Hamnet and the Quiet Triumph of the Christian Patriarchy
The father and the son are the embodiment of the Christian vision of the self-gift, sacrifice, healing, and peace. These are not the values of paganism.
A few weeks ago, Jessie Buckley videos saturated my social media feed. I guess I lingered too long on the video of her receiving an academy award. But who could blame me? It isn’t every day that you see an award-winning actress telling her husband she loves him: “You, Fred. I love you, man. I love you. You're the most incredible dad.” And then adding, “I want to have 20,000 more babies with you! I do, I do.” In fact, I’ve never seen it in my lifetime. And then there was more. Buckley continued: "It's Mother's Day in the U.K. today. So I would like to dedicate this to the beautiful chaos of a mother's heart. We all come from a lineage of women who continued to create against all odds."
Hoping that some of Buckley’s sentiments were reflected in the film for which she won the triple crown of acting awards, I decided to watch Hamnet. What I found was decidedly different, but also surprising.
Spoiler Alert.
Hamnet, based 2020 eponymous historical fiction novel by Maggie O’Farrell, is the story of William Shakespeare, his wife, Agnes, and the loss of their 11-year-old son in the 1596 plague. The story unfolds as the grief of losing a child cripples the couple, tearing at the very fabric of their relationship.
Beyond the gratuitous sex scene, there is something deeply unsettling in the film: Agnes is a witch, wedded to pagan rituals, prophetic dreams, and casting spells. She doesn’t just dabble in the occult; she goes so far as to deliver her first baby by herself in the “cradle” of the woods. The viewer is directed into feeling sympathy for this pagan woman. It is a tall order for those of us who know that such practices only end in pain, suffering, and disorder. Agnes the witch, however, is made to be a wise sage, who knows how take care of herself and her family better than the bumbling Christians hemming her in.
For centuries, the steady feminist argument has been that feminists (including pagans and witches) know how to care for women better than Christians do. Only a culture–sadly, our culture–awash with this ideology could believe that a witch is wise and loving, and forget that paganism is ultimately about power. This forgetfulness is what makes Hamnet tedious at times and, as some have told me, even loathsome. Paganism, nature worship, and sorcery can never offer that which is wise, good, and true. Agnes cannot be the hero we are supposed to believe her to be.
Remarkably, however, and probably unwittingly, a quite different message reveals itself to the discerning viewer. Despite the generally positive and sympathetic portrayal of witchcraft, its resulting confusion, resentment, and anxiety are unavoidable. Perhaps the author intended to pull back the mask to reveal its ugliness? Is hard to imagine in this era of The Handmaid’s Tale when female empowerment rages at a fevered pitch. And yet, at a mid-point in the plot, the Shakespeare children are in the garden acting out the role of the three witches from MacBeth, quoting from the first scene, “Fair is foul, and foul is fair.” More than a simple injection of their father’s poetry, this line punctuates the inverted moral order created by their mother.
As the film progresses, the traditional/natural moral order is beautifully and compellingly restored through a different thread. This restoration can slip by undetected because it is so deeply embedded in the western mind: the role of the Christian patriarch. Shakespeare, as a tender and loving father, teaches his young son, Hamnet, to be brave, to take care of his mother and his sisters, and to function in his stead while he must be away in London for work.
This scene is the hinge on which the story unfolds. Shakespeare’s twin children, Judith and Hamnet, are so alike that they believe one can be confused for the other. Judith, weak in constitution, catches the plague and is near death. Hamnet, hearing the voice of his father echo in his mind and heart, acts with great courage and bravery. He sees death coming for his sister and offers himself in her stead. Judith recovers. He, however, falls ill and dies before his father can arrive home to say a final goodbye. His death is a gut-wrenching series of images, containing the scene for which Buckley, playing the role of a mother watching her son die, received so many awards.
Shakespeare and his young son are the real heroes of the film. They embody the Christian man, the one meant to protect his family to the point of complete self-sacrifice. Shakespeare imparted these precious gifts to his young son, who absorbs them with great and grave seriousness. Hamnet then offers himself for his sister. He protects and provides for her in the most dramatic of ways, by giving his own life.
Adding to the surprise of seeing Christian manhood extolled, the movie also reveals the bad fruit of witchcraft. In death, Hamnet is led to a place of confusion because of his mother’s practices. It is seen in Agnes, too. Her anger, resentment, and determination to go it alone without her husband—all marks of contemporary feminism—sets the family on a path of destruction.
But Shakespeare, as father, loves and provides. His grief is not expressed in talking or tears, but in his craft as a wordsmith and storyteller. He restores the family through the telling of the story of Hamlet, communicating deep truths that pierce both his and his wife’s heart with a new and strange balm of calm, peace, and even joy. Shakespeare’s storytelling also allows their son to walk into the world beyond in peace and at rest, leaving the confused space into which he was led by his mother’s occult practices.
The father and the son are the embodiment of the Christian vision of the self-gift, sacrifice, healing, and peace. These are not the values of paganism; they are the values of the Christian ethos found in what is considered simple and ordinary. But they are extraordinary.
For centuries, the patriarchy, absent a proper understanding of what it truly means, has been both reviled and expected. At its best, patriarchy hides in plain sight. Even those of a feminist mindset, as evident in Hamnet, unwittingly appreciate it, laud it, and count on it. On a more granular level, what is often passed off as patriarchy isn’t gift but grasping; it isn’t Christian, but domination or neglect. Real patriarchy looks much different and truly is indispensable for healthy families and flourishing societies.
May the Lord bless us then with more Shakespeares, men to stand firm and deliver their wives and children from a world awash in ever-encroaching traps and snares.
And may we see and hear anew and live afresh, the real story of Christ the Patriarch, who gave his life for others.
Beautiful essay!