Content Most Foul: the British Library's Nanny Filter Blocks 'Hamlet'

An anonymous reader writes "A man using the British Library's public wi-fi found that access to an on-line copy of 'Hamlet' was blocked for 'violent content'. Now, it is true that 'Hamlet' is pretty violent (8 murders, including one before the play starts, plus one suicide). But the heavy-handed irony of a guardian of British cultural heritage censoring the greatest work of British literature is just too blatant to be ignored. Library staff initially didn't seem too interested in fixing the problem, but in the end they adjusted the filters."

Comments

Not So

[Anonymous Coward]

... the greatest work of British literature ...

Not. Both King Lear and The Tempest are better plays. Hamlet is, however, likely the best vehicle for an actor to present himself.

1st Psot?

Re:Not So

[radiumsoup]

Anon, Anon C., you should have posted non-anon.

/+5 cometh for thee (or something like that)

Re:Not So

[dkleinsc]

The old joke: Hamlet is a lousy play because about half its lines are cliches.

Not that Bill didn't write some other great stuff, but the fact remains that Hamlet is more influential than Lear or The Tempest or Richard III.

Re:Not So

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it also block it if it's in the original Klingon?

Re:Not So

[Anonymous Coward]

Aha! So it was really blocked for copyright infringement.

Re:Not So

[interkin3tic]

Rule 18.1: if you admit to liking some popular work of art, be it a song, a painting, a book, a movie, a videogame, or a play, and do so on the internet, someone will immediately criticize it. "Overrated" has a 50/50 chance of being used.

Observe. (ahem) The Beatles were a pretty good band. They had good songs. Like "Hey Jude." That was a good song.

...

Re:Not So

[nukenerd]

The British version of this joke is about an American seeing the play, and complaining afterwards that the writer had merely strung a load of quotations together.

Oops, this is an American web site.

Re:Not So

[Anonymous Coward]

The line is: "Do you see a sign outside that says 'Dead nigger storage'?".

Get it right man.

Re:Not So

[Drishmung]

On top of that, Hamlet is stolen from the old Danish story of Amleth. Which is a lot more violent :)

There's always Titus Andronicus if that's what you like.

A scottish schoolmaster called Adam McNaughtan took on the challenge of summarizing the whole play in one song. If you need a translation from Scots to English, then you might prefer Martin Carthy's version.

I love the bit towards the end. "Fortinbras, knee-deep in Danes, lived happily ever after."

Re:Not So

[mbkennel]

JULES
My coinpurse is the one
With "Blasted Oedipus" stitched upon it.
I pray you, open it and count its hoard.
How much find you?

PUMPKIN
I guess at ten times five score sovereigns.

JULES
That sum is yours; add it to thy purse.
Consider, if you add to that
The balance from our innkeepers' till
And the tally of what is in the others,
It may be thought a sum
That any would be glad of.

VINCENT
Sirrah, I pray,
Let not these ruffians rob thee,
Or I may slay them for the spite.

JULES
O, thou shall not, thou cur!
Be still, be silent and stand down!
They do not rob me, nor is it a gift;
It is payment for a purchase.
Knows’t thou what I purchase, friend?

PUMPKIN
I know not.

JULES
Your life. If I give it to you thus,
Then thou and I are spared
My need for vengeance for thy thievery.
I pray, do you often read the Bible?

PUMPKIN
Not regularly.

JULES
There is a Scripture verse; I did commit it to my brain.

Ezekiel 25:17. "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is The Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee."

I have for years recited thus. If thou didst but hear,It was as clear a sign of your demise As found in any witches' scry.
Yet never had I ponder'd its intent; T'was simply fiendish sounds I could thus speak/ Before I dealt my foes the final stroke
That sent them on to God's Own Realm../ But just this morrow hence, I saw such things/That lead me to reflect upon my words
And divine what the meaning was therein./Perchance, I guessed, you are the evil man,And I the righteous man. As for the shepherd, Methought it could have then stood for my blade../Anon, perhaps the righteous man is you;I then may be the shepherd, and the evil and the selfish Is all that stands about us in this world. Such is a pleasing thought. But such is also false.
In truth, you are the weak. And I, the tyranny of evil men.Yet, henceforth, I assure you, I shall try In all my ways to now become the shepherd.

[Jules lays down his sword. Pumpkin and Yolanda run off. Jules takes a sip of his ale.]

JULES
Anon, my ale is warm.

[He pushes it aside.]

VINCENT
My friend, mayhap we should depart.

JULES
An excellent idea, my friend;
And so, let us be gone.

[Vincent throws a coin on the table and Jules grabs the chest. They exeunt.]

Re:Not So

[M. Baranczak]

Both King Lear and The Tempest are better plays.

The Tempest is merely a British remake of Gilligan's Island.

Why...

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

> "Library staff initially didn't seem too interested in fixing the problem, but in the end they adjusted the filters."

Nooooooooooo! They were trying to get kids thinking it was forbidden to them.

Why are they blocking violent content?

[Rob the Bold]

TFA's a little short on detail, but why are they blocking violent content in the first place? I assume they have some reason to do so. And if that's the case, should it matter how old or famous the unacceptably violent work is?

Bottom line: if Hamlet fits their definition of inappropriate content, should they make explicit exceptions for particularly famous and important works, or should they evaluate the overall filtering/blocking objectives and rationale as well as the mechanisms and algorithms implementing those restrictions?

Re:Why are they blocking violent content?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

but why are they blocking violent content in the first place?

They don't want you to read the world news.

Re:Why are they blocking violent content?

