--- title: Richard Burton as Hamlet: Portrait of an 'Avenging Angel' description: LIFE photographer George Silk recounts taking what Richard Burton called "the best pictures he had ever had taken of him." canonical: https://time.com/3880726/richard-burton-as-hamlet-portrait-of-an-avenging-angel/ author: Ben Cosgrove article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-08-20T17:08:24.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:03:37.845Z og:title: Richard Burton as Hamlet: Portrait of an 'Avenging Angel' og:description: LIFE photographer George Silk recounts taking what Richard Burton called "the best pictures he had ever had taken of him." og:url: https://time.com/3880726/richard-burton-as-hamlet-portrait-of-an-avenging-angel/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt22eb6b13de222817/69884c573c163975c14577e7/140821-richard-burton-1964-feat.jpg?branch=production&width=554&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 554 og:image:height: 312 og:image:alt: 114836933.jpg og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Richard Burton as Hamlet: Portrait of an 'Avenging Angel' twitter:description: LIFE photographer George Silk recounts taking what Richard Burton called "the best pictures he had ever had taken of him." twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt22eb6b13de222817/69884c573c163975c14577e7/140821-richard-burton-1964-feat.jpg?branch=production&width=554&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Richard Burton as Hamlet: Portrait of an 'Avenging Angel' > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays to 40,000 subscribers as of August 2026. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Aug 20, 2014 5:08 PM UTC  Richard Burton starring in "Hamlet," directed by John Gielgud, Broadway, 1964. Richard Burton starring in "Hamlet," directed by John Gielgud, Broadway, 1964. George Silk—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Aug 20, 2014 5:08 PM UTC In 1993, John Loengard asked George Silk—a New Zealander who had been a staff photographer for LIFE from 1943 until the magazine stopped publishing as a weekly in 1972—if, in his long career, Silk had been “willing to pose pictures.” Silk’s reply is worth setting down here in full: --- > “” --- [\[Buy the book, _LIFE Photographers: What They Saw_ (Bulfinch Press, 1998)\]](http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/life-photographers-john-loengard/1114270250)  Richard Burton starring in Hamlet, directed by John Gielgud, Broadway, 1964. 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