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Dost Thou Even Hoist, Brother?: Shakespeare, Derridean Hauntology, and

New Media Adaptation
Saran Walker
When William Shakespeare composed his plays during the English Renaissance, he
couldnt have possibly predicted that images of his likeness would someday grace t-shirts with
the accompanying phrase, Prose before Hoes. As a lasting and major figure in English
literature, Shakespeares work has been adapted countless times in forms that range from theatre
reproductions to films to, more recently, Internet-based and digital renditions of his canon. In
part due to the sheer mass of adaptations across many forms, scholars have been unable to devote
their energy to chronicling and analyzing every instance of Shakespearean reproduction. But
some of these gaps can be equally blamed on academics general dismissal of what they deem
mass culture bastardizations of Shakespeares originals; while stage and film productions still
bear some resemblance to their source texts, more recent forms of media such as memes, Twitter
activity, and video games occupy an entirely different textual realm than the literary sources they
adapt. However, it would be a mistake to spurn new types of media as fruitful branches of
adaptation simply because they operate outside of traditional analytical frameworks and appear,
at first glance, unfaithful to the format of their originals. Instead, I propose to explore the
largely unexamined means by which new media adaptations of Shakespeare interact with their
sources.
Firstly, I find it necessary to unpack some issues in adaptation studies that I argue are
oppressive towards new media studies. Thomas Leitch highlights adaptation studies dominant
concern with the relationship between an original work and its adaptation in his essay, The
Ethics of Infidelity. Leitch argues that adaptations are constantly haunted by their originals

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and that most adaptation theory suggests that they have a responsibility to stick as close as
possible to their sources, it seems, or they have an equally strong responsibility to strike out on
their own (Leitch 66). Indeed, framing the measurement of an adaptations worth only in
relation to its source is a framework that dominates adaptation studies. While Leitch offers Gus
Van Sants 1998 shot-by-shot remake of Alfred Hitchcocks Psycho (which, by the views of
many critics amounted to grave-robbing (71)) as an example of an adaptation criticized for
following its source too closely, the issue of infidelity seems to be of greater concern to
adaptation scholars; Leitch points out that adaptations never have an ethical imperative to do
anything new with their source texts. Their ethical responsibilities are all toward the original text,
or to the authors or fans of that text (66). Furthermore, Leitch suggests that even an
adaptation that could somehow manage to perfect the balance between fidelity and freshness is
potentially doomed to fail by its necessarily inferior relationship to its original, illustrating a
sort of zero-sum game of creativity which only allows one creator per project and dismisses
other claimants as either the creators of so much raw materialor servile imitators (65); an
adaptation of an already well-established and beloved source couldnt possibly be any good
because the original had already used up all the goodness allotted the property (65). While
Leitch disagrees with this fidelity-based framework, he stops short of offering an alternative way
of interpreting adaptations.
The great literary reverence given to William Shakespeare makes his work an appropriate
and illustrative example for contending with adaptation studies fidelity-centric framework; as
Leitch points out, part of what seems to drive the focus on fidelity is the emphasis placed on the
genius of a single creator, which casts all subsequent adaptations as servile imitators. The
lasting popularity, ubiquity, and dominance of Shakespeares plays in English literature clearly

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exemplify how the exaltation of an individual author can overshadow all attempts to reinterpret
his work, insinuating that no one could possibly create a version as great or lasting as
Shakespeares original. Therefore, I want to use Shakespeares work as a model in my
deconstruction of fidelity to a textual authority.
Maurizio Calbi takes a different approach to adaptation by applying Jacques Derridas
hauntology theory to Shakespearian films in an attempt to refute adaptations obligation towards
fidelity. Derridas deconstructionist framework destabilizes the very concept of the original by
suggesting that its existence is relational to everything else and is in no way inherently imbued
with an essential presence that distinguishes it from other work or gives it any special purity.
Furthermore, Calbi points out, the understanding of Shakespeares original writings is
complicated by the fact that his work was assembled posthumously from the fallible memories of
transcribers, and different editions of his folios and quartos sometimes conflate versionsthat
do not quite match one another, and are in fact stages in a process of revisionshadows of
shadows (Calbi 41). With these considerations in mind, one cannot but problematically consider
any of Shakespeares writings as essential or pure iterations; they are only some of many
variations forming a particular textual concept which, ghost-like, can never be actualized as an
original.
Calbi further utilizes hauntology in order to dispute the infidelity of adaptations that
deviate from their originals. Identifying Shakespearecentric adaptations that closely adhere
to the source text and Shakespeareccentric ones that provide variation from the source text,
Calbi argues that the Shakespeareccentric actually summons the trace of the
Shakespearecentric, whereby the language of the original emergesor rather, re-emergesas
a retroactive spectral effect of a process of adaptation/surrogation that supplements the source

