Hamlet, prince of Denmark. Shakespeare's play was last presented on the Genesius Guild stage in Lincoln Park in the summer of 2019. For today's presentation, you will hear the story of the play along with excerpts from the play.

Tales from Shakespeare:

In the early 19thcentury, the Romantic poet Charles Lamb and his sister Mary embarked on an enterprise to retell the stories of Shakespeare's best-loved plays for a children's audience. Charles took the tragedies, and Mary took the comedies, and together they produced a best-selling reinterpretation of the Bard's works, Tales from Shakespeare, that achieved the status of classics in their own right. They were meant to be introductions to the study of the plays themselves: As the Lambs wrote in a preface on the subject of the benefits their own retelling, but much more so the plays themselves, would provide: "What these Tales shall have been to the young readers, that and much more it is the writers' wish that the true Plays of Shakespeare may prove to them in older years—enrichers of the fancy, strengtheners of virtue, a withdrawing from all selfish and mercenary thoughts, a lesson of all sweet and honorable thoughts and actions, to teach courtesy, benignity, generosity, humanity: for of examples, teaching these virtues, his pages are full."

Now, here's a challenge: Given the Lambs' intention to retell the stories for an audience of children, can you detect any ways this has possibly affected the storyline of the play or the presentation of the characters?

Today we present to you "Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," in the Lambs' retelling, narrated by Dee Canfield; and interspersed with the Lambs' text, excerpts from Shakespeare's original play, performed by actors from the Genesius Guild's 2019 production of Hamlet.

Credits:

Narrator (reader of Lamb) - Dee Canfield

Hamlet - Andrew Bruning

Ghost - Mischa Hooker

Ophelia - Sarah Willie

Claudius - Phillip Dunbridge

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor - Mischa Hooker

Transition music: John Dowland, "Flow, My Tears," performed by Jon Sayles [jsayles.com]

Theme music: Chopin, Waltz in A flat Major, Opus 69, number 1, performed by Olga Gurevich.