Shakespeare Wrote His Grief So His Wife Could Hear It

A mother’s cry, a father’s silence, and a play that turned private loss into words the world still leans on—we trace the tender line from Hamnet to Hamlet and what it reveals about how we grieve. We open with the film’s intimate portrait of marriage under strain, childbirth risk, and a family reshaped by the death of a son. From a boy’s heartbreaking plea to save his sister to a mother’s raw lament, the story refuses neat answers and invites us to feel the full weight of love.

We then pivot to Shakespeare’s response: not a scene at a bedside, but the slow, deliberate work of writing. Hamlet becomes his container for sorrow, a place to test the edges of mortality, betrayal, conscience, and hope. Hearing the famous soliloquy through the lens of a grieving father changes everything; “To be or not to be” is no longer abstract debate, but a soul trying to stand in the storm. Along the way, we talk about how art can say what we cannot.

Throughout the conversation, we return to a simple truth: grief is personal and cannot be standardized. Your bond with the one you lost is singular; so is your way of mourning. 

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We welcome suggestions for future episodes or reach out to us for one on one spiritual direction, individually or as a family as you travel through griefIf you have questions about spiritual direction while grieving, or grief support or grief groups in your community, my contact information is in the show notes.

SPIRITUAL DIRECTION WHILE GRIEVING IS AVAILABLE

UPCOMING WORKSHOP ON  SOULFUL LISTENING:  https://events.scu.edu/markey-center/event/359741-soulful-listening-workshops-on-the-ministry-of

Art:  https://www.etsy.com/shop/vasonaArts?ref=seller-platform-mcnav
and  https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/candee-lucas

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F2SFH4Z6

Music and sound effects today by:   via Pixabay

Chapters

• 0:44 Welcome And Mission Of Solace
• 1:35 Introducing Hamnet And Spoilers
• 2:31 Marriage, Motherhood, And Risk
• 3:35 The Twins And A Brush With Death
• 3:57 A Son’s Sacrifice And Loss
• 4:42 Shakespeare’s Absence And Distance
• 5:27 Grief Poured Into Hamlet
• 6:39 To Be Or Not To Be Reframed
• 8:21 Grief Is Personal And Sacred

Transcript

Candee: 0:44

Welcome to Solace: + Grief. My name is Candee Lucas. I'm your host, and I'm glad you're here. When we started this ministry nearly four years ago, we wanted to reach out to those who are grieving, both those in fresh grief and those who've been on their grief journey for a while. We found that being able to talk about the issues that we're going through as we grieve, our relationship with God and how that is affecting our grief journey, and study of scriptures and meditations and poems can help us along the way. You're always welcome in this circle of healing love and support.

Candee: 1:35

Today I want to talk about the movie "Hamnet". So if you haven't read the book and want to, or haven't seen the movie yet, and want to, please be aware there are spoiler alerts ahead. As you may know, the story of Hamnet is the story of how William Shakespeare's greatest play, "Hamlet", was born.

Candee: 2:01

It's a very intimate portrait of his family life as he struggled to become a successful playwright. He had a devoted wife whose only wish was to raise her children and keep one with the country side that she had been raised in. The movie illustrates the struggles the couple have along the way. There is never any question of the love between the two and the devotion. It seems quite earnest and strong, nourishing for them both. But as in most couples' relationship, this relationship changes when they have children. It illustrates very clearly the difficulty at the time of women in childbirth, the mysteries surrounding childbirth, the fact that the women were the only ones that carried the knowledge, did not often share the knowledge, make these childbirthing scenes quite harrowing. And when one of her babies, a twin, doesn't seem to breathe, we see the agony on her face as she holds the baby, tenderly looks into her face, and the daughter miraculously starts breathing and is saved. But the movie is ultimately and poignantly about grief. Later on, their only son, who is called Hamnet, because the words Hamlet and Hamnet were interchanged at the time, has a profound spiritual experience as his sister is dying. He makes the greatest sacrifice he can think of to save his dying sister and asks God to take him in the sister's place. In the morning the transfer has occurred, the brother is sick, and the sister is well. Hamnet dies in his mother's arms in agony, and the sound that comes out of the mother's mouth on his death is both primeval and touching and familiar.

Candee: 4:41

Meanwhile, Shakespeare has been away in London achieving some success as a playwright, and he returns home the morning after Hamnet dies. His response is more curious. It's as if he knew he would arrive too late to see his son before he died. And Hamnet's mother cannot forgive her husband for not being there.

Candee: 5:16

What we have not seen and we do not see is William Shakespeare's reaction to the death of his only son. And we don't understand until near the end that he processes that death through his writing, through the writing of his greatest play, "Hamlet", which discusses all the ins and outs of dying, of grief, of loss, of betrayal, the goodness of men, and their downfalls. And it is not until his wife experiences that play that she fully understands that they have grieved differently, most differently. William Shakespeare has imbued all of his beautiful words with sadness and meaning and reference to the love and the loss that this death brings to the family and to him and to his wife. Reconsider what that famous speech from Hamlet means when you consider it is spoken by a father in the depths of his own grief.

Candee: 6:57

--To be or not to be, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them; to die to sleep no more and by asleep to say we end the heartache and the thousand natural shocks the flesh is heir to-- 'tis a consummation devoutly to be wished to die to sleep to sleep perchance to dream; Aye there's the rub for in the sleep of death what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil must give us pause there's the respect that makes calamity of so long life. --

Candee: 8:21

Grief illustrated most eloquently, and it illustrates the most important part about grieving. We all do it so differently in our own manner, in our own time, in our own process. So please do not let the church, your pastor, your friends, your family weigh in on your own grief process. It needs to be as personal as a fingerprint. Only you shared a relationship with your loved one. Only you can know what it means going forward, what it meant in life and what it means in the afterlife. So mourn as you will. God will always stand with you, embrace you, carry you, give you whatever you need, if you allow him to.