiety, and confusion. As John Wilks aptly puts it,

Hamlet’s grief over his father’s death suppresses his reason, and he is ready to follow

his passion against “the laws of heaven and nature” (105). His mind is susceptible to a

belief in anything that would override his grief. He is eager to replace the fact of Death

by whatever is offered him, and Horatio suspects so: “He waxes desperate with

imagination” (1.4.87). We know that the Ghost is real, three other people saw him, “he

has an objective reality” (Hallet 60). Still, the conversation between Hamlet and the

Ghost is without witnesses. The question of the Ghost’s existence is answered, but his

                                             24

essence and purpose are not. Hamlet is called by a silent apparition (1.4.84), and the

nature of the call remains hidden.

       By the second approach the King Hamlet’s Ghost is an omen that foreshadows

some disaster coming to the world of men. As Horatio observes, it is similar to the

events “A little ere the mightiest Julius fell” (1.1.114), “when all the sway of earth /

Shakes like a thing unfirm” (Julius Caesar 1.3.3-4), signifying that “the world, too

saucy with the gods, / Incenses them to send destruction” (JC 1.3.12-13). The same way

the appearance of the Ghost might be a messenger from “up there” to foretell some

tragedy: “This bodes some strange eruption to our state” (1.1.69). We are here presented

with the clue of “folk tradition of ghost lore; [Barnardo and Marcellus] fear the Ghost,

they know that its appearance is important” (Atchley 10). We also know that it might be

connected with their country: “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” (1.4.90).

       Horatio is acquainted with the third theory as well. Challenging the Ghost to

speak, he proposes a possible explanation of his appearance. One of them, already

mentioned, relates to the “country’s fate” (1.1.133). Another one that touches on

religious issues shall be discussed later. The last left, “thou hast uphoarded in thy life /

Extorted treasure in the womb of earth, / For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in

death” (1.1.136-138), suggests, as Atchley says, that the Ghost came back to take care

of something he left behind (11), to “oversee [his] familial, financial, and political

legacies” (Ornstein 78). Another possible explanation may be associated with the

deceased person mourning for the life in a human shell, “nothing other than his own

remains” (Watson 1994: 79). Such might be the case with the Ghost, who cries for “All

[his] smooth body” (1.5.73).

       There are a few clues presented that might lead to the conclusion that the Ghost,

as the fourth possibility suggests, comes from Purgatory, and Anthony Low agrees with

                                             25

this eventuality (453). First, there is one of the explanations suggested by Horatio who

addresses the Ghost “as if it were a troubled purgatorial spirit seeking rest for its soul”

(Atchley 10): “If there be any good thing to be done / That may to thee do ease and

grace to me” (1.1.130-131) If this hint is not sufficient, there is another indication

provided by the Ghost himself: “I’m thy father’s spirit, / Doomed for a certain term to

walk the night, / … Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature / Are burnt and

purged away” (1.5.9-13). A few lines later he explains why he is caught inbetween

Heaven and Hell: “Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, / Unhouseled, disappointed,

unaneled / … With all my imperfections on my head” (1.5.76-79). King Hamlet was

murdered while asleep, and was thus not ready for the afterlife; he was “deprived of his

chance to receive three of the Sacraments that would have prepared him to face death

and individual judgment” (Low 454). Finally, Hamlet gives us the last clue concerning

Purgatory, “by Saint Patrick… / It is an honest ghost” (1.5.136-138). As Stephen

Greenblatt mentions in his work, Saint Patrick was closely associated with Purgatory,

and the Elizabethan audience would have no problems in recognizing “the patron saint

of Purgatory” (233-234). Hamlet then assumes that the Ghost must be an honest good

spirit who came to ask his son for help on his way to Heaven. Despite all the evidence

there are many other hints that refute them all, and invite the final possibility.

       Following the last of the theories, let us trace the allusions that might suggest a

demonic nature of the Ghost. When Horatio sees the thing that looks “like the king”

(1.1.43), he dares to address it and call upon it: “By heaven I charge thee, speak”

(1.1.49). He hopes that it might be perhaps a good spirit that “cannot speak until he has

been charged to do so in the name of God” (Prosser 114). There are two possibilities.