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and forces it to interact with other intertexts (Calbi 8); in other words, adaptations that differ
from their sources draw attention to the deviations from the source text in an adaptation (perhaps
in part due to adaptation studies historically ingrained concern with fidelity to the original),
thereby evoking the presence of the original through its own absence. Calbis conclusions also
suggest an inverse of this notion, by which all adaptations are Shakespeareccentric to some
degree, whether they occur onscreen or on a stage lit by electricity; in this sense, the attempt to
measure different adaptations by their fidelity to Shakespeares initial stagings seems
unnecessary, as no adaptation is ever quite the same as its source.
The spectral presence of the absent source text isnt the only hauntological consideration
in Shakespeareccentric adaptation, however; Calbi also identifies the interplay of various other
haunts that may interact with that of the original. his analysis of 2001s Scotland, PA, for
example, he zeroes in on the partial incorporations that retrospectively produce Macbeth as an
ensemble of remainders that are forced to cohabit with 1970s popular culture, and in a way that
is reciprocally illuminating (37, Calbis italics), characterizing adaptation as a process of
selective incorporation of that which cannot be fully consumed (38). In this way, he seems to
echo Leitchs comments about the problematic nature of an adaptations duty to distinguish itself
from its source (that which cannot be fully consumed) while also arguing that the variety of
sources being drawn upon (in the case of Scotland, PA, this includes 70s pop culture and the
Shakespearean canon) can liberate the adaptation from fidelity obligations to a single dominant
source.
While Calbis arguments thwart assumptions that Shakespeareccentric adaptation
necessarily marks unfaithfulness to Shakespeares original, he still seems to be concerned with
fidelity in his suggestion that Shakespeareccentric texts remain, in fact, faithful to their sources

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by carrying the haunt of the sources absence; as for the interplay of multiple sources, the notion
that they inject new life into the moribund corpus of Shakespeare (111) merely seems to shift
textual authority from Shakespeare and distribute it among the adaptations other various
sources. In either case, Calbi appears more interested in excusing Shakespeareccentric work
from accusations of infidelity than moving beyond a fidelity-based model of assessing
adaptation.
Calbis research examines the way that different haunts function in adaptation, but I am
much more compelled to explore how different types of adaptation affect the haunts of their
sources; I instead want to borrow Calbis hauntological framework as a means for reading new
media adaptations while shifting my focus away from fidelity as a main concern. This shift is
essential for understanding more recent forms of media in both Shakespearean and wider
adaptation studies, which have largely dismissed this media as mass culture or Schlockspeare (Burt 12). If Internet memes or video games appear to be functioning differently as
adaptations than film or printed text, thats because they arebut for so many academics to see
the differences that fall outside of traditional analytic frameworks as grounds for condemnation
or neglect misses the adaptive potential of these new forms of media. On the other hand, I am not
interested in taking up the argument that the importance of recent alternative adaptation is simply
to mediate Shakespeare in a form that is more digestible for modern audiences; rather, I believe
that new mediums are doing adaptation in unique ways that deserve greater academic attention
than they are currently receiving. I argue that adaptation should be seen as a process of constant
remediation, reiteration, and reinterpretation instead of as a measuring stick for faithfulness to a
single original text. Therefore, I will undertake a hauntological deconstruction of fidelity-based

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adaptation theory using new media; specifically, I will analyze Internet meme, Twitter, and video
game adaptations of Shakespeare.

