Halperin reframes Hamlet’s line as life for ‘troubled hearts’

The Guardian’s Poem of the Week highlights Richard W Halperin’s poem "Now, Mother, What’s the Matter?", from his collection All the Tattered Stars, published by Salmon Poetry in 2023. Halperin treats Hamlet’s line "Now, mother, what’s the matter?" as "life on earth," and frames the play as a space where "everything is troubled" and "there are no monsters in it." The poem opens with the assertion "Only the monsters do not have troubled hearts.

Life is for troubled hearts. Art is for troubled hearts," and the reviewer notes that Halperin abandons quote marks and footnotes to allow the line to read as a contemporary address. The piece situates Halperin’s work amid his biography: he was born in Chicago to an Irish mother and an American father with Russian ancestry, moved to New York in childhood, taught briefly at Hunter College and later worked in education administration, latterly with Unesco in Paris, where he currently lives.

The review also notes the New York School’s influence on his work and Halperin’s serious interest in the function and power of art, cinema and the literary arts.

Key Topics

Culture, Richard W Halperin, Tattered Stars, Hamlet, Unesco, Paris