#hamlet staging notes

Horatio is a lower-class nobody running around the royal court. If he were Hamlet’s golden retriever, the play would go down exactly the same.

None of the upper-class characters talk to him (except Hamlet.) Osric makes a point to ignore him. Gertrude tells him to leave the room after he’s run her down and told her how to handle the Ophelia situation. She’s calling in Rosencranz and Guildenstern to check in on Hamlet like she has no idea he already has a friend already there. 

The whole class situation explains Horatio’s generally low opinion of himself. He’s a powerhouse at the beginning and at the end, he’s as brilliant as Hamlet... but he can’t see himself as Hamlet’s equal. Introducing himself as “your poor servant ever,”  hitting the “my lord” so much harder than everyone else? Not playing with Hamlet when he has the mind for it? I think he’s dealing with some internalized classism, same as Iago in Othello. (Iago and Horatio have a lot of superficial similarities. I actually think you can make a good case that Iago is Dark Horatio.) 

Horatio is also interesting because - in a play about different kinds of bad parents - he is the only main character with no parents or parental figures of any kind. So what’s he doing here? 

He’s not here for the plot. He’s here for the theme. Horatio is left calling the shots at the end when society collapses because Society is Horatio’s “bad parent.” It was thing that kept him silent, and away from Hamlet. It is triumphant when Fortinbras (who is Hamlet, but with good parents) comes in at the end and listens. There’s hope for the world after all.