Polski Simba, czyli Zabawy Hamletem
A Polish Simba, or Plays with Hamlet

Summary/Abstract: The article offers an overview of comic travesties of Hamlet by William Shakespeare in Polish culture. The author is interested in allusions appearing in popular culture (in commercials, or Internet memes) as well as in cinema, drama, and small literary forms. Invoking numerous examples, the author attempts to systematise, classify and define specific features of Polish jokes about Hamlet in global context. The following dramas are analysed as examples of the literary variations: Fortynbras się upił (‘Fortinbras Gets Drunk’) by Janusz Głowacki, Po Hamlecie (‘After Hamlet’) by Jerzy Żurek, Król IV (‘King IV’) by Stanisław Grochowiak and three scenes from the Green Goose Theatre by Konstanty Ildefons Gałczyński. The author indicates some less obvious mocking allusions to Hamlet as well, e.g. in Król w kraju rozkoszy (‘King in the Land of Bliss’) by Franciszek Zabłocki or Wędrowna muza (‘A Travelling Muse’) by Michał Bałucki. What makes for a particularly interesting case is the practice of parodying the masterpiece by setting Hamlet in the shabby realities of socialist Poland or having it played out by colourful marginalised elements of society (Hamleś, a film etude by Jerzy Skolimowski; Hamleciak by Stefan Wiechecki; Hamlet chuligański by Jeremi Przybora). These and other selected examples show that the Poles can make fun of Hamlet, even though our parodies tend to be somewhat more serious and socially committed than The Lion King.

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