Shakespeare and Memes

While the concept of mimetics far predates the Internet, memes have flourished and
become overwhelmingly popular in a digital context. While an Internet meme can take on a
number of forms (indeed, multiplicity and reproduction are central concepts to Internet
memetics), they can be loosely defined as units of popular culture that are circulated, imitated,
and transformed by Internet usersnot as single ideas or formulas that propagated as well, but as
groups of content items that were created with awareness of each other and share common
characteristics (Shifman 367). Due to their both their ephemeral and mutable nature and their
relatively recent explosion in a digital context, Internet memes have been thus far been little
explored by academics, and certainly not in the context of adaptation studies. However, I would
argue that memes are by nature adaptations, spectrally re-enacting and reinterpreting both
popular culture and themselves. Their emphasis on imitation and alteration destabilizes the
centrality of adaptive fidelity and the authority of the original in ways that I will explore
below.
Using Shakespeare in a memetic setting highlights the mutability and capacity for
reinterpretation in both; in the same way that memes reproduce by various means of
interpretation (365, Shifmans emphasis), Shakespeares plays have been reinterpreted
endlessly both onstage and across other mediums. Memes effectively illustrate Derridas idea of
the specter, lacking a definite, central version or original; the beginnings or creators of any
particular meme, if even identifiable, are secondary to the memes germ-like dissemination and

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mutation. The success of a meme is contingent upon its ability to be imitated, changed, and
reincorporated into new contexts; rather than dictating the direction of their variations, they are
whatever they are altered or remixed into. While Shakespeares work, considering the emphasis
placed on the sacred authority of the originals, may not seem to match this relational
framework, I would argue that his plays contain and invite limitless readingsindeed, even
among strictly Shakespearecentric film or stage adaptations, variations in overall tone,
emphasis, mood, and characterization (to say nothing of the infinite inflections that each actor
can potentially employ on all of their lines) can create drastically different meanings from the
same source text. Thusly, Shakespeares canon and memes alike can be characterized as
centerless conceptual clusters that are defined and reproduced by their many imitations and
variations; like memes, whose survival is dependent on reproduction, the lasting influence of
Shakespeares work is perhaps in part due to its propensity for reinterpretation. The necessity for
modification in both deflects, in a truly hauntological sense, a single authoritative, initial version
or reading of either, and instead copies becomemore important than the original: They are
the raison detre of digital communication (Shifman 373).
Additionally, audience participation in the spreading and remixing of memes challenges
the authority of a texts original creator. That the success of memes is dependent upon their
reinterpretation and transmission by viewers lends interpretive power to the memes audiences.
Shifman notes that people may share a certain [meme] with others for many different reasons
(spanning from identification to scornful ridicule), but when they create their own versions of it
they inevitably reveal their interpretations of the text (368, Shifmans emphasis). Viewers
become authors themselves when they adapt memes, and, as Shifman points out, they are in no
way obligated to remain faithful to or reverent towards their source. In the case of Shakespearean

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memes, adaptors may mock Shakespeare, place him in unexpected contexts, or even edit or alter
his texts. In this way, viewers are able to share authority with the creator of an original work
by infusing their own interpretations into their memetic adapatations.
The anatomy of memes themselves intervenes with the authority of the original. Most
image-based Shakespeare memes feature either a portrait of Shakespeare, or occasionally actors
in film adaptations of his work. In some variations, Shakespeares image is altered or combined
with other visual meme signifiers, such as the black framed glasses he is shown wearing in the
Hipster Shakespeare meme (fig. 1), or Scumbag Steves iconic snapback photomanipulated
onto his head in the Scumbag Shakespeare variant (fig 2); in almost all of the image-based
Shakespeare memes, the image is overlaid with the memes text as well. Such digital graffiti
done to Shakespeares image is reminiscent of Marcel Duchamps L.H.O.O.Q and seems to
suggest a similar disdain for the concept of the original, in this case directed at the authority of
Shakespeare himself. It is of note that the text overlaying the image is usually not any of
Shakespeares own quotes except for variations and spoofs, such as Do you or do you not
lift/Bro that is the question (fig. 3) as an intertextual parody of the To be or not to be speech
from Hamlet and the Bro, do you even lift? meme (knowyourmeme.com). As such,
Shakespeares textual authority is made secondary to the necessity of the memes variation,
exemplified by the remixing of Shakespearean quotes with existing memetic signifiers.
Memes also destabilize the temporal clarity of the original. Because Shakespeares
printed plays are the earliest recorded evidence of Shakespeares work, they are regarded as the
authoritative source for all subsequent adaptations; their temporal precedence is what makes
them the originals. However, though Shakespeare precedes Internet memes in a historical,
temporal sense, Internet memes pre-exist Shakespearean memes; that is, non-Shakespearean

