Hamlet
William Shakespeare · 1601
Shakespeare's longest play and probably the most performed work in any language. A prince who thinks too much, a ghost who demands action, and a court rotting from within. It invented the modern interior monologue on stage. Four centuries on, every actor still wants a crack at the part.
The case against
Uncut, it runs four hours, and the fourth act sags while the prince is offstage with pirates. The revenge plot creaks under conventions Shakespeare inherited and only half believed in; Hamlet's delay is a problem the play poses brilliantly and declines to solve. You stay for the speeches and forgive the machinery.
Drama · the Pro canon
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
if this one calls to you, so will these →
