2.1 Hamlet (2007)
2.1.4 The Duel Scene
As the last scene in Hamlet, the duel scene not only provides the climax of the play but marks a tragic epilogue composed of revenge, killing, and sacrifice in the end.
Everything that has been hidden under the masks of kawaii faces are now totally revealed in the fencing match. Furthermore, the significance of Hamlet’s death leaves to the readers to ponder whether he dies meaningfully or not.
In the beginning of the duel scene, Hamlet hits Laertes several times and wins the first round. To celebrate for Hamlet, Claudius puts a pearl in the cup. However, Hamlet rejects him. When Laertes sees the cup, he becomes astonished, indicating that he has already known that wine is poisoned. In addition, the depiction of Claudius gnashing his teeth in anger also proves that the wine is poisoned. Later on, seeing Hamlet’s excellent performance, Gertrude is so glad that she shares her happiness with Claudius while he only replies, “Our son will win” (5.2.229) with a stiff face which is drawn in half black, showing his fury and anxiety.
After a while, Hamlet hits Laertes again, and Gertrude wants to drink wine for Hamlet’s victory. As she prepares to drink, Claudius abruptly shouts out: “Gertrude, do not drink!” (5.2.233). Claudius’s behavior indicates that he does not merely regard
9 In Q1, there is a stage direction indicating that Hamlet leaps into the coffin after Laertes. However, in Q2, there is no such a stage direction. Here, in the manga version, the readers can observe that both Laertes and Hamlet wrestle in the coffin beside Ophelia’s dead body.
Gertrude as a tool to help him enthroned. He really loves her. Yet, Gertrude does not listen to her husband. Her rejection to Claudius’ dissuasion reveals their marital disharmony. After Gertrude is accidentally poisoned to death, and Laertes is wounded by his own poisoned sword, Claudius’s filthy murder and scheme can no longer be concealed and he becomes the main target for everyone to blame.
Unlike the plot in the original text that Claudius is killed by Hamlet himself, in the manga version, Horatio joins the battle and assists Hamlet. To kill Claudius, Horatio subdues Claudius from his back and lets Hamlet force Claudius to drink the poisoned wine. In this scene, we can see Horatio shows his courage and loyalty to Hamlet. Also, before Horatio wants to commit suicide and follows Hamlet to die, Hamlet dissuades him and asks him to live on and tell his story: “And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain. / To tell my story” (5.2.290-91). The reason is because that Hamlet wants to die meaningfully like a hero and be remembered and recorded in the history.
At last, Hamlet utters, “The rest is silence,” and he dies (5.2.300). Not before long, a warlike noise comes from the outside, and Fortinbras comes in. When Fortinbras appears on the panel, he is posited in the middle part of the frame surrounded by four close-ups of the dead bodies (Gertrude, Claudius, Laertes, and Hamlet). The effect of this arrangement highlights Fortinbras’s surprise upon seeing the bloody corpses. In this way, the readers can also experience the horrifying tragedy again instead of quickly reading through the process of killing.
In the end of the scene, Horatio narrates to Fortinbras what has happened in Denmark, and Fortinbras buries Hamlet like a soldier accompanied by “the soldier’s music and the rites of war / speak loudly for him” (5.2.344-45). The soldier-like burial suggests that Hamlet is considered an ideal soldier, not an ideal king. Besides, Horatio
does tell the story of Hamlet, but is Hamlet’s story going to be passed down as Hamlet wishes? I consider that the answer is in doubt.
2.2 Manga Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet (2007)
Regarding Romeo and Juliet, Sonia Leong10 modernizes Shakespeare’s Romeo
and Juliet by setting it in the present day Tokyo. The manga adaptation depicts the
story of the star-crossed teenage lovers, Romeo and Juliet, who struggle in the feud between two Yakuza families (members of organized crime syndicates). In this adaptation, readers can see how Shakespeare’s theatricality blends with Japanese culture and traditions, such as kimono (Japanese traditional garment), Shinto(Japanese religion which focuses on acting out rituals religiously), Bushidō (the way of the warrior’s life), and Yakuza. These elements create a new taste to appreciate Shakespeare’s play with exotic Japanese and Shakespearean elements at the same time.