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Internet memes existed and became popular before Shakespearean ones began to crop up,
suggesting a temporal queerness that complicates a chronological framework for determining
originals. Indeed, a majority of the Shakespeare-based memes I examined were adaptations of
other, older memes. For instance, the most prevalent branch of Shakespearean memes, which
feature Shakespeare superimposed with archaized renditions of contemporary rap lyrics (fig. 4),
appear to be adapted from the Joseph Ducreux meme, which ostensibly began the archaic rap
lyric trend in 2009 (knowyourmeme.com). Moreover, in the context of the archaic rap lyric
meme, Shakespeare functions not as a source but as a variation; knowyourmeme.com proposes
that [the archaic rap memes] highly verbose joke provides a satisfying challenge of decoding
the corrupted lyrics back into the original verses (knowyourmeme.com), displacing Shakespeare
as a canonical source and instead casting him as a corrupting force haunting the original lyrics.
In this way, memes interrupt Shakespeares temporal authority and complicate the standards of
fidelity ascribed to adaptations.
The archaic rap lyric meme also highlights a potentially queer dynamic in temporal
authority. On one hand, translating rap lyrics into Early Modern dialect seems to draw attention
to the alienating verbosity of Shakespeares writings; that his language must be decoded and
overflows the rhythm of the original rap lyrics portrays Shakespeare as antiquated and out-oftouch to the point of clumsy incomprehensibility. On the other hand, however, portraying
Shakespeares anachronistic awareness of the lyrics lends him a temporally impossible hipness
and awareness of modern pop culture; by another reading, one could also interpret the meme as
jokingly suggesting that Shakespeare himself wrote the lyrics during the Early Modern period,
and that they were later altered and adapted by contemporary rappers. The first interpretation
speaks to the classic enmity between modern students and old literature, insinuating that

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Shakespeares written works are outdated or impenetrable. But the second two interpretations
repute that assessment, casting Shakespeare in the role of the rapper and thus placing him in a
context more comprehensible to modern audiences. In a way, Shakespeares imagined mastery of
contemporary rap actually seems to reaffirm his textual authority, implying that he either
invented a sort of proto-rap or else transcended the boundaries of time to visit the present and try
his hand at another lingual art. But either envisioning of Shakespeare as a rapper is haunted by
our understanding of rap as a modern phenomenon; just as the archaic rap meme underscores
Shakespeares humorously unlikely role as a rapper, it equally underscores raps humorously
unlikely place in a Shakespearean context. The result is a temporally queer intertextuality
wherein Shakespeare and contemporary rappers are in equal parts interrupting the authority of
the other.

Shakespeare and Twitter

Twitter is perhaps an unexpected and intriguing platform for Shakespearean adaptation
considering that it is primarily a social network. In this section, I will focus on Such Tweet
Sorrow, a Twitter-based adaptation of Romeo and Juliet performed over the course of five weeks
in 2010; the condensed cast of seven characters has been modified to include Juliets sister, Jess
(based off of Juliets Nurse in the play), Laurence Friar, a local caf owner who becomes
embroiled in the lovers story, and Jago, a mysterious character who is not involved with the
other characters but provides commentary in a chorus-like manner, in addition to the more
familiar Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio, and Tybalt. The whole of their tweets are compiled on a
Twitter list, where they can be viewed together in full. While the performance is set in the
modern day, some characters occasionally use Shakespearean language and paraphrase quotes

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from the original play. Calbi explored this performance at length in the final chapter of his
book and demonstrated how features of Twitter mirrored aspects of the original, but I hope to
expand upon his analysis by suggesting ways that Twitter destabilizes adaptation studies fidelity
hierarchy.
The basic structure of Twitter as a storytelling platform deflects the notion of one single,
original text. The 140-character limit for tweets necessitates the storys fragmentation between
characters tweets, and between the activity on their separate profiles, preventing a condensation
of the performance to a single, traceable origin point. Because the whole of the performance
occurs through the online activity of the plays characters, the Shakespearean story underlying
Such Tweet Sorrow is deconstructed and distributed across the characters profiles, their tweets
and re-tweets, and even cross-media interactions on other sites, such as when the characters post
links to videos, songs, pictures, and posts from other websites like Tumblr. This confluence of
digital sources illustrates what Henry Jenkins terms, convergence culture, defined as the flow
of content across multiple media platforms (Jenkins 2). One effect of transmedial
storytelling, as he puts it, is that it encourages readers to search for clues across a range of
different media or historical fictions that depend on the additive comprehension enabled by
multiple texts to make the past come alive for their readers (129). This mode of storytelling
depends on narrative dispersal and rejects the authority of a single source as the storys definitive
text.
Such Tweet Sorrow demonstrates Jenkins concept of transmedial storytelling through its
multimedial format. In one example, Juliet, falling under the influence of the Propofol that
Lawrence has given her, tweets that she is feeling very very sleepy cant wait to see romeo
(11 May, 2:59 p.m.); in response, Laurence tweets her the link to a Youtube video of the song

