This book chapter examines the early reception of Shakespeare in Sweden, with a specific focus on early performances of Hamlet in Gothenburg in the 1780s and 1790s. Notably, provincial theatres in Sweden picked up Shakespeare decades before his plays were performed in the capital of Stockholm, and I argue that in the specific case of the Hamlet performances, this tendency can be explained by the rise of a notable provincial middle class with ties to Britain as well as the fact that the cultural élite in Stockholm was strongly influenced by French classicism. I also suggest that to its audience in Gothenburg Hamlet may have carried a certain topical relevance in terms of Scandinavian politics, such as the anti-Danish sentiment that was prevalent at the time; the play moreover may have suggested parallels between Hamlet and the Swedish monarch, Gustav III.