Welcome to the Shakespeare Digges Association
Peter Usher dedicates this page to outreach and research in science and literature. Selected papers in:
LITERARY INTERPRETATION AND HISTORY OF SCIENCE.
"Words, words, words." Hamlet (2.2.189)
"Hawk and Handsaw" Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society Vol. 40:2 (2008), 273.
Prince Hamlet knows a hawk from a handsaw (Hamlet 2.2.347-8) because he recognizes
two modes of astronomical data collection in the sixteenth century -- with telescopes and with the naked eye. The former has the advantage of hawk-like resolution, which far exceeds that of human vision. The latter is needed to explain the portrait of the world's leading naked-eye astronomer, a portion of which is depicted at the right.
Hamlet's Universe San Diego: Aventine Press (2006, 2007)
An enduring puzzle of the Renaissance
is why William Shakespeare ignores the astronomical revolutions of the
sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. He deals superficially with
celestial phenomena and appears oblivious to the effects that new perceptions
in cosmology were having on worldview. This book discusses the rise of
evidence-based inquiry into natural phenomena and argues that Shakespeare's
famous play, Hamlet, is an allegory describing the chief cosmological
models that vied for acceptance at the turn of the seventeenth century.
This book explains: WHY Hamlet is 30 and knows a hawk from a handsaw, WHAT Ophelia's name means, WHO Claudius, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern represent, WHEN telescopic astronomy began, WHERE 16th-century astronomy and theology intersect, HOW Shakespeare welcomes the New Philosophy and WHETHER he foresees its consequences.
Hamlet's Love Letter and the New Philosophy. The Oxfordian 8 (2005) 93-109.
Hamlet's love letter is another part of Hamlet that has both
literal and figurative meaning, first that
Polonius is justified in believing that Hamlet is madly in love with his
daughter, and second that Hamlet's letter is a parody of Aristotelianism, and
as such is further support for the cosmic allegorical interpretation of the
play. Through the agency of Hamlet's letter, Shakespeare continues his
disparagement of Aristotelianism that Thomas Digges engages in A Perfit
Description, as does Digges' favorite poet Palingenius in Zodiacus Vitae.
The love letter is ironical, as Hamlet dupes Polonius into announcing the
essential elements of the New Philosophy in the presence of the King who
epitomizes its very antithesis, viz. the bounded geocentricism of his namesake,
Claudius Ptolemy.
Galileo's Telescopy and Jupiter's Tablet. Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society 35:5 (2003) 1258.
Jupiter and Cymbeline.The Shakespeare Newsletter 53:1 (2003) 7...12.
In 1610 in Sidereus Nuncius, Galileo reported that the planet Jupiter had four moons. Shakespeare and/or his collaborators celebrate this discovery in Cymbeline. Independent dating of Cymbeline suggests that the play appeared in late 1610.
Shakespeare's Support for the New Astronomy. The Oxfordian 5 (2002) 132-146.
Shakespeare's Hamlet of c.1601, contains descriptions of craters on the Moon, the phases of Venus, Mars and Jupiter, the Great Red Spot, sunspots, the stellar makeup of the Milky Way and the distribution of stars.
The Shakespeare Newsletter. 51:4 (2001/2) 82.
Advances in the Hamlet Cosmic Allegory. The Oxfordian 4 (2001) 25-49.
Sixteenth-Century Astronomical Telescopy. Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society 33:5 (2001) 1363.
Copernicus's Neglected Successor. Mercury Magazine. 30:5 (2001) 38-41 (with J. Best, S. Maene)
Hamlet's Transformation. A Groat's Worth of Wit, 11:3 (2000) 39-51.
Hamlet's Transformation. Elizabethan Review 7:1 (1999) 48-64.
Hamlet and the Infinite Universe. Research Penn State 18:3 (1997) 6-7.
Shakespeare's Cosmic World View. Mercury Magazine 26:1, (1997) 20-23.
Press release on a new reading of Hamlet, 13 January 1997.
A New Reading of Shakespeare's Hamlet. Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society 28:4 (1996) 1305.
Astronomy and the Canons of Hermeneutics. The Astronomy Quarterly 3 (1979) 115-124, 171-184.
Peter Usher is Professor Emeritus of Astronomy and Astrophysics at The Pennsylvania State University.