Hamlet (legend)
Hamlet is a figure in Scandinavian romance and the hero of Shakespeare's tragedy, Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.
The chief authority for the legend of Hamlet is Saxo Grammaticus, who devotes to it parts of the third and fourth books of his Gesta Danorum, completed at the beginning of the 13th century. There are no means of determining whether Saxo derived his information in this case from oral or written sources.
Read more about Hamlet (legend): Saxo's Version, Chronicon Lethrense and Annales Lundenses, Prose Edda, Other Scandinavian Versions, Parallels in Britain and Ireland, Belleforest's Tragedies
Famous quotes containing the word hamlet:
“If I had any doubts at all about the justice of my dislike for Shakespeare, that doubt vanished completely. What a crude, immoral, vulgar, and senseless work Hamlet is. The whole thing is based on pagan vengeance; the only aim is to gather together as many effects as possible; there is no rhyme or reason about it.”
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910)