R&J Clown Takes Special Edition—Hamlet/Horatio Parallels and The Migratory Slash Fandom
In which I focus on one particular clown take and see if it at least gives me a couple of chuckles/insightful meta. Today’s R&J Clown Takes comes a relatively rare but definitely not unheard-of crossover I’ve seen pop up every so often—supposed Hamlet/Horatio and R&J parallels, particularly their death scenes.
But all right, OP, I’ll bite. Let’s investigate whether these parallels are warranted.
So in R&J, Romeo goes on a fulsome speech before he drinks the potion. His last words before drinking the potion are these:
Romeo. Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide,
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy seasick weary barque
Here’s to my love. [Drinks the poison]
O true apothecary,
Thy drugs are quick! Thus with a kiss I die.
He kisses Juliet, then dies. Juliet wakes up after Romeo ends himself, the Friar pleads with her to go with her, Juliet rejects him, he leaves, and says this:
Juliet. What’s here? A cup closed in my true love’s hand?
Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end.
She then immediately tries to drink it. But it’s all gone.
Juliet. O churl!—drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after? I will kiss thy lips.
Haply some poison yet doth hang on them
To make me die with a restorative. [kisses Romeo]
Thy lips are warm!
Like Romeo, Juliet also kisses him. She then hears noise and decides to kill herself with Romeo’s dagger.
In the ~supposedly equivalent scene in Hamlet, Hamlet is dying from Laertes’ cut, and urgently tells Horario explicitly to tell his story to the world.
Hamlet. Horatio, I am dead,
Thou liv’st. Report me and my cause aright
To the unsatisfied.
Horatio. Never believe it.
I am more an antique Roman than a Dane.
Here’s yet some liquor left.
Horatio rejects Hamlet’s request (or rather command), comparing himself to an ancient Roman than a modern Dane—as in, a subordinate soldier to his commander. He then aims to drink the potion.
Hamlet. As thou’rt a man,
Give me the cup. Let go. By heaven, I’ll ha’t!
Hamlet not only rejects Horatio’s attempted suicide but also tries to stop him verbally and (implied) physically, by throwing the cup away from him. He then repeats his injunction:
Hamlet. O God, Horatio, what a wounded name,
Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me!
If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity a while
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain
To tell my story.
Hamlet’s “If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart” is clearly rhetorical, but it’s interesting that he still felt the need to ask him to mourn him and act as witness, as if he weren’t sure Horatio’s affection for him.
Apart from “there’s yet some poison/liquor” idea, I think it’s clear from these two death scenes that there is no true parallel. Romeo compares himself to a ship, a pilot, and explicitly calls Juliet his love. He dies on Juliet’s kiss. Juliet, waking up, tries to kill herself on his kiss before opting for the dagger. All throughout, the emphasis is on their love.
Meanwhile, Horatio compares himself to a Roman soldier, whose honor would compel him to commit suicide for his superior. Hamlet rejects the suicide but implicitly buttresses this general/lieutenant metaphor, giving him the command to “report” his story—like an actual general to his lieutenant. There is also a clear parallel/reference to Julius Caesar, written about a year before Hamlet, particularly Brutus’ commander’s honor suicide as well as Brutus’.
In any case, there are no kisses and unlike Juliet, Horatio does accept Hamlet’s command that he not kill himself (and, explicitly re:Hamlet, to “man up!”). For his part Hamlet is almost wholly concerned with his reputation, although he does acknowledge Horatio’s feelings and how difficult it would be for him to talk about his late friend.
If Shakespeare had wanted a true R&J parallel, one would assume he would have had Horatio drink the poison after Hamlet’s death. Or better yet, decide to use his dagger/sword and attempt to wound himself along with Hamlet, as Juliet did. But of course, that would have been OOC for Horatio, and go against the very quality Hamlet had praised him for—not being passion’s slave. Even his attempted suicide was logical—as in, it follows the logic of honor killing.
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For me the multi fandom experience is, being interested in one thing for example let‘s say I’m into Loki atm, but then I’m at my grandparents’ and we watch Star Trek, where I see Data and start catching Fandom-feels. So I’m thinking “maybe I’ll watch Star Trek while eating tonight. But instead of doing that I watch Romeo+Juliet for the 50th time which sends me off to reading fanfic until I go to sleep.
I wake up the next morning, my brother asks me to play a game with him, it‘s Pirate Worriors, so I start to look for One Piece fanfiction while we‘re still playing because my focus switched, while also still reading a Bencutio fanfiction from the night before. I scroll through tumblr on my search for content and bump into a Destiel edit, that emotionally destroys me so much that I want to start watching SPN again cuz all types of feelings are welcome as long as I feel something. The edit then reminds me of a Good Omens edit I made for myself some time ago and now I’m left at the table unsure of what I should watch while eating, cuz idk which road I wanna go down and nothing feels completely right.
Yeah.
And in the end I watch smth totally unrelated.
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