What Thinking Is Like in Hamlet (May 18)

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Description

As one of the most iconic literary works, William Shakespeare’s Hamlet is often rendered in the public imagination as a single clichéd image: a brooding young man holding a skull and talking to himself in totally abstract formulations, “To be or not to be….” Never mind that this image actually conflates two different scenes of the play; more importantly, Hamlet actually makes war against such deadening ideas about how thought works. In this talk, we will explore what thinking in Hamlet is really like: imbued with sociality, animated by feeling, and embedded in life. (Offered in the morning and afternoon on May 18.)

About the Faculty Lead

Dr. Rachel Eisendrath specializes in English Renaissance poetry. Her work explores problems of aesthetics and the history of poetic forms. Her first book, Poetry in a World of Things: Aesthetics and Empiricism in Renaissance Ekphrasis (University of Chicago Press, 2018), won the 2019 Elizabeth Dietz Award for the best publication in early modern studies; the chapter on Marlowe won the 2017-2018 Roma Gill Prize for the best publication in Marlowe studies. This book looks at elaborate literary descriptions, or ekphrases, against the background of the early modern rise of objectivity. Drawing on Adorno, the book explores the fraught relation between aesthetic form and an increasingly empiricist understanding of the historical world. Her second book, Gallery of Clouds, a creative meditation on Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, was published by New York Review Books in 2021. B.A. Harvard, M.A. St. John’s College, M.A. and Ph.D. The University of Chicago

Registration is Open Now!

Barnard alums (and individuals they invite) and families of current Barnard students can now register for the Spring 2024 Explorers Series — the inaugural Barnard|Next classes. Questions about participation can be addressed to barnardnext@barnard.edu.