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Ninna Nanna A Michele from The Godfather Part II (3:18 p.m.). The boundaries of the
performance are blurry in instances like this one; not only does the ghostly trace of
Shakespeares influence suddenly cohabit with that of composer Nino Rota (and by extension,
Francis Ford Coppela, Al Pacino, and other figures associated with the entire Godfather
franchise), challenging spectators of the performance to recognize the song as Vito Corleones
lullaby for his young son Michael, but Laurences otherwise wordless message to Juliet is
additionally mediated across multiple media platforms. While the performance is ostensibly
composed of the characters Twitter activity that is compiled more cohesively in their Twitter list,
it turns out that such activity extends beyond the website itself and instead often is haunted by
actions on other sites, illustrating the convergence culture Jenkins describes. Twitter as a
platform for Shakespearean adaptation therefore seems to function more as a centerless
multiplicity of sources and ideas than a single independent text.
Twitter also subverts the authority of the original by allowing, and even encouraging
audience participation. Unlike the separation between viewers and actors in a movie or onstage,
on Twitter the plays cast share the same level of control over the medium as the rest of the
audience; in some cases, the audience may demonstrate more ease and experience within the
medium, since some of the characters, like Juliet, are totally new to this! Ive only just joined
(11 April, 5:03 a.m.). The characters follow other non-cast Twitter users, retweet their posts, and
dialogue with them. Indeed, the public nature of Twitter as a social network demands interaction,
as audience members in turn follow the characters and respond to their tweets. Jenkins
emphasizes audience participation as a deconstructive tool against dominant authorial forces,
using work made by fans of the Harry Potter and Star Wars franchises as an example. He
explains that grassroots artists are finding themselves in conflict with commercial media

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producers who want to exert greater control over their intellectual property (21) and that active
participants in these new media landscapes [are] finding their own voice through participation in
fan communities, asserting their own rights even in the face of powerful entities (205). While
Shakespeares work is old enough that it falls under a creative commons license and is free from
the kinds of copyright disputes that J.K. Rowling and George Lucass respective franchises are
concerned with, Jenkins argument seems to echo Thomas Leitchs condemnation of how
academics penalize adaptations that infringe upon the sanctity of the original. In a similar
sense, then, Jenkins view of audience participation as disruptive to established textual
authorities can be seen in Such Tweet Sorrow.
For Laurence in particular, as a character desperate for condonement of his role in Romeo
and Juliets lives and who ponders whether Ive always done the right thing, havent I? (6 May,
7:37 a.m.), audience input provides further opportunities for his characterization. As one
example, Laurence retweets a tweet by user FrozenGlitter so that it displays on his profile page:
@LaurenceFriar You have to bring the Montagues and Capulets together so they can heal (13
May, 3:31 a.m.) to which he responds I agree @FrozenGlitter But thats for @Jess_nurse and
her family & the Montagues to sort out. Im not going to meddle anymore (3:40 a.m.). In such
instances, audiences are allowed to join the performers in interacting with the story, even to the
point of suggesting courses of action to the characters. The already ephemeral boundaries of the
performance are further blurred when characters retweet audience tweets in the main list for
Such Tweet Sorrow, as when Laurence retweets user im_lunars assurances that Im sure noone
blames you for what happened.. Everyone deals with sorrow in their own way (9 May, 11:34
a.m.); the performers and audiences therefore share a role in enacting the story, allowing people
to participate in a fictional plot by way of their own presumably real Twitter accounts. The

