1. Introduction
The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, known popularly by its shortened: Hamlet, is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. Shakespeare’s longest play, it follows as Hamlet’s contemplation of one decision: to kill or not to kill. The ghost of his father tells him to avenge his death. He is to kill his uncle who poisoned his father. Hamlet feigns (or is driven to) insanity, ponders upon questions of life and death, and seeks revenge. His uncle, fearing for his life, also devises plots to kill Hamlet.
“Among all the plays of Shakespeare, Hamlet appears to be the most popular in India.” (Das 52).
Haider, 2014, is the last of Vishal Bharadwaj’s shakespearian trilogy adapted to the Indian context and is based on Hamlet. Bharadwaj’s protagonist, Haider, played by Shahid Kapoor, returns home to Srinagar from Aligarh, where he is a student, after the arrest and “disappearance” of his father, Dr Hilal Meer. He finds his hometown to a constant threat of militancy and terror attacks in the air on the one side and his home life in upheaval much like Hamlet’s, with his uncle and mother appearing much more at ease than he would deem appropriate.
When Hamlet arrives back to Denmark, he comes back to his home. However, Haider returns to a home that does not look like his anymore. He has to pick his parents photos and his fathers shoes and dust them off, a symbol of the complete destruction and disintegration of the Kashmir he knew and left behind.
In Hamlet, the protagonist hits the ground running. The ghost appears almost as soon as the plot opens, the treacherous betrayal is made known and revenge is sought. However, in Haider, the “ghost” appears in the form of Roohdar only at interval point.
Like Hamlet, Haider is missing during the initiation of the plot. But the difference between the two is apparent from the scene that Shahid Kapoor is introduced as Haider, coming back to Srinagar on the bus. When asked where his home was by officials at the check post, “Islamabad,” he tells them, almost offending them. To them, the only Islamabad is across the border. The scene sets the tone for the character as a political one, a rather straightforward protagonist in contrast to the philosophical Hamlet.
Their motivations also differ. Throughout the play, Hamlet is divided and feels torn between life and death, between forgiveness and murder. Haider, on the other hand, is out for revenge. There is never a shadow of a doubt in his mind since the moment he is told that his father’s dying wish was for Haider to pursue and kill his uncle.
Haider’s story, additionally, is about more than just his home. He had grown up watching two countries tearing his home apart and had almost walked down the militant path before vengeance was ever a provocation.
“Haider introduces some of its key themes; treachery, oppression, unlawful disappearances, the personal price paid for political leanings, in a pre-credits sequence that sees good-hearted doctor Hilaal Meer come under attack from the army for attempting to treat an ailing militant. Hilaal disappears, setting the stage for the return of his son Haider, a soulful young man who is attempting a doctorate on colonial-era poets in Aligarh.” (Ramnath, 2014).
This difference in the attitude of the two protagonists is clearly a product of the environment the two characters are placed in. Although there is political upheaval and external threat in Hamlet’s case as well, the character is concerned more with inner turmoil. On the other hand, the primary source of Haider’s discomfort comes from his environment: the uncle did not kill his father only for the throne and the wife – the politics was much more nuanced.
Haider is not just a Shakespearian play adapted to Kashmir, it is a movie that is about Kashmir and the violence, the injustice it has weathered over the years.
“I strongly feel that Kashmir has been the biggest tragedy of modern Indian history and no film has been made to capture the real tragedy of what has been going on there for the last 25 years. I began to read Basharat’s (Kashmiri journalist Basharat Peer’s) book, Curfewed Nights, with Hamlet in mind and by the time I finished it I had decided to collaborate with him.” (Bharadwaj PAGE)
Peer is the co-author of the film’s script.
“Haider such a special movie is that, unlike other works that have dealt with the Kashmir conflict, it does not pretend that history does not exist.” (Ashok, 2014)
The brilliance of this movie is how its director Vishal Bharadwaj has handled to adapt Hamlet to an entire new setting and yet, as an audience, one speculates if they are watching a completely new story. Bharadwaj has skilfully used the ‘show but do not tell’ procedure to provide us an implied peep into the lives of common Kashmiris who have borne the burden of the Indo-Pakistan line of control conflicts (Ashok, 2014).
Haider’s speech at the historic Lal Chowk is remarkable. The choice of this chowk is intentional on the part of Bharadwaj because the political leaders of Kashmir deliver their speeches here.
It is important to note that Haider sets its actions in the past, in the mid-nineties, apparently to avoid disagreement among the audience in the present.
One major dissimilarity can be witnessed within the climaxes of the two: Hamlet dies but Haider does not. Hamlet chooses to act on his impulse and kills his uncle. But he is poisoned in the act and does not survive. Haider, on the other hand, realises that revenge would only breed revenge. He chooses to not kill his uncle despite being seconds away from it and finds salvation in that choice.
Conclusion
It is a faithful adaptation.
“So in a faithful adaptation, even if the movie went so far as to change the original story’s ending, the movie makers would want to make sure that they did not betray the core meaning.” (Dean)
However, the play, as we know it, is mostly crammed into the second half, while the first half concentrates on presenting a ‘realistic’ picture of the situation in Kashmir.