Consequently, to investigate how Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is represented in Leong’s manga edition, I want to base my reading mainly on the major themes of love, death, and protagonists’ transformation of self-autonomy through the application of graphics and texts. For example, in Leong’s Romeo and Juliet, instead of showing Romeo and Juliet’s innocent and juvenile love, she portrays more on their pursuit of self-autonomy, freedom, and transformations through banishment, conflicts with parents, and even their protest through suicide. In addition to these plots, the drawing style of the characters’ appearances (especially the eyes) and usage of words in balloons or panels are worthy of exploring, especially the transformations of eye
10Sonia Leong is a professional illustrator specializing in the anime/manga style and comic artwork.
She is a core member of Sweatdrop Studios, the leading UK comic collaborative. Her artwork has featured in several manga-related publications, events, websites and magazines internationally. (experts from Manga Shakespeare’s website: http://www.mangashakespeare.com/)
depictions which strongly represent characters’ inner feelings instead of verbal words.
Discussions on Major Themes: Love, Death, and Self-Autonomy 2.2.1 Ill-fated Love under Traditional Patriarchal System
In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, both Romeo and Juliet act rashly in the voyage of love which is young, irrational, and passionate. From their first encounter at the ball to their final suicide in the tomb, it only takes five days, revealing how fast their love grows and how fatal their love is. Nevertheless, in Leong’s adaptation, despite the fact that actions and hastiness of time can be portrayed through captions or sequence of images, the idea of time passing is not strongly emphasized. Rather, she underscores how Romeo and Juliet stand up for their love and their mental
transformation under the patriarchal power of two households.
The voyage of Romeo and Juliet’s love can be briefly divided into four phases:
the ball scene, the balcony scene, the bedchamber scene, and the tomb scene. Each phase proclaims different significance of their love and individual inner
transformation in the story. In the ball scene and the balcony scene, the seed of love grows in the young lovers’ hearts and leads to the succeeding tragedy. Shifting from happiness to sadness, the bedchamber scene omens the forthcoming death of the lovers who take their life in the final tomb scene. In addition, in these four scenes, we can notice how characters express their emotions through eyes instead of verbal words and how graphics portray the hidden meaning between the lines without many texts.
At their first meeting in the ball scene, Romeo and Juliet fall in love at the first sight, and this hasty love results in a series of fatal death. On the way to the ball, Mercutio tells Romeo about his dream of Queen Mab11, who is “the fairies’ midwife”
11 In the manga version, instead of quoting the whole speech of Mercutio’s lines on Queen Mab, Leong
(1.4.55). “[S]he gallops night by night / [T]hrough lover’s brains, and then they dream of love” (1.4.71-72; Leong 29). The drawing of Queen Mab is a traditional Japanese beauty with long black hair and enchanting eyes, appealing to young lovers to indulge in the desire and fantasy of love. Mercutio’s Queen Mab speech can be interpreted in two noteworthy aspects. One is to predict the upcoming romance between Romeo and Juliet, and the other is to portray love as fantasy which is “as thin of substance as the air” (1.4.99). According to the Queen Mab imagery, it proposes that all desires and fantasies are fragile, transient, and unrealistic as dreams, similar to the love between Romeo and Juliet.
Unlike the masque ball in the original text, Romeo does not wear a mask but a pair of transparent black sunglasses that enable Romeo to show his passionate
emotion in his eyes through lens. When Romeo actively approaches Juliet, he initiates a conversation with Juliet to court her. Also, when Juliet reaches her hand to Romeo for a kiss, the image of several little Cupids is filled with the background of the panel to display the love bond between the lovers. The conversation between Romeo and Juliet fleetingly ends in ten panels within two pages. The hastiness of their love reveals that everything seems to be predestined, and they are bound to fall in love with each other.
Then, the scene changes to the balcony scene, and we see Romeo hiding himself in the brushwood and eavesdropping what Juliet says from her balcony. Here, the first panel is designed as a long and narrow strip at the left side to create a visual distance between Romeo and Juliet, while the right side is separated into two panels to
illustrate the close-ups of Romeo’s and Juliet’s facial expressions. On the next page, as Juliet delivers her well-known “wherefore art thou Romeo” speech (2.1.75), the
only focuses on the romance and fancy of Queen Mab. The readers can observe from Mercutio’s lines and Queen Mab’s graphics on page 29.
image of Juliet’s upper body is depicted at the upper panel and her eyes look into a distant place, illustrating her endless sorrow and worries. The next two panels are the close-ups of Juliet’s sorrowful eyes and Romeo’s distressing facial expression with a thought balloon writing “[s]hall I hear more” next to his face (2.1.75-79). These graphics elucidate that both Romeo and Juliet understand that their love is forbidden but they still cannot resist the temptation of love.
