Last Becker-Rose Café, GRF Sara Schlemm led a talk about the development of melancholy over time in literature. I thought the talk was intriguing since melancholy isn’t a term that people talk over a cup of tea and a cookie or two. Emotions are often felt more than they are talked about and it was different to see melancholy from a more academic standpoint.

Sara briefly introduced her own research on melancholy and told us about how it led to the exploration of several literatures, such as Hamlet. It’s been a few years since I’ve touched on Hamlet, but Sara reminded everyone of the scene where Hamlet stages an act of madness. She talked about the brilliance of the writing and how the concept of torturing oneself is a form of melancholy.

And to pull away from more concrete, written sources, she later showed us clips from a movie called Vertigo in which a former detective is hired to follow a woman. I think I really admired the scene where the woman was dressed in the same attire in the painting since it brought to light the different ways melancholy can be portrayed. In that clip, melancholy was represented visually and audibly and it somehow created an feeling of eeriness and beauty.

While I haven’t watched Vertigo in it’s entirety, I will be sure to revisit the movie and hopefully gain some more insight on the topic of melancholy!