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Look Hamlet
by Barbro Lindgren
Age Range: 9-11
Look Hamlet.
Hamlet not happy.
Hamlet’s mommy dumb.
Hamlet’s daddy dead.
So begins this wacky and off-the-wall hilarious darkly comic graphic retelling of Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy Hamlet. Legendary Swedish children’s author Barbro Lindgren’s radical makeover on this classic has the prose condensed to less than 100 words with minimal dialogue, expertly translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Somehow, Lindgren manages to capture the story in her pithy text, which is no mean feat, considering the complexities of Shakespeare’s original story.
The fifteen evocative illustrations by Anna Höglund provide the perfect accompaniment. Höglund’s artwork using anthropomorphic animals is powerful as she cleverly casts them in Shakespeare’s play. Hamlet appears as a rather gloomy rabbit with long drooping ears and the darkened illustrations with toned-down colour lend themselves to the tragedy of Hamlet while the facial expressions contrast by providing an irreverent humour to the proceedings.
Look Hamlet is ideal for 21st-century readers who are more used to using X (formerly Twitter), WhatsApp and memes. It is definitely a one-off; clever and funny in equal measure. Lindgren and Höglund have certainly created something very unique.