In a poignant new collection marking his 80th year, the acclaimed poet Richard W Halperin turns a lifelong fascination with Shakespeare's Hamlet into a profound meditation on life, art, and the universal condition of the 'troubled heart'. His poem, 'Now, Mother, What's the Matter?', serves as the centrepiece of this exploration, drawing its title from Prince Hamlet's charged confrontation with his mother, Queen Gertrude.
A Lifelong Bridge Between Life and Art
For Halperin, the Danish prince's story has long been a crucial conduit. 'Hamlet has been a bridge between,' he writes, asserting that both life and art exist for 'troubled hearts'. The poem's opening lines set a contemplative tone, suggesting that to be troubled is an intrinsic part of the human experience, distinct from monstrousness. 'Every character in Hamlet is troubled,' Halperin observes, 'there are no monsters in it.'
This perspective allows him to reframe the famous line, 'Now, mother, what's the matter?', lifting it from its specific, accusatory context in the play. He transforms it into a more universal, contemporary utterance—something a son or daughter might say to a mother fretting over a minor complaint, spoken with a mix of exasperation and affection.
Rendering Unto Art: A Personal Pilgrimage
The poem gracefully weaves in spiritual and political dimensions, referencing Christ's words on rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar's. Halperin updates this, projecting himself into the biblical scene: 'everything is troubled there and, if I am lucky, Caesar is troubled.' He extends this rendering to God and, crucially, to art itself, though he confesses with disarmingly honesty, 'I have no idea what art is.'
This leads him to cite seemingly disparate literary touchstones—Edward Thomas's 'Adlestrop', Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady, and John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress. The common thread is pilgrimage, a journey the speaker's mind is pre-wired to understand. The poem concludes with a stark, resonant image: 'that just before the gate to heaven is yet another hole to hell.' This suggests the perilous, unilluminated path of the artistic and human journey, acknowledging the darkness that persists even near salvation.
Celebrating an Octogenarian Poet's Legacy
'Now, Mother, What's the Matter?' features in the 'New Poems' section of All the Tattered Stars: Selected and New Poems, published by Salmon Poetry in 2023 to honour Halperin's 80th birthday. Born in Chicago to an Irish mother and an American father of Russian descent, Halperin grew up in New York. His career spanned teaching at Hunter College and education administration, including a significant period with UNESCO in Paris, where he still resides.
Critics note the audible influence of the New York School in his work's 'refreshing lightness of texture', but his commitment to the function of art is deeply serious. As the poem's analysis notes, Halperin cleverly escapes Shakespeare's shadow while playing with ideas of universality, ultimately presenting a powerful case for art as a space where 'troubled hearts' encounter themselves, free from the binary judgments of monsters and angels.