Either the Ghost is too proud to talk to Horatio, who is not of royal blood, or the

mention of Heaven prompts an evil spirit to leave. Nevertheless, the Ghost returns and

                                             26

Horatio decides to cross its path again. After a vain attempt to make it speak, the silent

apparition suddenly vanishes again: “’Tis gone” (1.1.142). An explanation is offered

immediately stating that “it” left “when the cock crew” (1.1.147) behaving “like a guilty

thing” (1.1.148). As Eleanor Prosser states, the audience is here presented with a

popular belief that “only hellish spirits were banished by the light of the sun” (109), and

what else can the crowing of the cock mean than the outset of a new day. When Hamlet

eventually comes on stage to meet the strange specter, the thought of possibly evil

nature of the apparition crosses his mind: “Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned”

(1.4.40). However, he is eager to accept the identity of the Ghost as his father: “I’ll call

thee Hamlet, / King, father, royal Dane” (1.4.44-45). Still, the heavy burden that was set

by the Ghost of King Hamlet upon his only son compels Hamlet to reassure himself of

the true nature of the apparition. “The spirit that I have seen / May be a devil, and the

devil hath power / T’assume a pleasing shape… / [in order to] to damn me” (2.2.611-

614). By presenting the mousetrap for Claudius, he wants to find out if what the Ghost

says is true, and if it is indeed an honest spirit. Hamlet is both wise and foolish, because

his interpretation of the commonly known truth about demons lacks a second half. He

sees just one face of a two-faced fact. As Wilson points out, devils can use the form of

the deceased person “in order to work bodily or spiritual harm upon those to whom they

appeared” (62), which is one of the faces that Hamlet clearly observes. There is, still,

another face left. Not only can an evil spirit take on someone’s likeness to harm, but it

will do whatever to lead one’s soul to damnation, since “the instruments of darkness tell

us truths only to betray us in deepest consequence” (Wilks 104).

       The last clue that I would like to present can easily override the preceding

evidence. It lies in the Ghost’s speech. Although he is trying to present himself as a

good spirit of Hamlet’s father, possibly from Purgatory, there is no doubt left about the

                                             27

speculation of whether he is or is not a purgatorial spirit after we hear the command

directed to his son: “Revenge his [thy father’s] foul and most unnatural murder”

(1.5.25). Whatever he says, the Ghost has now closed the door to Purgatory as the

eventual place of his residence: “‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord”

(Romans 12:19).3 Consequently, “[i]f a ghost urges something against the teaching of

the Church, it is surely demonic” (Prosser 111), and what is more, Purgatory “is utterly

incompatible with a Senecan call for vengeance” (Greenblatt 237). I agree with Norman

Austin that “[t]he Ghost in this play is not in purgatory, whatever definition of

purgatory we choose” (86)4. There are at least two other instances insinuating that the

disturbing specter might come from Hell. One occurs in act 1.5 where Hamlet urges

Horatio and his two companions to swear that they will not reveal what they have seen

and heard. The Ghost intervenes by crying from under the stage: “Swear” (1.5.149). In

the Elizabethan time the stage of the theatre was divided in three parts: Heaven, Earth,

and Hell. Since the Ghost makes himself heard from the space under the stage, that

signifies Hell, he is apparently “acting like a devil” (Prosser 140). Even though, on one

hand, all this evidence does suggest that the Ghost is not a good spirit coming from

neither Heaven nor Purgatory, it is not, on the other hand, quite certain that he must

necessarily be of an evil nature. Even Walter King argues that “the very humanness of

the ghost’s emotional outpouring suggests the contrary” (30).

        Before coming to conclusion about the Ghost’s origin, identity, and nature, it is

important to have an insight into the audience’s attitude to what they see, and to what

degree their comprehension is influenced by the clues provided. For if we want to fully

3
 http:// bibleresources.bible.com/passagesearchresults.php?passage1=Romans+12:19&version=49#cen-
NASB-28265B
4
 For further discussion of whether the Ghost is or is not of purgatorial nature see: Stephen Greenblatt’s
Hamlet in Purgatory.

                                                    28

understand the Ghost and his meaning, we have to look at him through the eyes of the

Elizabethan spectators and consider their beliefs and the time they lived in. As was

mentioned in the introduction, England, at the time when Hamlet was written, was a

country of conflicting religious beliefs. Still, regardless of their religious persuasions,

Elizabethans shared a common view of revenge. Not only does it touch on the question

of justice, but it also deals with one of the burning subjects of that time, Death. As far as

justice is concerned, the Ghost might be viewed as a reminder for Hamlet as a duty to

avenge his ancestor. Although the time, in general, was against any kind of private

revenge, the medieval belief in individual justice was not completely eradicated. As

Prosser puts it, “[t]he Elizabethan audience may have entered the theatre doubting that

revenge was justified, but it was probably ready to be convinced” (35). There lies the

conflict and tragedy that drew the audience to the theatre to watch a revenge tragedy.

