translation studies. retrospective and prospective views

emphasising her “melodious lay” (IV, 7, 181-182). Ophelia’s death is
presented by means of floral symbolism, which she invoked in her round of
farewells and which has wreathed her in a special fragrance from her first
scene to her burial.
Hamlet’s and Ophelia’s madness raise the question of death by
suicide. There is a contrast between Ophelia’s mad suicide and Hamlet’s
contemplated one. Ophelia’s suicide is described by Gertrude as accidental
(“an envious sliver broke” – IV, 7, 172), passive, involuntary, mad.
Madness renders suicide innocent, while Hamlet’s calm contemplation of
suicide turns this act into a sin and a crime.
Death can be the result not only of disease, poison and sickness, but
also of rotteness, corruption and decay. In the first part of the play, the
atmosphere of corruption and decay is presented in a more general way.
Marcellus says: “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” (I, 5, 90). The
imagery of decay used here foreshadows that the king’s throne (the state of
Denmark) is on shaky ground because Hamlet will shortly find out that his
father was murdered and not bitten by a snake, as it was originally
thought ; it also reveals an atmosphere of growing suspicion (something is
rotten).
Hamlet declares in Act I how the world appears to him: “….ah fie, ‘tis
an unweeded garden/ That grows to seed; things rank and gross in
nature/Possess it merely.” (I, 2, 135-137) The image of the weeds (in the
word “unweeded”) is related to sickness and it appears two more times in
the play. The Ghost tells Hamlet: “And duller shouldst thou be than the fat
weed/That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf.” (I, 5, 33-34) The same image
follows that of the ulcer in the dialogue between Hamlet and his mother:
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place,
Whiles rank corruption, mining all within,
Infects unseen…
…do not spread the compost on the weeds
To make them ranker. (III, 4, 149-154)
He continues by presenting his view upon the world in Act II:
…and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly
frame the earth seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent
canopy the air, look you, this brave o’ercharging firmament, this
majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appeareth nothing to
me but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. (II, 2, 297-303)
In the graveyard scene, Hamlet meditates on “how long a man will
lie in the earth ere he rot.” (V, 1, 158) Even when he speaks of himself, he
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