What’s Hecuba to Shakespeare?^*

Abstract

When Hamlet reflects on the charged power of the tragic theater, the figure who haunts his imagination is Hecuba, Queen of Troy, whose tragedy came to define the genre in sixteenth-century Europe. As a bereaved mourner who seeks revenge, Hecuba offers a female version of Hamlet. Yet even while underscoring her tragic power, Shakespeare simultaneously establishes a new model of tragic protagonist, challenging the period’s longstanding identification of tragedy with women. In exploring why both Hamlet and Shakespeare are preoccupied with Hecuba, this article argues that ignoring the impact of Greek plays in sixteenth-century England has left a gap in our understanding of early modern tragedy. Attending to Hecuba highlights Shakespeare’s innovations to a genre conventionally centered on female grief. In invoking Hecuba as an icon of tragedy, Shakespeare both reflects on and transforms women’s place in the genre.

“For One’s Offence Why Should so Many Fall”?: Hecuba and the Problems of Conscience in The Rape of Lucrece and Hamlet

“…Lucrece's identification with Hecuba is an act that involves self-transformation" (Kietzman 1999, p. 39). consequences, however. Tanya Pollard notes that "Euripides' Hecuba was by far the most popular of the Greek plays printed, translated, and performed in sixteenth-century Europe," and while throughout most of Euripides' play, Hecuba "evokes tragic pathos," she also "points to another model of tragedy: the triumph of action, and in particular, of revenge" (Pollard 2012(Pollard , pp. 1064(Pollard , 1067.…”

“…In Euripides' play, Hecuba finally turns from lament to revenge upon Polymestor, the king of Thrace who killed her son. "Capable of melting audiences and destroying kings, Hecuba offers a model of tragedy with both emotional and political power" (Pollard 2012(Pollard , p. 1074 and Hamlet clearly follows this model.…”