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flipside of this dynamic is that the performers are also then made to be spectators to the
audiences interactions. These subversions of traditional performer/audience dynamics speaks to
Twitters deconstruction of textual authority.
In a performance that is shaped by characters online interactions, the offline occurrences
that haunt the characters online activity come to represent a kind of death. In the case of
characters like Mercutio and Tybalt, this connection is literal, as they cease tweeting once they
have died. But in other instances, being offline is a form of death itself; Romeo, on the run and
attempting to avoid being tracked by his phone signal, had to turn my phone off (11 May
9:32 p.m), leaving him oblivious to the plan behind Juliets faked death. While Romeo discovers
Juliets seemingly lifeless body and tweets that he will lie with thee (12 May, 2:22 a.m),
Laurence sends him a frantic stream of tweets imploring him to ANSWER YOUR PHONE!
Thy love is asleep, only ASLEEP!!! (2:21 a.m.), and similarly tries to explain to Juliet that The
plans gone wrong (2:46 a.m.) and begs her to PLEASE answer your phone (2:49 a.m.). For
the star-crossed lovers, going offline and ignoring Jess and Laurences desperate warnings seems
to be a form of suicide itself; in spite of having access to instant communication on their phones,
the Romeo and Juliet of Such Tweet Sorrow fall victim to the same fate as those of Shakespeares
version.
However, the online/offline dynamic also destabilizes the finality of the characters
deaths, and, by extension, the end of the story. Now, almost four years after the performance of
Such Tweet Sorrow, the profiles of all the characters are still on Twitter; though there has been no
new activity since the performance period, one can still read all of their previous posts, view
their content, and even follow their accounts. If the dispersal of content across multiple profiles
and platforms thwarts a definite starting point of the performance, then the spectral online

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remainders of the characters interferes with any notion of a clear-cut ending, both for the story
and the characters. Distraught over Juliets supposed death, Romeo invokes Mercutios
posthumous aid, tweeting @mercuteio what do i do merc everything is turned to death.I brought
death to Juliet,her family and to you. TELL ME WHAT TO DO MERCUTIO!!!!! (11 May,
11:56 p.m.), followed by a tweet that repeats @mercuteio fourteen times, becoming
increasingly misspelled and jumbled. The tweets to Mercutio read like an attempt to resurrect the
dead character through his still-living Twitter profile. This is furthered towards the end of the
play, when Juliet, Jess, and Tybalts father accesses Tybalts Twitter account to find out where
my daughter Juliet might be. Can anyone out there help me please? (12 May, 3:17 a.m.); the last
tweet in the main list is his plea to Jess: @Jess_nurse Im so sorry. Come on home. Dad x (13
May, 5:36 a.m.).
The lives and deaths of the characters, embodied by their Twitter profiles, prove flexible
and indefinite in the suggestion that they may outlive their characters offline lifespan, and can
even undergo a form of reincarnation, as when Tybalts father begins tweeting from his account.
The story, itself materialized by the characters actions, therefore also lingers, never ending
completely while the characters profiles live on. This queering of textual finality brings to mind
the reincarnation that occurs in every adaptation of Romeo and Juliet; namely, that every time the
story is performed, those characters are resurrected, only to die again and again as the story is
retold. Such Tweet Sorrow makes visible the eternal inconclusiveness that haunts adaptation,
blurring the temporal boundaries of a text and suggesting a form of continuity between
adaptations.

Shakespeare and Video Games

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This section will focus on the 2010 video game Hamlet or the Last Game without
MMORPG Features, Shaders, and Product Placement (which I will refer to as Hamlet or for
the rest of this section), created by indie game developer mif2000. The point-and-click
puzzle/adventure game provides a liberal interpretation of Shakespeares Hamlet: Claudius, with
the support of his henchman Polonius, has murdered both Hamlets parents and plans to marry
Hamlets girlfriend, Ophelia. The games nameless protagonist (referred to as The Hero) travels
back in time into the middle of this scenario, accidentally incapacitating Hamlet with his time
machine, and so must take his place in rescuing Ophelia and defeating Claudius. The game is
broken up into twenty-five levels, which are in turn separated into five chapters. I will explore
the ways that this video games participatory storytelling and temporal queerness disrupt the
authority of Shakespeares original version of Hamlet.
Audience participation, an important aspect of meme and Twitter adaptations, is an even
more central feature of video games, and it de-emphasizes the textual authority of a single
original narrative. Shakespeares authority as the creator of the play Hamlet is already
disrupted by the authority of the games creator; this is furthered by the fact that the player, to
some degree, controls the games narrative. To be sure, in Hamlet or, the games levels are
chronologically ordered and will unfold in the same sequence during every playthrough. The
games puzzles do not change, and there is usually a single correct chain of events that guide the
character to the end of each level. However, video games are a unique narrative platform in the
sense that the player is pulling the strings and plotting events. Yet the player is not designing
these events with a free hand. All the acts and happenings are shaped by their context: by the
game, its physics and rules (Carr 38). While the player must operate within the games
constraints, however, they are still able to map a unique narrative path; Diane Carr applies Espen

