To give or not to give a one-star review? That can sometimes be the question when you are faced with reading and rating a classic that doesn’t live up to the glorious tales everyone has been telling about it.

And that’s especially true when it comes to one of Shakespeare’s most famous and highly renowned plays, Hamlet. Whether you love or hate Hamlet (or even just feel sort of meh about it), we can’t deny that it has a particularly large impact on popular culture, containing multiple turns of phrase that we still use regularly today.

I asked Ben to return and look up some bad reviews of Hamlet so that we could start talking about the aspects of the play people don’t like – and how it’s largely okay to not like a classic piece of literature.

Of course, he found some kind of ridiculous arguments, but overall the reviews serve as a nice reminder that Shakespeare can be difficult to understand, that certain characters in this place generate a lot of opinions, and even that the practice of publishing and copyright used to be different!

Also, a surprise appearance from T.S. Eliot.

Further Listening

One-Star Shakespeare (the original episode)

Shakespeare in Love with Guest Ben Roman (if you like listening to Ben)

Further Reading

“Hamlet” an essay by T.S. Eliot

Credit where credit is due

Podcast art by ⁠Halie Branson⁠

Music recording by ⁠josdvg⁠