Mikhail Bakhtin, a Marxist scholar, used the term carnivalesque to describe a dominating style or atmosphere through laughter and chaos. The original term carnival is Latin for carne vale, meaning farewell to the flesh. Within the Catholic Church, Lent is the growing season to deny oneself of physical pleasures such as smoking, sex, drinking, eating of a certain food, as a way to purge your body and bring the nature nearer to God. Being such a hard period for some the church, many began to store up prior to the season on the guilty pleasures. The customers began to indulge themselves before the season with all the current smoking, sex, taking in, and eating the body could handle. The thought was that if you indulged yourself on that with an extreme, then it might be easier to give it up the pleasure when the time came. Over time, the Church made the virtue a necessity and referred to it as a carnival. Feast of Fools it was called and the Claims have today's version with the special event of Mardi Gras. Bakhtin has a theory that the carnivalesque found in literature can be from the behavior that takes place in pop-culture carnivals. The public classes mingle to be able to take pleasure from the fleshly pleasures. Heaven and Hell mingle as does fact and illusion. Michael Bristol's article, "'Funeral bak'd-meats': Carnival and the Carnivalesque in Hamlet. " uses Bakhtin's made term to describe Hamlet in a manner that you may or may not trust.
Bristol uses the field in Hamlet when the united states is grieving the old king, yet celebrating the new ruler to spell it out a carnivalesque gesture. While Claudius executes such an appealing function with the carnival like festive, Hamlet rejects the manipulations of Claudius. He cannot understand the how people can enjoy and mourn at the same time. Hamlet, himself is not carnivalesque at this time in the play while some around him are.
Bristol then starts to discuss the "'funeral bak'd meats. . . [which] provide[ed] the relationship desks'" (356). From there he considers that Hamlet gradually begins his get caught in carnivalesque once he has wiped out for the first time. Later, Hamlet explains his sufferer Polonius, as being at the dinner table in a carnivalesque manner. Bristol persists the discussion of the slaughter of Polonius, focusing on worm imagery as a significant factor of the meats/food imagery previously mentioned. Through worms, the carnivalesque becomes almost cyclical; a worm eats a lifeless king, a fish eats the worm, and a beggar eats the worm that fed after the kings.
Bristol then talks about the gravedigger scene, as well as perhaps his best debate. Bristol is convinced the clowns, or grave-diggers, of the scene give voice to the fullest & most accurate interpretation of carnival because they themselves signify the "practical awareness of the normal people" (359). The theory that a ruler can be worm beef is laughable, and implies that the school of an individual can be studied away. Also the idea that the poor working category buries the ruler is a carnivalesque gesture.
Bristol also cases that Hamlet uses carnival to go against Claudius. He even compares Hamlet and Claudius as "two murderous clowns attempting to gain strategic gain above the other" (350). Bristol then cases that Claudius' makes an attempt to regulate the action, such as exiling Hamlet are futile, because "Carnival cannot be handled 'from above'"(356).
I believe that I must agree with a few of the points made from Bristol. You start with the funeral and the relationship; I do believe that it was a carnivalesque gesture. Claudius in my view was simply aiming to take the glory from the old ruler. In politics the simplest way to adopt people's minds off the tragedy is to bring out the best in a bad situation. A married relationship with a large event was a deceitful way of doing just that. What sort of people were easily distracted from mourning proved to me that the idea of the carnival in pop culture held to be true. We go to carnivals to feast on food, excitement, games, rides, and everyone pays the same price. If you lose at a casino game you simply just forget about it and move on to another thing that keeps your attention. I found this to be always a similar situation with the marriage of Claudius and Gertrude.
I do not assume that Hamlet changed carnivalesque only after eradicating Polonius. I think Hamlet started out his fall after the ghost of his dad told him the reality about Claudius. Before the truth came out, Hamlet was definitely upset in the loss of life of his daddy, but he didn't project to make a mockery of his mothers wedding and set out to seek revenge after Claudius. After the truth arrived Hamlet had modified once and for all. His views and his lifestyle had transformed, and people in his live were no more held to the same level they once were. When Hamlet wiped out Polonius it had not been associated with carnivalesque in my opinion. Hamlet was seeking revenge, and he designed to kill Claudius. Experienced he wiped out the right person, you wouldn't possess the dramatic ending the play provides. Instead when Hamlet killed Polonius, the play shifted marginally showing how everything in one person's life intermingles and affects not only you. I do however; feel that just how Claudius travelled about trying to capture Hamlet for the murder was a carnivalesque motion. It almost looked like as if the kingdom didn't service what Hamlet tried out preaching, but just wished to seek to destroy who the king had told them to. It was a party or a carnival if you will.
When Bristol made reference point with the worm food, it had not been only engaging, but I sensed his debate was legit. I can't say I completely agree with it, however. I have two different opinions about the declaration made. You are that I'd trust him because the truth is when you pass away, you are worm meat and your cultural class wouldn't normally suggest anything to the worms. The affirmation alone is very much indeed carnivalized. The second of my ideas would be that perhaps Hamlet is immune to death as so many in that time frame were. Maybe Hamlet was just agreeing to death.
The gravedigger scene I will consent was carnivalesque. Two poor men burying someone of high importance just says the storyline of how in the end it certainly doesn't matter who or what you did, we are all equal in the end. Also the very thought of getting to have a Christian burial when it was clear you weren't adhering to Christian morals is its way carnivalesque. It pokes fun of the individuals who are the real hypocrites, even in fatality.
The idea that Hamlet uses carnival to go up against Claudius can be an obvious gesture for me. Hamlet almost makes a mockery of Claudius. Hamlet also intends showing the whole kingdom what kind of an person Claudius is really by his actions. When Hamlet directs the play for the kingdom, he shadows the fatality of his dad and the marriage of the Claudius. The play was surely a carnivalesque gesture. This in my judgment is the first action Hamlet got to being carnivalesque.
While Bristol makes some very powerful arguments, I tend to not trust him fully. I like the idea that was provided; however, Personally i think that it was inadequately presented. Like a lot of things you read, it's always left to thoughts and opinions. Not everyone will always agree with your view. Hamlet to me was about individual emotions. Although it had the humor in it that may be carnivalesque, I don not see the intent of the play being is certainly a way. Just how Bristol came about his ideas was that Hamlet was written for the Marxist followers. I don't see how the two Marxism and Carnivalesque go together with each other, but I really do observe how you can connect the two back again to Hamlet separately. Overall, however, the idea of carnivalesque was very intriguing to me. The theory that you can visit a carnival and discover all classes of folks react and communicate the same as one another is a brilliant observation.
