This is a noncommercial site, designed and maintained solely by Ulrike Böhm.
All written content © Ulrike Böhm 2002 – 2009, except as noted on this page.
All artwork, including all graphics and photography used on this site © Ulrike Böhm 1984 – 2009, except as noted on this page or in the respective image's scroll-over legend.
Web design © Ulrike Böhm 2002 – 2009.
All rights reserved.
In selecting the primary source texts used throughout this site, I have made a special effort to rely on texts (including translations) that are, to the best of my knowledge and belief, in the public domain and/or have been made available for use in a noncommercial, educational/scholarly context.
A substantial number of excerpts, including those from plays by William Shakespeare, are taken from eBooks published by Project Gutenberg, whose License contains the following provision:
"This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net."
(Note: Although on many eBooks the text of the license still contains a reference to www.gutenbergberg.net, the domain has actually changed to www.gutenberg.org.)
(For Project Gutenberg eBooks used in addition to the texts of Shakespeare's plays, please see this website's Further Reading page.)
The index page for the contents of the so-called "Chatsworth Copy" of the First Folio made available as a downloadable PDF-document by the "Liberty Fund's Online Library of Liberty, provides:
"COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
The text is in the public domain.
FAIR USE STATEMENT
This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit."
The adaptation of "Hamlet" contained in Edith Nesbitt's "Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare" is taken from that work's online publication by the World Wide School (Seattle, WA, USA, 1998), whose license reads as follows:
"[A] The School permits this Book to be viewed by anyone online, and to be downloaded and stored as a full or partial copy on a hard drive or other tangible medium for any personal, educational, or other non-business use, and for archival copies to be made for such uses, PROVIDED each full or partial copy includes this License without addition, deletion or modification.
[B] All rights and licenses of the School not explicitly granted here are reserved, and in particular NO permission (except as the School may, in its discretion, give in writing) is granted to use the words 'World Wide School', or further to distribute the book online, on disk, as a package with any service or hardware, or otherwise."
The excerpts from classic Greek and Latin works (Ovid, Euripides, Aeschylos) are taken from the translations compiled in the Internet Classics Archive and as part of Sacred Texts.
The excerpts from Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy" derive from the translation made available at Everypoet.com.
The excperpts of John Milton's "Paradise Lost" are taken from the text published by The Literature Network.
Other primary medieval and early modern sources used are taken from texts reproduced or referenced in Fordham University's Internet Medieval Sourcebook.
The reproduced excerpts of medieval women's writings are supplemented by my own translations of parts of Christine de Pizan's "Livre de la Cité des Dames" (chapter headings as well as Book 1, Chapters 11 and 14, and Book 2, Chapter 47), and of excerpts from Hildegard of Bingen's "Scivias" (Visions 3 and 5) and "Physica," such as rendered in German in her biography authored by Barbara Beys ("Denn ich bin krank vor Liebe," Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich, 2001).
Aria texts are in part based on translations made available by the Aria Database; again, however, supplemented and modified by my own translations of the arias used. The excerpt from Tchaikovsky's "Pikovaya Dama" ("Pique Dame," or, "The Queen of Spades") is taken from the libretto accompanying the 1992 Kirov/ St. Petersburg recording conducted by Valery Gergiev (Philips Classics Productions, 1993).
For an extensive list of primary and secondary sources concerning "Hamlet," William Shakespeare's life and work, women's role from the Middle Ages to the 17th century, and the Church Fathers and Catholic Doctrine, see also this website's Further Reading page.
