Two Bees or not two bees

Two bees or not two bees

Today, I went to yet another performance of Butterfly's Day at Desert Stages to see my sister perform. And even though I have seen this play multiple times already, this time the song "two bees or not two bees" had a different meaning. In the play, a butterfly only has one day to live to find her true meaning. This song is played at the beginning when the bees are helping the butterfly decide how she will live her last day alive. The butterfly, throughout the play, was so worried about preventing her death, finding meaning in her life, and living to make a difference. While this play is obviously fictional, it made me wonder... why is it that we as humans are so intrigued by death and what death means?

In Hamlet, the mystery behind death is a major theme that is discussed. In addition to the "to be or not to be" soliloquy, there are many other instances in which we see Hamlet's wonder and obsession surrounding death. In the scene where the gravediggers prepare for Ophelia's burial, Hamlet wonders about the skulls that were excavated and who these people were during their lives. Hamlet talks to the gravedigger and is taken aback when he learns that one of the skulls was Yorick's. It appears that Hamlet is so interested in the skulls/death in general because it relates to the idea about the afterlife. Death brings a physical disappearance from the earth and from life, but where does the soul go? Hamlet's encounter with Yorick's skull impacted him because he saw the physical remains of a person he remembered as a child. Likewise, humans seem to be intrigued by things that they cannot understand. In an age where problems have solutions, where questions have answers, death is one of those concepts that is not really discussed and is hard to comprehend.

Although Hamlet and The Butterfly's Day are drastically different plays with drastically difference audiences, they both shed light on the confusing and uncomfortable concepts behind death and what it means to live. In the butterfly's case, her true meaning was found in helping her long-lost human friend who was trapped in dream land. In Hamlet's case, he tries figure out if the ghost has reliable information, if it is right to seek revenge on the man who took the throne and his wife, and what love means with Ophelia, etc..