Hamlet: Video Introduction

Thank you to Ralph Alan Cohen of the American Shakespeare Center for providing our introduction to Hamlet.

Ralph Alan Cohen is Co-Founder and Director of Mission of the ASC, Emeritus Professor of English at James Madison University, and currently Gonder Professor of Shakespeare at Mary Baldwin University, where he founded the graduate program in Shakespeare and Performance.

He was project director for the building of the Blackfriars Playhouse and has directed 30 productions of plays by Shakespeare and his contemporaries. He founded the Studies Abroad program at James Madison University, where he won Virginia’s award for outstanding faculty. He has directed four scholar summer institutes on Shakespeare and staging sponsored by the National Endowment forthe Humanities. He is the author of ShakesFear and How to Cure It: The Complete Handbook for Teaching Shakespeare.

In 2001, he established the Blackfriars Conference. He has received numerous awards and fellowships including the Governor’s Arts Award with ASC Co- founder Jim Warren (2008), the Theo Crosby Fellowship at Shakespeare’s Globe in London (2009), the Folger Shakespeare Library’s Shakespeare Steward Award (2013), and the Globe’s Sam Wanamaker award — the first American to receive this honor (2014). He earned his undergraduate degree at Dartmouth College and his doctorate at Duke University, where he received the outstanding alumni award in 2016.

Many thanks to my friend Joey Bianco of Whim Wham for the animated video elements.

Hamlet: Additional Resources

Hamlet by Dan HainsworthThere is a world of resources for Hamlet out there, so this list barely scratches the surface. That said, here are some of the types of resources I normally share, to enhance your experience of Hamlet:

Thanks for Dan Hainsworth for letting us use his Shakespeare icons, as shown above right.

Hamlet: From the Folger Archive

Enjoy these Hamlet images from the Folger Shakespeare Library. Find more here.

Hamlet in the Queen’s chamber [graphic]. by William Salter Herrick.
[Julia Marlowe as Ophelia in Shakespeare’s Hamlet] [graphic] / White.
Hamlet, IV, 7, Ophelia falling into the water [graphic] / [Johann Heinrich Ramberg].
Hamlet [a set of 121 original drawings] [graphic] / John Austen.
Hamlet [a set of 121 original drawings] [graphic] / John Austen.
Hamlet, a set of 13 original drawings [graphic] / [Byam Shaw].
Hamlet, Sarah Bernhardt as [graphic]
John Barrymore as Hamlet [graphic] / Bert Sharkey.
John Barrymore as Hamlet [in Shakespeare’s play of the same name] [graphic].
[Edwin Booth as Hamlet] [graphic].
Edwin Booth [as] Hamlet [graphic].