[idontgno]

Or the Bible.

Re:Why are they blocking violent content?

[SoTerrified]

This, in a nutshell, is the real problem with censorship, even well intended. If you have a human doing the censoring, you'll get personal opinions influencing your judgement. (Example, see the judge who prevented parents from naming their child 'Messiah' because "There is only one true Messiah".) If you automate it, you get pieces falling through the cracks like Hamlet. Now, in this case, they were able to reverse the censorship because everyone knows Hamlet. But suppose this wasn't already well known? What if this was the first work of a new author? And you saw it, thought it might be interesting, but it's blocked. Are you going to 'know' it's not really something that should be censored? Are you going to know that it's a mistake and get the library to do something to fix it? Nope. A potentially ground-breaking work like Hamlet gets buried, never to see the light of day instead of becoming a classic for the ages.

Re:Why are they blocking violent content?

[flayzernax]

Pardon me if I'm going to hitch on to your +5 insightful. This whole idea of censoring and removing decensatizing violence from our cultures is all wrong.

In cultures with high levels of violence. People manage just fine. Violence happens and it does not create a mass stampede of stupidity. People are able to resolve their issues with no problem.

When you brainwash people and the only way they know how to deal with anything "dangerous" or "aggressive" is to seek authority. This is when you get serious psychological issues. People who loose their minds over minor problem. The lack of respect. The lack of courtesy.

Media, art, and play are not the places to "pacify" us. It will create worse psychosis than the most horrible warfare known to man. We'd be better off living in the bibles figurative hell.

No one can be enlightened by previous human experience if we cannot share that experience. Through fiction, or history. Legend, or school.

The goal of these draconian rules (regardless of what the people actually implementing them believe) is to create the ultimate strife and slavery and tyranny. The destruction of our minds. Our power. And our ability to cope with life.

What a big Hamlet you have, Sir!

[turgid]

Brannagh had a huge Hamlet.

Shakespeare has one of the oldest blue jokes

[maroberts]

Hamlet (Act 3, Scene 2)....

QUEEN GERTRUDE: Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.
HAMLET: No, good mother, here's metal more attractive.
LORD POLONIUS: [To KING CLAUDIUS] O, ho! do you mark that?
HAMLET: Lady, shall I lie in your lap?

        Lying down at OPHELIA's feet

OPHELIA: No, my lord.
HAMLET: I mean, my head upon your lap?
OPHELIA: Ay, my lord.
HAMLET: Do you think I meant country matters?
OPHELIA: I think nothing, my lord.
HAMLET: That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs.
OPHELIA: What is, my lord?
HAMLET: Nothing.

Re:Shakespeare has one of the oldest blue jokes

[Ol Biscuitbarrel]

There's more to it than the obvious one in that scene: Hamlet Steaminess Rating

OPHELIA: I think nothing, my lord.
Translation: I'd rather not keep talking about this and I can't acknowledge your sexual innuendo because that would suggest that I, an unmarried maid, know a little too much about sex.

HAMLET: That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs.
Translation: In Shakespeare's time, "nothing" was another slang word for female genitalia.

Re: Shakespeare has one of the oldest blue jokes

[ceoyoyo]

One of? Shakespeare wrote popular plays for the commoners. They're filled to the brim with multilayered sex jokes. You can find a lot older though.

Re:Banning Hamlet

[Rob the Bold]

The next thing you know they will be banning Bambi.

They just might. Bambi is pretty violent.

An excerpt from the English translation, where the Old Stag is showing Bambi that Man is not all-powerful:

He was lying with His pale, naked face turned upwards, His hat a little to one side on the snow. Bambi who did not know anything about hats, thought His horrible head was split in two. The poacher's shirt, open at the neck, was pierced where a wound gaped like a small red mouth. Blood was oozing out slowly. Blood was drying on His hair and around His nose. A big pool of it lay on the snow withc was melting from the warmth.

"We can stand right beside Him," the old stag began softly, "and it isn't dangerous."

Bambi looked down at the prostrate form whose limbs and skin seemed so mysterious and terrible to him. He gazed at the dead eyes that stared up sightlessly at him. Bambi couldn't understand it all.

No doubt they just "adjusted" to pass Shakespeare

[Ungrounded Lightning]

But the heavy-handed irony of a guardian of British cultural heritage censoring the greatest work of British literature is just too blatant to be ignored.

So, we got the story about Hamlet, then they start talking about censoring Blackadder and provide no link.

I'd bet they just "adjusted" the nannyware to pass Shakespeare. So The Bard's work will be seen, but any new talent whose work's quality might approach or surpass his will not.

(Not to say that Blackadder and Hamlet are even in the same league. But that IS something to be decided by tens of generations of readers and viewers, not a piece of software written by a handfull of people from this one.)

What about the Bible

[Jason Levine]

If they think Hamlet is too violent with 8 murders and one suicide, what about the Bible? That thing's full of people killing other people for various reasons. Heck, the exodus from Egypt alone kills all of the Pharaoh's soldiers while the Israelites celebrate on the shore. (To be fair to the Israelites, they did just escape from slavery. Seeing your former slave masters drowning as you escape to freedom is cause for celebration.) Is the Bible censored too? Do we need to come up with a child-friendly version of it?

"And so, as Lot escaped Sodom and Gomorrah, God came down and... gave them a very stern talking to.... then Lot's wife looked back and... got really dizzy so she had to lie down for a bit..."

Once the copyright expires, so does blacklisting

[tepples]

That or William Shakespeare has been dead long enough (70+ years) that his works have expired from the blacklist.