In the subsequent pages of the balcony scene, notwithstanding the abbreviated lines are the same as the original text, through the layout of panels uniquely
intersecting on pages, it delineates the physical distance and the mental closeness of Romeo and Juliet. For instance, during their conversation, the speech balloons of Romeo’s and Juliet’s are set in the individual panels that separate them and create a sense of isolation. However, by means of cartoon version and close-ups of eyes, the images depict the naïve love between the lovers, and their intimate eye contact shows spontaneous overflow. Besides, some lines are replaced by the protagonist’s silence to represent the characters’ inner worlds, thought, feelings. These silent depictions mostly appear through the presentation of the characters’ eyes. The eyes are the mirror of the soul that directly reflects the lovers’ simple and primal love and their mental closeness with each other.
After two sweet and romantic scenes mentioned above, the bedchamber scene changes into a doleful and melancholy atmosphere. In this scene, Romeo and Juliet spend their last night together before Romeo goes to Mantua. When Romeo says his final goodbye to Juliet, he stands beneath the balcony just like that night at the balcony scene; however, the background of this panel is in gray and filled with
irregular curved lines, suggesting Romeo’s impending doom and the lover’s uncertain future. At the same time, Juliet’s painful speech also points out the threatening death
of Romeo:
O God, I have an ill-diving soul!
Methinks I see thee, now thou art so low, As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.
Either my eyesight fails, or thou look’st pale. (3.5.54-57)
From Juliet’s speech, the words “so low” and “as one dead in the bottom of a tomb”
mention not only the positions of the lovers but also the upcoming death of Romeo.
Moreover, after Romeo leaves, Lady Capulet breaks into Juliet’s chamber and narrates her fantasy of poisoning Romeo in Mantua. In this panel, the close-up of Lady Capulet’s resentful face covers more than half of the page, and the whole background is totally in black. The depiction of this panel elucidates Lady Capulet’s deep hatred toward Romeo and predicts Romeo’s approaching death. These elements of death contribute to the dramatic atmosphere that intensifies the image of death and allow readers to imagine the lovers’ doomed love based on their actions. Finally, in the tomb scene, Romeo and Juliet take their lives and realize their doomed love as the opening prologue suggests.
Compared with the original text, the Montague and the Capulet families are defined as Yakuza in manga, and the group of Yakuza focuses on the law of respect and hierarchy of class. This setting foreshadows brutal and bloody violence and strengthens the power of male dominated society and the idea of patriarchy. The demonstration of male power can be apparently observed from Lord Capulet’s control of Juliet and his treatment to Lady Capulet. The following are three examples to inspect Lord Capulet’s dominating power over Juliet and Lady Capulet.
In the original text, when Lord Capulet and Paris discuss about the marriage between Juliet and Paris, Lord Capulet replies to Paris: “I think she’ll be ruled / In all
respects by me. / Nay, more, I doubt it not” (3.4.13-14). Nonetheless, in the manga adaptation, Lord Capulet answers “I think she’ll be ruled by me. I doubt it not”
(Leong 104). The omitted words “in all respects” demonstrate Lord Capulet’s compelling power and his confidence in controlling over Juliet.
After the serious quarrel with Lord Capulet, Juliet decides to pretend to be dead and elope with Romeo. She even rides a heavy motorcycle to see the Friar for advice, showing her toughness and determination to challenge conventional gender role.
Before taking the vial, Juliet apologizes to Lord Capulet for her disobedience. She says “Where I have learnt me to repent the sin / Of disobedient opposition [. . .]
Pardon, I beseech you. / Henceforward I am ever ruled by you” (4.2.17-22; Leong 140). This statement marks that Juliet belongs to one of her father’s possession and she should be ruled by her father. However, when Juliet kneels down and apologizes to her father, Juliet’s weird facial expression with fake smile conveys that she does the apology on purpose to deceive her father that she will obey whatever he requests.