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Aarseths typography for cybertext to video games, distinguishing between textons and
scriptons: textons are all the potentials offered by a game, and scriptons are the ways in which
those potentials are played out, on-screen, by different users (66). The texton/scripton model is
visible in Hamlet or and reveals compelling examples of narrative multiplicity.
For instance, in level five of the games first chapter, The Hero must battle Polonius, who
operates a remote controlled laser beam. If the player attempts to make The Hero approach
Polonius, he is stopped short and jumps backwards to avoid a blast from Polonius laser (Hamlet
or). The various sequence of actions a given player may take forms a unique scripton; the
player may repeat this sequence as many times as they wish, or as many times as it takes to
figure out the correct means of killing Polonius. Carr comments that games invite the player to
act in and on the material worldactions are performed with the intention that they will lead to
desired outcomes, but they can also produce outcomes that are neither intended nor wanted
(Carr 139). The fact that the game allows for mistakes, providing a texton in which The Hero is
almost zapped by the laser, suggests a flexible narrative structure that can be tweaked an altered
with each playthrough; though the game contains a fixed number of textons, they are haunted by
potentially infinite sequences of scriptons that are formed during different playthoughs. This
narrative multiplicity challenges the notion of emphasizing one single, original narrative
within a game, instead offering the potential for every players individual playthroughs to be
unique.
The players authority in Hamlet or is further emphasized by their omnipotent control
in the gameworld. While many games offer the player control over a digital avatar, an embodied
agent [who] actually penetrates into spaces on the players behalf (Carr 70), for the most part in
Hamlet or the player does not actually directly control The Heros movements and actions.

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Instead, however, they may manipulate the environment surrounding The Hero, solving the
problems that confront him. If a players control over a game avatar could be likened to the role
of an actor in a play, then the players spectral power over the environment of Hamlet or is
perhaps more closely linked to the part of a plays director. For example, in the first level of the
first chapter, the player must manipulate a weather-changing machine to water a plant seed,
which then grows into a large vine that The Hero can then climb and use to enter a window of
Polonius castle (Hamlet or). The player takes on an almost author-like role, deciding how The
Hero will overcome his next obstacle and actively shaping his path towards that goal.
The players omnipotence even extends beyond the environment itself; in the first level of
chapter two, The Hero dives underwater to rescue Ophelia and finds his path blocked by a live
mine. If the player clicks on The Hero, they may access his thoughts in a thought bubble, which
reads, Thats whos missing here above a picture of a crab (Hamlet or). The player must
click and drag the crab from The Heros thoughts and into the environment, where it will snip the
mines tethers with its claws. At another point in the game, The Hero has been knocked
unconscious, and the player must manipulate a series of numbers, letters, and symbols in The
Heros thought bubble until they form a logical mathematical equation, causing The Hero to
awaken from his stupor (Hamlet or). In these instances, the players control extends beyond
environmental manipulation and actually extends into the ability to manipulate and materialize
characters mental processes. This degree of access demonstrates the players power in shaping
The Heros journey, both externally and internally. This authority allows the player to become an
accomplice to the games creator (and Shakespeare, spectrally present here through his
authorship of Hamlet) in directing and enacting the narrative of Hamlet or

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The queer temporality of Hamlet or also destabilizes chronological fidelity. The game
situates itself as something of an anachronism, as its title claims it as the Last game bereft of
features that proliferate in many current games. Yet the game is also situated as the first game in
the world based on Shakespeares Hamlet and as following the best traditions of classic
adventure gaming in promotional material (gameletgame.com). The emphasis on Hamlet or
as both old and new speaks to issues of fidelity; marking itself as the first game adaptation of
Shakespeare highlights its own originality as an adaptation. Interestingly, Hamlet or seems
concerned more with fidelity to gaming genre, rejecting comparatively modern MMORPG
features, shaders, and product placement in favor of classic gaming features. The games
paradoxical temporal situation complicates a clear-cut assessment of adaptational fidelity,
suggesting that adaptations have fidelitous obligations on many different levels, such as
platform. Hamlet or therefore provides a version of fidelity that decentralizes Shakespeares
original as the arbiter of faithfulness, instead offering faithfulness to features of game genre as
an additional or alternate measure of fidelity.
Furthermore, Hamlet ors liminal temporality destabilizes Shakespeares hauntological
presence in adaptation. The game sets up a queer interpretation of time: The Heros interference
in the original story of Hamlet is simultaneously a rewriting of the story (as he, coming from
the future, is changing the events of the Hamlet that modern readers are familiar with) and the
original writing of the story (since the events of the game, set in the past, become
chronologically original). The dynamic seems to be that of flipped hauntology; rather than the
presence of a spectral Shakespeare coming back to haunt all future adaptations of his work,
The Hero is going back from the future to reverse-haunt the original. However, the concept
of the original is troubled by the fact that The Hero travels back in time to an anachronistic