They knew that “[t]o do what the Ghost asks is to risk damnation, to avoid it seems like

cowardice [“Am I a coward?” (2.2.582)], and to escape the whole problem through

suicide is only to arrive back at square one – doing damnation” (Hallet and Hallet 189).

It is much of an interest to watch and judge some current issue if one is not directly

involved.

       Unlike The Spanish Tragedy where the identity of the Ghost is not a riddle, and

where the audience can focus primarily on the question of revenge, Hamlet urges its

spectators to wonder, doubt, and search the identity of the Ghost; and they do so,

principally for the reason, as Charles Hallet states, that “Hamlet himself seeks the

source of the Ghost’s authority” (60). Hamlet invites both the Protestants and Catholics

to examine the apparition according to their beliefs and superstitions. Prosser presents

her readers with a Catholic and Protestant approach to the nature of the Ghost. They

correspond in three of the four possible explanations. Either the Ghost is a hallucination,

                                             29

an angel’s spirit, or a devil. The additional Catholic interpretation is, of course, that the

specter is a spirit of the dead, and before the Reformation, obeying such commands

would be seen as a sacred duty (106-109). Even using all the clues given, it still might

be hard for the audience to determine the Ghost’s nature. Presented with three witnesses

to the Ghost’s reality, they can reject the delusion theory. Still, the role of illusion is not

yet completely put aside. Although we are convinced of the existence of the apparition,

its nature is open to interpretation: Hamlet “[o]ut of [his] weakness and [his]

melancholy” (2.2.613) can be misled by his grief, “deluded by his senses” (Prosser 110).

There is only a small possibility that King Hamlet could reside in Elizabethans’ minds

as a good spirit, because we do not meet the Ghost in any other time but at night, and as

Marcellus points out, “no [evil] spirit… / …. nor witch hath power to charm” (1.1.163)

in the time of daylight. Though the idea of a purgatorial spirit would be denied by

Protestants, Catholics might have secretly believed in its existence. Nevertheless, the

evidence presented above objects to such a presumption. What we are left with is the

option of an evil spirit.

        However convincing the proofs leading to such a conclusion, there is one

important presumption that can disprove them. To condemn the Ghost as demonic

disrupts the concept of a revenge tragedy. If we concede that he is a devil, the richness

and fascination we have experienced so far will diminish, and “thus [we together with

the audience] reject the devil theory” (West 67). What William Shakespeare does here is

simultaneously offer his audience all plausible interpretations of King Hamlet’s origin,

and at the same time undermining all the adduced evidence. It does not only make the

play more appealing, it also makes the audience search the different meanings behind

the figure of the Ghost, and question its own beliefs.

                                              30

Revenge itself does not seem to be the primary concern here; rather, it covers a

more important matter, how to deal with Death, and the associated questions of

remembrance and identity. After the Reformation, there was, all of sudden, a gap

between the world of the dead and the living. Purgatory had provided the path between

the two worlds, and secured the link. With the bridge pulled down, the black emptiness

raises questions. On one hand, what is going to happen to those close to us after they die,

and on the other hand, how can the deceased stay in touch with those alive. If they lose

touch, how can one prevent the utter oblivion of those who crossed the path? Not only

did “death bec[o]me a more absolute annihilation” (Neill 38), but “the blankness of

being forgotten was of all thoughts the most tormenting” (Spencer 135). Finishing his

long speech directed at Hamlet the Ghost utters two words: “Remember me” (1.5.91).

What is it that Hamlet should remember? From a Catholic point of view, Hamlet might

have been asked to remember his father through prayers. The problem is that Hamlet, as

one of the students “at Wittenberg, political base of Martin Luther and hotbed of radical

Reformation thought” (Atchley 11), never “openly reveals that he has heard of such a

place as Purgatory” (Low 459). However, it is more likely that he does know about such

a place as something forbidden and unreal, and as such it takes away the plausible

explanation of the happening after one’s death. To remember might then be a call from

blank nothingness echoing the fear of not being which equals being forgotten, the

anxiety of one’s identity. Above all, it might be a reminder that all human beings who

“are notoriously ready to disbelieve in their own mortality” (Watson 1994: 29) are,

nevertheless, mortal. The nature of the Ghost seems to reflect it all.

       It is not, then, important what or who the apparition is; the significance lies in

what it embodies. The Ghost of King Hamlet bitterly complains that he was robbed

“[o]f life [his immortality], of crown [his identity], of queen [his remembrance]”

                                            31