“I would have cut out my heart and given it to him, if it would have made any difference,” Agnes avows to William Shakespeare as she lambasts herself for failing to keep their child alive.

Later, the credits roll. The lights are switched on. Patrons remain riveted to their cinema seats. Faces are wet, eyes dazed by what they have seen. Hamnet has many dimensions. The movie deals with love, loss, grief, guilt, blame, redemption, and the achievement of immortality through the medium of art.

Running through it all is the raw, primeval instinct we humans have to keep those we hold dearest close to us.

This week, Ireland has been celebrating Killarney woman Jessie Buckley’s deserved award of a Golden Globe for her portrayal of Shakespeare’s wife, as imagined by Coleraine-native Maggie O’Farrell in her inspirational novel. The Bard’s heart-wrenching rendition by Kildare’s Paul Mescal merits an award, too. How apt, one might think, that a country that prides itself on cherishing the family has excelled in representing its nuclear essence.

But the breathless accolades have overshadowed another story that also evokes Hamnet’s predominant theme. The difference is that this one has a heartless denouement.

Amid the joyous........

© The Irish Times