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pastPolonius operates from a technology-infused castle, Claudius plays electric guitar, and no
characters clothing resembles even a caricature of Renaissance fashion (Hamlet or).
Moreover, the basic plot of Shakespeares Hamlet has been altered even before The Hero arrives
to take Hamlets place. These changes suggest a metadramatic spoof of fidelity to the original
that The Hero upsets within the story; Hamlet or is, by a conservative interpretation, already
unfaithful to Shakespeares original because of its format as a video game, which allows the
player to anachronistically participate in the story of Hamlet. In this way, video games function
as a sort of metaphorical time machine which allows the player, like The Hero, to come back
to and change an original story.

Conclusion
Over the course of this essay, Ive demonstrated the necessity of flexible and adaptable
frameworks for reading new forms of media. While scholars like Maurizio Calbi have attempted
to show how non-traditional adaptations can fit inside of an adaptational fidelity model, it is not
enough to simply prove that they are good adaptations; rather, we as academics must assess
what good entails and whether our current mode of evaluating textual worth excludes perfectly
valid and valuable types of media. Part of this process involves demystifying and destigmatizing
supposedly mass media like Internet memes, Twitter, and video games. I hope that my research
has, on one level, provided a useful example of how these kinds of texts may be analyzed;
indeed, I think my analysis illustrates the impressive academic capacity that these mediums can
contain.
We must also resist idolizing authors to the point of rejecting potentially powerful
adaptations of their work. A writer like Shakespeare is undoubtedly spectacular and influential.

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But considering his already pervasive literary authority, then, one neednt try to protect his work
from corruption by popular culture; Shakespeares spectral influence will always haunt any
adaptations of his plays. Instead of trying to preserve, to borrow Calbis language, the corpus of
Shakespeare, we might discover compelling new ways of reading his work by allowing it to be
remediated, reimagined, and reinterpreted.
Works Cited
Burt, Richard, ed. Shakespeare After Mass Media. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. Print.
Calbi, Maurizio. Spectral Shakespeares. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. Print.
Carr, Diane, et al. Computer Games: Text, Narrative and Play. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006.
Print.
Do You Even Lift? Know Your Meme. Cheezburger, Inc, n.d. Web. 22 November, 2014.
Hamlet or the Last Game without MMORPG Features, Shaders and Product Placement.
mif2000. 2010. Video game.
Jenkins, Henry. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York: New
York University Press, 2006. Print.
Joseph Ducreux/Archaic Rap. Know Your Meme. Cheezburger, Inc, n.d. Web.
20 November, 2014.
Laurence Friar (LaurenceFriar). Laurence Friar. Twitter. Web. 2 December, 2014.
Leitch, Thomas. The Ethics of Infidelity. Adaptation Studies: New Approaches, Cranbury:
Fairleigh Dickinson, 2010. 61-77. Print.
Shifman, Limor. Memes in a Digital World: Reconciling with a Conceptual
Troublemaker. Journal of ComputerMediated Communication 18.3, 2013. 362-377.
Print.

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Such Tweet Sorrow (Such_Tweet). Such Tweet Sorrow. Twitter. Web. 1 December, 2014.

Fig. 1. Hipster Shakespeare. Quick Meme. Web. 14 November, 2014.

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Fig. 2. SouthItalyRomano. Scumbag Shakespeare. deviantArt. Web. 14 November, 2014.

Fig. 3. Lift Like Shakespeare. Meme Center. Web. 14 November, 2014.

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Fig. 4. Lyrical Shakespeare. Quick Meme. Web. 14 November, 2014.