ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS

`Taint not thy mind' in Hamlet

by

Michael Socrates Moran

Master of Fine Arts in Theatre and Dance (Directing)

University of California, San Diego, 2015

Professor Gabor Tompa, Chair

The play Hamlet is a trap of mirrors for both its characters and the artists that produce it. Like Hamlet, working on this play felt like the inevitable 'walking into one's grave' and thereupon begin suffering the abject terror of unknown consequences. It is a trap of mirrors because it reflects back our unpleasant and inescapable darkness. It transfixes the imagination to observe the anguish the noble prince Hamlet endures. He who wishes to illuminate the world must navigate his dark side and the dark side of others.

I directed Hamlet because I wanted to understand the transformation of Hamlet in the fifth act. I lived in terror of producing this play. However, I developed at least a

modest awareness of the inevitable limitations that adhere to its production. The play is either too introspective or too extroverted. The wrongdoings are either minor or profligate. Also, some of the shortcomings and wrongdoings are not susceptible to change. The awareness of our failings transforms our relationship with the world. Is it possible that the trap of mirrors ceases to affect us so violently once we see the darkness the mirrors reveal about ourselves?

At the end of the day, a proverb by the monk, Martin Luther, seems applicable to Hamlet's journey, to the play's history and to all the collaborators who worked so diligently: `Sin bravely'. If the root meaning of the word `sin' is to miss the mark, then perhaps we `sin bravely' because it is only by missing the mark, by walking into the unknown and by facing our terror, that we might be saved.