I am particularly grateful to the following institutions and companies, both for the kind and generous support which I have received from their staff, and for the permission they have granted me to use certain images whose lawful copyright holders they are:
The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, California, USA, for the use of images of the title pages of the 1603 "First Quarto" and 1604 "Second Quarto" editions of "Hamlet;"
The National Portrait Gallery, London, UK, for the use of an image of the so-called Chandos Portrait of William Shakespeare (NPG 1);
The Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D.C., USA, for the use of images of the cover of the 1623 "First Folio" edition of Shakespeare's works, of the title page of the 1637 "Fifth Quarto" edition of "Hamlet", of the so-called Janssen and Ashbourne Portraits, of Dante Gabriel Rossetti's copy of the Droeshout Engraving, and of James McArdell's 1756 painting (after Benjamin Wilson), "Mr. Garrick in Hamlet, Act I, Scene 4";
The Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford-upon-Avon, UK, for the use of an image of the so-called Flower Portrait;
The University Librarian and Director, The John Rylands University Library, The University of Manchester, UK, for use of an image of the so-called Grafton Portrait;
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, Stratford-upon-Avon, UK, for the use of images of the so-called Stratford or Hunt Portrait, the Soest, Chesterfield, Wright, and Humphrey Portraits, the Hilliard Miniature, George Vertue's engraving at the beginning of Samuel Johnson's 1765 edition of Shakespeare's works, the engraving on the first page of Stockdale's 1784 edition of Shakespeare's works, images of two paintings by Richard Westall and Thomas Newland, William Shakespeare Between Tragedy and Comedy and Shakespeare in His Study, as well as of Benjamin West's portrait miniature of David Garrick, of a painting showing the Stratford Market Cross, decorated for the Garrick Jubilee, of a cider mug commemorating the Shakespeare Club, and of Maude Cattell's ink sketch of the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon;
The Art Archive, London, UK, for the use of images of the so-called "Davenant" Bust of William Shakespeare (attributed to Louis-François Roubiliac), Johann Zoffany's portrait of David Garrick, Thomas Lawrence's portrait of John Philip Kemble as Hamlet (in Act V, scene I), John Everett Millais's portrait of Sir Henry Irving, and a portrait of John Gielgud as Hamlet;
The Guildhall Library, City of London, UK, for the use of a number of images from their COLLAGE database: The Globe Theatre, Bankside, ca. 1647; John Norden, Map of the City of London, ca. 1653; and Wenceslaus Hollar: Panoramic view of London and the River Thames from the south bank (1647 etching, 1657 engraving, and 1670 engraving);
The Royal Dutch Library and Museum Meermanno, The Hague, Netherlands, for the use of select images from their joint Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts collection;
The Heritage Playing Card Company, Nottingham, UK, for the use images of certain cards from their Shakespeare's Flowers playing card deck; and
The Ordo Templi Orientis, New York, NY, USA, and Berlin, Germany, for the use of certain tarot cards from the Aleister Crowley/Frieda Harris Thot Tarot deck.
Select, specifically marked public domain images are copied from the website of Professor William Kemp, of the Department of English at Mary Washington College, Fredericksburg, VA, USA, which contains the following note:
"For several years I've accumulated images of and related to Shakespeare, scanning them from various sources. To the best of my knowledge all are public domain images. ... Feel free to establish links to this site or to download these images for personal or educational use. Do not use them in any commercial project. If you post any of these images on another web page, please credit this site.
Send Comments/Questions To: wkemp@fls.infi.net."
The remaining images relating to William Shakespeare and his works, as well as the paintings and masterpieces of art used for purposes of illustration on this site are, to the best of my knowledge and belief, in the public domain due to the date of death of their respective authors, or due to their date of publication, and/or have been made available for use in a noncommercial, educational/scholarly context; such as all images contained in the Yorck Project's 10,000 Masterpieces Collection and other images reproduced on the Wikimedia and Wikipedia sites, as well as all images made avalaible under a GNU Free Documentation License, a Creative Commons License (e.g., as applying to images collected by the Nines Consortium), or comparable licenses. – The scroll-over legend of each image identifies the museum or collection in possession of the original work in question.
I have made a reasonable attempt to identify and obtain the permission of the copyright holders of any materials used other than my own, and it is not my intention to step on anybody's feet. Should I have done so regardless, please contact me at the address given on the About Me ("My Humble Self") page of this site. Please be advised that I do, however, reserve the right to request proof of ownership of anybody claiming proprietary rights in this manner, particularly if I suspect such a claim to be spurious.
Please also note that, to the extent I have been granted permission to use material copyrighted by others, that permission does not include a license for visitors to this site to copy any such material from this site in turn. To do so constitutes an infringement of the respective copyright holders' rights, in the same way as copying any parts of this site that are created by me constitutes a violation of my own copyright. Therefore, if you are interested in using any materials marked as "used by permission," please contact the parties identified as copyright owners on this page or (in the case of images) in the respective image's scroll-over legend.
Finally, with regard to any and all links to external sites contained on this website, please note that although I have tried to include only links to such sites as I hope and expect visitors to my own site to find helpful, I have no influence whatsoever on the contents of any of those external sites and can, therefore, not accept any responsibility or liability for any of their contents.