Additionally, the role of Lady Capulet in manga also pinpoints the overall
authority of Lord Capulet. First, it is interesting that Lady Capulet is called “Capulet’s Wife” in the original text. It implies her subordinate status and husband-and wife relationship with Lord Capulet. Conversely, in the manga adaptation, Lady Capulet is called “Lady Capulet, mother of Juliet” which emphasizes the mother-daughter relationship with Juliet, underlining that both mother of Juliet and Juliet are part of Lord Capulet’s properties and are ruled by Lord Capulet as well.
Second, in Act 3 Scene 5, when Juliet and Lord Capulet fiercely quarrel about her marriage with Paris, “Capulet’s Wife” reminds her husband that “[y]ou are too hot” in the original text (3.5.175). However, when “mother of Juliet” tells Lord Capulet that “[y]ou are too hot” in the manga adaptation, she is slapped harshly with
blood by Lord Capulet and falls down. When she falls down, the depiction of Lady Capulet is set at the upper panel covering almost half of the page with gray curved lines to illustrate her chaotic and startled emotion. She is astonished with shocked eyes depicted in white color, her lips are bleeding, and one of her hands touches her injured cheek.
Below the panel of Lady Capulet lies the graphic of furious Lord Capulet
standing straightly and blames Juliet for her disobedient behavior. The background of Lord Capulet’s panel is the gradient color of black and white. The two panels of Lord Capulet and Lady Capulet display different emotions through the design of
background and point to the power hierarchy between them.
Furthermore, in Act 3 Scene 5 of the manga adaptation, not only Lady Capulet but also Juliet suffers domestic violence by Lord Capulet, who grabs Juliet tightly by her arm and slaps her. Instead of narrating the quarrel in texts, the action of fight is violently acted out through visual images, emphasizing the violent male physical power over the female’s body. Also, after the quarrel, when Juliet wants to support Lady Capulet from her falling, Lady Capulet coldly rejects her and replies12: “Talk not to me. For I have done with thee” (Leong 126). Lady Capulet’s indifferent action expresses her alienated relationship with Juliet and obedience to Lord Capulet. From these examples, we can understand that female characters go through both physical and mental repression under the male’s control and readers can understand how arduous Juliet’s pursuit for love can be in the story.
2.2.2 The Function of Death: Mercutio, Tybalt, Paris, Romeo, and Juliet
Each death signals a turning point and thus weaves the whole story into the12 The original lines spoken by Capulet’s wife are “Talk not to me, for I’ll not speak a word. / Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee” in Act 3 Scene 5, lines 202-03.
fabric of Romeo and Juliet’s final tragedy. In Romeo and Juliet, death is everywhere.
From the first page of manga, the original 14 lines in prologue are abbreviated into four sentences:
Two households
From ancient grudge to break to new mutiny From these two foes
A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life. . . . (Leong 1)
The precise four lines portend the impending death of the lovers and encourage readers to carefully witness how the lovers suffer and struggle in their love. Also, we can clearly observe how Mercutio, Tybalt, Paris, Romeo, and Juliet die in individual ways. The rapid death not only speeds up the pace of story but also foreshadows that the love between Romeo and Juliet is transient and not blessed.
The first killing scene occurs in the fight between Mercutio and Tybalt. Besides, Mercutio’s and Tybalt’s death represent dramatic turning points and change the tone of story from optimistic to sorrowful. Before Mercutio and Tybalt are slain, it is interesting to note that the mangaka applies lots of cartoon versions to illustrate characters. The usage of cartoon version releases the harsh tension of brawls in the street and provides an easy tone for readers to enjoy the story. However, after
Mercutio and Tybalt are killed, the use of cartoon version disappears and the style of drawing turns into mournful atmosphere with more black gutters and dim
backgrounds instead.
On the one hand, before Mercutio dies, he says “A plague on both your houses”
in bold letters (3.1.95; Leong 80) and this curse portrays Mercutio’s anger about the feud because he is an innocent person but dies of the quarrel between two households.
On the other hand, the depiction of Tybalt’s death is different from the original text. In
Shakespeare’s play, the stage direction suggests that Tybalt falls and dies. However, in Leong’s adaptation, it is Romeo that falls and accidentally stabs Tybalt to death. This unintended action makes readers feel more heartbreaking for Romeo’s careless
Shakespeare’s play, the stage direction suggests that Tybalt falls and dies. However, in Leong’s adaptation, it is Romeo that falls and accidentally stabs Tybalt to death. This unintended action makes readers feel more heartbreaking for Romeo’s careless