Heiner Müller's The Hamletmachine

""I'm good Hamlet gi'me a cause for grief""

At first glance, readers of The Hamletmachine (1979) could be forgiven for wondering whether it is actually a play at all: it opens with a montage of texts that are not ascribed to a character, there is no vestige of a plot, and the whole piece lasts a total of ten pages.

Yet, Heiner Müller's play regularly features in theatres' repertoires and is frequently staged by university theatre departments. In four short chapters, David Barnett unpicks the ...