Quote:
Originally Posted by meeera
Do you think so? I think it's a prime example of a truly transformative work.
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Sorry, I truly cannot say. I read hamlet but have never seen Tom Stoppard's play. I was going by the Wikipedia article.
Quote:
The main source of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead is Shakespeare's Hamlet. Comparisons have also been drawn to Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot,[3] for the presence of two central characters who almost appear to be two halves of a single character. Many plot features are similar as well: the characters pass time by playing Questions, impersonating other characters, and interrupting each other or remaining silent for long periods of time.
Title[edit]
The title is taken directly from the final scene of Shakespeare's Hamlet. In earlier scenes, Prince Hamlet, having been exiled by the treacherous King of Denmark (his uncle, who murdered Hamlet's father to obtain the throne) to England and discovering en route a letter from the King carried by his old but now untrusted friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, which letter implored from England Hamlet's death upon his arrival, rewrote the letter to command Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's death and escaped, returning to Denmark. By the end of Shakespeare's play, Prince Hamlet, Laertes, Ophelia, Polonius, King Claudius and Gertrude all lie dead. An ambassador from England arrives to bluntly report "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead" (Hamlet. Act V, Scene II, line 411) and so they join all the stabbed, poisoned, and drowned key characters. By the end of Hamlet, Horatio is the only main figure left alive.
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I am sure it is wonderful and unique in many ways but I am still inclined to think it is derivative to a fair extent. I only mentioned it as hardcastle used it as an example of an important derivative work and I was agreeing with him that many derivative works are worthwhile.
Helen