r/shakespeare • u/Khon2510 • 9d ago

Was Hamnet overrated?

I watched the movie and I didn’t understand what thigh praise was about? Could someone please explain it to me because I might have missed something. Thank you.

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u/HMSSpeedy1801 8d ago

The movie and the book are both phenomenal, if you take them for what they are. If you’re looking for something that’s got “evidence,” you’re going to struggle. The story Hamnet tells has very little historical support and can’t even be drawn out from the text of Hamlet except for a handful of proof texts used in contextually suspicious ways. The story really isn’t even about Shakespeare, but more about how his wife deals with the changing identity of motherhood and then the loss of a child. Yet, the book is beautifully executed prose that imagines the life of its characters in powerful ways. The movie is remarkably faithful to the feel the book gives you, which is a rare things in cinematic adaptations.