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DARK LADY PLAYERS WORKING PAPER (2009) NUMBER 1
HAMLET; THE ANNUNCIATION SCENES
Opheliasewing sceneBiblical Allegory Astronomical AllegoryOpheliareading scene/kissing carrion/nunneryCOMMENT
We need to understand both the astronomical allegory as well as the Biblical allegory toget the full meaning.Hamlet as the son of Hyperion is Helios, the sun. In the annunciation scene Hamletstares at Ophelia and oddly walks while still looking at her backwards over his shoulder (a retrograde movement?). There are ‘sun beamed eyes’ in LLL 5,2,170-1 in a sectionwhich contrasts the sunshine of one’s face with the other’s face as a moon. Hamlet’seyes “bended their LIGHT” on her. Hamlet is the sun, and this is a split annunciationscene in which Ophelia gets pregnant by his sun rays, like the Virgin Mary, like a sun-god kissing carrion. The passage also echoes passages from an apocryphal gospelannunciation scene.Staging. The cuts. Sun beams (torches?) clothed with the sun? maggots? do the ‘as Iwas sewing in my closet’ passage as an inset dumbshow of the sun impregnating thevirgin?Handpuppets? Hamlet as devil—being from hell, and sugaring over the devil?
REFERENCES(1) BIBLICAL/RELIGIOUS ALLEGORY
Conception is a Blessing  Author(s): Evan K. GibsonSource: PMLA
 
, Vol. 64, No. 5 (Dec., 1949), pp. 1236-1238 
Medieval theologians thought the way that the sun can create worms in rotting flesh wasa symbol of Christ, who was born of flesh, without sperm. The conception of the virginMary was imagined as if sunlight shining through glass—in that sunlight can penetratebut not cause physical damage, thus Mary could have conceived and maintained her virginity.
Hamlet's "God Kissing Carrion": A Theory of the Generation of Life Author(s): John E. HankinsSource: PMLA, Vol. 64, No. 3 (Jun., 1949), pp. 507-516 
Hamlet goes from his comment about the maggots in the dog, directly to a reference toconception and Ophelia, linking both these attributes.
Painted Women: Annunciation Motifs in Hamlet R Chris Hassel Jr. Comparative Drama. Kalamazoo:Spring 1998. Vol. 32,. 1, p. 47-84 (38 pp.)
Polonius and Claudius set Ophelia up with a book. In most representations of theannunciation the virgin holds a book. Ophelia is asked to show “devotion’s visage”,
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